The 52 project

I've been thinking a lot about what to do with this blog. I dipped in and out of this space in 2013, wanting to be here, but not quite knowing how.  The transition back to Australia, into motherhood and back to work has not been easy.  Like many women I have struggled to find my voice. At some point in 2013 I stumbled across Jodi's blog practicing simplicity. Her voice and her words resonated with my own longing for quiet and her 52 project seemed like a manageable 'something' that I could do. 

In Jodi's words: "There's a common saying amongst mothers, first coined by writer Gretchen Rubin in her book The Happiness Project: “The days are long, but the years are short.” Indeed, our days of mothering babies and young children can be tiring and messy; a cycle of washing, settling, cleaning and playing. Sometimes they’re monotonous and seemingly endless. But then, without so much as a blink, the sleepless nights and mornings at the park are over, and we’re sending our children off to school, hesitantly cutting the metaphorical cord once again.

And so, I plan to take "a portrait of my daughter, once a week, every week, in 2014". A manageable 'something' that will keep me here, keep my camera in my hands and yet not be too much that I give it all up for some other, more manageable, goal.

If I am being honest, this may be the only thing that appears on this blog this year.  A post a week. And that will be okay.  

Beginnings

It's no secret that our house has been having a few sleeping problems. E has never been the greatest sleeper, even at the best of times she has always struggled just to let her little body relax into dreamland. Although in hindsight we did have a pretty good thing going when while we were living in Germany.  Once she actually got to sleep, she generally slept well, waking only occasionally for the odd top-up. No problem.  It all went to pieces when we moved to Australia.  I was jetlagged, she was jetlagged and in addition to that completely overwhelmed by the move. For a while we clung to each other like it was nobodies business, an overtired Mama nursing her little girl everytime she made a peep (and she made plenty).   It took a few weeks but we eventually got over the jetlag and Emilia settled into her new home.  Only problem was that the lasting legacy of the whole thing was a fairly fractured sleep routine.  Everytime Emilia woke up she needed me to nurse her back to dreamland.  Sometimes it was twice a night but more often it was 4 or 5.  Last weekend we hit crisis point. There were tears and a sudden realisation that I just physically couldn't keep doing it anymore. What was broken needed fixing.

And so last weekend I stood in a section of the bookshop I never thought I'd be in and spent a good half an hour reading all the baby-sleep bibles. Turns out there's a lot.  With a little bit of reluctance I bought one that sat somewhere between "let your child cry it out" and one that promised a "no-cry" solution.  Nice as a no-cry solution sounds, it just doesn't seem realistic. We started lastnight. Safe to say I didn't sleep much lastnight. Crossed fingers we round a corner tonight and by the end of this week we'll be one the road to recovery and mending our broken sleep. And then... and then I'm hoping that I'll be able to emerge out of the foggy shadow of tiredness that is lurking over me and enjoy the summer.

The picture above is my first selfie for a photo project that I'm doing as part of Urban Muser's "In the Picture" challenge - a selfie a week for 2012. Hopefully I'm up for the challenge.

this is who I am : food

This week Christina from Diva's and Dreams has us thinking about food.  I love food, in fact there's not many foods that I don't like.   I love stone fruits, cherries and strawberries in the summer but as soon as autumn comes I'm lusting after figs and chestnuts.  In winter I love homemade soups and roasts and in spring it's asparagus and fresh greens. Anyway, it should come as no suprise that I struggled to come up with a single food that I love.  

In the end I chose chocolate because it's something I'm a little picky about.  I love chocolate, but I'm discerning.  I rather have gummy bears and jubes than a cheap chocolate lolly; for dessert I'll choose a lemon tart over an overly rich chocolate mousse - but a quality dark chocolate square - well that's something I can never turn down. 

Interested in joining in? Head over to Divas and Dreams and take a look.

all about hair

This week the "this is who I am" challenge is all about hair and hair flicks.  This photo isn't particularly recent - it was taken at a wedding I attended in Australia back in November last year, but it's a pretty accurate depiction of my hair at the moment.  

I  have thick hair.  Really thick.  It's thick enough that throughout my life hairdressers have always commented on it.  Without fail.  Even hairdressers who I've been going to for sometime still, at some point, need to emphasise the thickness of my hair.  

Anyway, due to it's thickness I've had quite a few unfortunate haircuts through my life.  At one point my 'friends' gave me the nickname "mushroom", which they tried to tell me was endearing, but really had a lot more to do with the state of my hair than anything else.  I've tried to grow it long to remove the volume and for a brief period had a pixie-like do.  No matter where I stray, I seem to always come back to the bob.  I like the bob.  Cut properly it'll sit nicely and be able to take you from wavy, fuss-free "mop" to sleek straight do with a simple blow dry.  It's short enough to keep your neck cool in summer and long enough to keep your ears warm in winter.  And then, at a real stretch you can still get it back into a ponytail with the help of a few bobby pins. The Bob - classic, versatile, simple, sleek and easy.  My version of a great hair cut.

And, one more thing about hair.  I believe in a good haircut.  I would sooner do without new clothes or new shoes before I abandoned a good haircut.  You wear your hair everyday.  It is your most consistent fashion accessory and it should look good. 

this is who I am : for the love of photo prints

This is one of the few photos I have which is framed in our house.  We have a wall of photos in the kitchen, but they're really just happy snap-shots and quick family photos that remind us of friends and family.  I keep meaning to print out a few photos and frame them like this one - I even thought about doing it this week for Divas and Dreams Creative Challenge - but it is something that has remained on the 'to do' list.

This is a photo of my older sister and me around 1983-84, I guess.  We're sitting at my grandparents house glued to the TV.  I love everything about this photo - the light is exactly how I remember the room looking when the blinds were drawn to watch TV, the pattern on the chair brings back memories of afternoon naps curled up with a blanket and I love how my sister has her arm drapped so casually around me.  Looking at this photo brings with it sights and smells and sounds from my grandparents house in the 80s, and really that's what all good photos should do, right? 

this is who I am : celebrate emotions

I might have been slightly misleading about there being no photos of me from the wedding on the weekend.  There were a couple but the only one deemed blog-worthy was this one and I was saving it for Divas and Dreams Creative Workshop challenge.  Week three is all about celebrating your emotions.  The task was to think of the one emotion that takes up most space inside you, which feeling is the most dominant one? 

Perhaps it's a combination of summer heat and weddings but I'm feeling very sentimental and romantic this week.   Six months after moving to Berlin to live with Matthias I am beginning to feel like this is our home, not just an apartment where we live.  Moving was a bit of a gamble requiring a healthy dose of trust and a sprinkle of faith.  Well, I think the gamble paid off.  Six months on I still feel very much loved and in love.

this is who I am : the good and the bad

This week over at Diva's and Dreams our challenge was to think of two positive aspects of our personality and one negative aspect and play with them in photos and words.  For more details visit here.

My words were:

Quick

Passionate

Peppery

What I most love about myself if that I'm passionate and quick

What I most hate about myself is that I'm peppery

Now a sentence with them all together:

A quick and peppery temperament allows me to embrace my interests passionately.

Let's make a negative a positive...

The good thing about being peppery is that I rarely hold a grudge against people and grievances are quickly forgotton.

Being peppery is great because it creates a drive and motivation to explore new things, interests and continue to learn.

This is who I am

This is who I am is a creativity workshop hosted by Christina of Divas and Dreams.  I actually found out about it from Lemontines, who is following a similar path to me at the moment discovering photography, mixed-media and also has a soft-spot for knitting.  A girl of my own heart.  

This week's challenge was to capture your personality in objects and write about it.  Hmm, tricky.  And yet as I pottered around the house composing my collage it quickly became clear that my personality was exerting itself without the objects even speaking.  Order, symmetry, colour coordination.  Control freak perhaps?  Penchant for planning?  And yet nothing is quite "right" - the photo isn't quite in focus, the picture is not alligned (did you notice?)  There's an element of "near enough is good enough" which would bother many.  And yet here it is.  A healthy dose of food and wine, travel, love, craft, mostly old with a little bit of new.

This vase is part of a small collection of blue glass that I have sitting on our bookshelves.  I love blue.  I especially love blue glass.  There's something about the way it sparkles in the light.  Like the ocean, or the blue summer sky.  I'm constantly on the look out for new pieces, I don't think my collection will ever be complete.

Keys to my parents' house.  This set of keys has traveled around the world with me, several times.  It represents family, my childhood, my heimat*.  Keys to a door that will always be open.  For a little while I didn't really feel like I was living in a "home" and these keys reminded me that no matter where I was, there was always a place for me back in Australia.  

* Heimat, is a german word that has no good translation in English.  It means homeland, home, country or native land.  Indigenous Australian's would probably translate it as 'country' encompassing family, spirit and place.

Jewellery.  The necklace was a gift from Matthias.  I really love it but unfortunately it's broken.  Has been for almost a year.  It broke while I was completely engrossed in play with an 8 month old - I was so smitten that I didn't mind that she was pulling rather dangerously at my necklace.  It broke.  I intended, and still intend, to fix it but like many things I haven't yet got around to it.  Yet. It's been sitting in my jewellery case waiting for the last 10 months.  And this is how it is with many things that I start.  So many ideas.  So many beginnings.  It's the endings that I have trouble with.

So there you go.  A little more about me in objects.

Birthday Spectacular

Wow, what a great weekend!  The sun shone on Saturday - perfect weather for a guided bike ride through Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg and then an amazing dinner at Ma.  A four-course degustation menu with Champagne and German Reisling shared with Matthias, Clare and Shane. Yum!  And today, completely spoilt with gifts, flowers and lots of love.  Can you guess what one of the presents was? The last picture is a clue.  

30 after thirty : like, want, need

Birthday week - yippee!  It all starts tomorrow when two friends, Clare and Shane, arrive for a week of sight-seeing in Berlin, and of course, to celebrate my birthday.  Matthias has been asking me for a while what I want to do and I keep answering with different (but equally delicious) plans - bike-riding around Kreuzberg, picnic in the park, massage, pedicure, champagne on the Spandau canal, shopping at KaDeWe - but really I'd just be happy to hang-out on the balcony with the sun warming my back, a glass of white wine in my hand, some good music and excellent company.  

Anyway, this last list is a bit of a mixed bag - a cosmopolitan collection of wants, needs, hopes and dreams for the next 30 years.  A small slice of how I'd like my life to be when I look back at 60.

30. Have a wine cellar

29. Love

28. Own a "biscuit tin" which is usually full of homemade biscuits

27. Buy local

26. Belly-laugh every day

25. Live back in Australia 

24. Own a macro lens for my camera

23. Age gracefully

22. Teach (subject to be decided)

21. Tread lightly on the earth

20. Grow tomatoes

19. Maintain friendships

18. Have babies

17. Shuck oysters with finesse 

16. Influence health policy

15. Sell something I made with my own hands

14. Own a built-in shoe cupboard

13. Have friends over regularly for dinner and wine

12. Eat seasonally

11. Be an inspiring boss/mentor

10. Invest in good hair-cuts

9. Maintain a healthy body weight

8. Read a classic novel a year

7. Skate on a frozen lake

6. Publish my own research

5. Live in a house full of memories

4. Own a fabulous winter coat

3. Prioritise family and friends

2. Buy fresh flowers

1. Don't sweat the small stuff

PS.  It was hard - it really forced me to think about what I want and in the end I struggled to come up with 30 things.  But a great exercise.

30 after thirty : learning

This week it's all about what I want to still learn.  Because learning is never done and there is so much more I want to master - some things are big, some are small...

30. Ride a motorbike

29. Chop vegetables "like a pro"

28. Sew

27. Grow Bonsai trees

26. Play the Guitar

25. Tango and Salsa dancing

24. Understand internet code

23. Master manual mode on my camera

22. Backgammon

21. Fair isle knitting

20. Cook the perfect "nanna would be proud" Sponge Cake

19. Master German

18. Wolf-whistle

17. History of the Arab World and Moorish Europe

16. Re-learn the Piano

15. Yoga

14. Sail on the open seas (well, at least around an island)

13. Knit socks

12.Make pottery (on a wheel)

11. Viennese Waltz

10. Ride my bike without hands

9. Preserve fruit and vegetables

8. Life-drawing classes

7. Run 10km

6. Paint my left hand's fingernails without wobbling

5. Make homemade pasta

4. Build an edible, sustainable garden

3. Relax

2. re-learn French

1. Shuck oysters

What have you always wanted to learn but haven't yet got around to?

Photos: 1. Vanesse Gurzon 2.Such Pretty Things

30 after thirty

My birthday is coming up.  It's a big one - a milestone you might say.  Even more so because this year I turn my "date age", that is, I will turn 30 on the 30th May.  The fact that I find this more interesting than the number itself probably say a lot about my love of symmetry and order.  This is the only year that my birth date and birth year allign.  

But I digress...

I've been umming and ahhing about how to celebrate my birthday on my blog (the day itself is already full to the brim of hopes, wishes, fantasies and dreams).  After much thought and a little bit of procrastination, I've decided that I want to look forward and not back.  Each Tuesday until the 30th May I'm going to list 30 things that I want to do in the next thirty years.  

Today I'm starting with trains, planes and automobiles.  In no particular order, here are the places that I'd like to visit, the sights, the sounds and the tastes that I'd like to absorb: 

30. Sail down the Nile in a Felucca

29. Have a 4WD holiday in Central Australia

28. Share a bottle of wine and a bowl of olives while watching the sunset over the Meditteranean in Sicily

27. Explore the markets of Fez, Morocco

26. Go hiking in the Alpes

25. Visit the Montana Prairie

24. Spend a decadent weekend in Paris

23. Eat locally caught fish in Croatia

22. Walk along the Cinque Terra, Italy

21. Drink beer at Oktoberfest

20. Visit Pompei

19. See the Northern Lights

18. Hike the Inka Trail

17. Sail around the Greek Islands

16. Go wine tasting in Margaret River, Western Australia

15. Eat at the street market in Hong Kong

14. Take a road trip between Portland, Oregan and San Francisco, California

13. Go skiing in the Alpes

12. Visit Port Arthur, Tasmania

11. Drink fresh coconut milk directly from the fruit

10. Travel on a train in India

9. Ride on a camel through the desert

8. Take a road trip through Northern Scotland

7. Spend a summer at the beach

6. Visit Collogne, Germany

5. Rent a house in Tuscany

4. Go shopping in New York

3. Fall asleep under the stars

2. Sail around the Whitsundays, Queensland

1. See an Oasis

Hmm... seems like I have my work cut out for me.  

What's on your list? 

Photos: 1. Vanessa Guzan 2. David and Cheryl M 3. Martin Third 4. Gisleh 5. Phunkmax 6.Aksveer 7. Clare-B

old-world romance

Image from My Vintage Love (Flickr)

Matthias almost always helps me put on my winter coat when we go out. And when we get to whereever we're going he lets me sit down while he hangs our coats up. He also opens doors, carries my suitcase and brings me flowers. And while I consider myself to be an emancipated women in most respects, all the emancipation in the world can't stop me from loving the old-world romance of it all. Makes me feel all mushy inside.