blooming

American  

[bloo-ming] / ˈblu mɪŋ /

adjective

1. in bloom; flowering; blossoming.

2. glowing, as with youthful vigor and freshness.

   blooming cheeks.

3. flourishing; prospering.

   a blooming business.

4. Chiefly British Slang. (used as an intensifier).

   He's got his blooming nerve.

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adverb

1. Chiefly British Slang. (used as an intensifier).

   not blooming likely.

blooming British  

/ ˈbluːmɪŋ /

adverb

1. informal (intensifier)

   a blooming genius

   blooming painful

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Other Word Forms

• bloomingly adverb
• bloomingness noun
• nonblooming adjective
• preblooming adjective

Etymology

Origin of blooming

1350–1400; Middle English; bloom ¹, -ing ²; as intensifier, a euphemism for bloody, by phonetic similarity

Example Sentences

Then we saw one person crouching down on a small steep hill, and we immediately stopped and asked if the desert lilies were blooming.

From Los Angeles Times

“The freshness of an orchard? The warmth of a blooming flower garden? The windswept allure of the coastline?”

From The Wall Street Journal

In one body of work, concrete peaches have pits of engines, and in another, massive fruit sculptures are decadent and disgusting in their dreamy blooming mold.

From Los Angeles Times

Now, Sac City sports 70 blooming creations, including entries from the Red Hats women’s group, the sheriff’s office—and the police.

From The Wall Street Journal

But in the early 1920s, Ecke’s son, horticulturalist Paul Ecke Sr., learned a secret way to create a compact single-stemmed plant with many blooming branches that could be grown in pots indoors.

From Los Angeles Times

Related Words

• budding
• flourishing