travel notes - europe.

I've been lucky enough to spend quite a portion of the past year abroad. Catching planes, hanging with strangers, being in the sun, the snow, the mountains, the sea.

This was October, 2013.

I met up with a dear friend, one of the best I've got, & we traversed Spain & Morocco.

We couchsurfed, drank copious amounts of beer, took many a photograph, slept on trains, buses, platforms. We lived out of backpacks, got robbed, got lost. Got found, got invited places of amazement. Got a really short way up a really big mountain, learnt Spanish, drank sangria, did yoga under the stars.

I've got the gypsy blood - i've got to keep moving, moving, around & see new places & have a hard time & have the best time. But to me, there is nothing better than coming home. If you are somewhere else, & miss where you came from, then you know you're where you should be.

(These are all taken with a $2 disposable camera from a discount store, half were developed in Morocco & half at home.)

Enjoy.

j x

onwards.

We are moving.

It's not far - it's around one corner, about 5 houses down, a hop skip & a jump, & a very practical move. The new place is a cottage, it has fruitful fruit trees, blue paint, a wood fire, enough room to swing at least a couple of proverbial cats & kook galore.

But to move is to leave, & to leave is give away all the wonderful times we've had at McCulloch Street. The house of many doors, of mismatched wallpaper, of a room just for a shower, of two sheds & vintage wood paneling. The house where the veggie patch is bigger than my room, the house where we had to put a rug over where the dog chewed the carpet in her tiny puppy days. It's only been a year, but nonetheless, a year, here, here where every photo looks like it was taken in the 70s & where you more than likely would find a friend or stranger sleeping on the couch on any given night.

We moved here to get Rafi - the love of my life - the gangly, black dog who shares my soul & my bed. And this is her house, how do you explain to a pup that this isn't the drive we turn into anymore after a walk? That even though the new house smells totally different, that is now your home? As long as she is with us I think it not an issue, we are her pack & she is our life. 

Here we have had couchsurfers, Christmas, we made mead & pasta, we spent whole days in our jarmies & whole days in our rooms. We spent days watching movies, days ignoring each other, nights piling into one car for snacks & chats. Many a beer was drunk, many a smoke was had, many a gathering was had in that sunroom. We had fights, bills, cold water. We had the time of our lives, most of the time.

And so as I pack boxes, as I give away things I no longer need, as I try to fit my life into as smaller physical space as I can, I am prepared to move. I am ready.

So here are a few summer photos to show you what will be in my heart, as the McCulloch Street Bandit house.

j x

Lunchtime-haircuts & instant photographs.

Lunchtime-haircuts.

Rafi & Sam.

Rafi.

Mine & Ryan's bedroom window.

Christmas-time.

Baby girl & chalk textas.

Lounge.

hullo.

This is a new venture.

Not entirely a new idea, nor my first attempt, nor a unique addition to the world of blogs.
I have written things before, posted photos, collected anecdotes in my pockets like
pennies to share later.
But this here, now, is a shiny new blank piece of paper, a world I can shape with words I enjoy & the new pieces of my life as they come together.

I am 23, with a boyfriend of six years I enjoy immensely, with a little lovely puppy girl who is 18 months old, & my absolute world. I make a lot of things, I can cook, I can sew, I can be tidy & organised or reinvent the word messy.

I would like to share it all with you.

j x

(The first photo I wish to leave with you is from a recent trip to Fiji.
This is inside the village chief's house after a kava ceremony.)