This ain't no disco

One week in, and it feels like ages. I've been back in the Dutchlands for just over a week, and I've already accomplished so much and made my mum very happy. And that makes me happy.

Mum only moved into this place a few months ago, and when I arrived, it need me. And by that I mean that I am the uber-organiser and this house needed 'a few' things sorted. Every room in the house needs something sorted out, fixed or organised, including the garden. There were still boxes everywhere, Mum had lost things during the move that she couldn't locate. For example, I found her iron in the bottom of a box that was full of toiletries and was labelled 'bathroom'.

Me, I like order. My friends will attest that I am a bit obsessive about order, as in slightly OCD. As in, I make my own handbags (with 26 pockets) out of the frustration that normal handbags don't have enough pockets. Yeah.

So far I've put handles and catches on Mum's wall unit (it has 13 double doors, just to give you an idea), I've organised her tool shelves, which is crucial to me being able to build/fix and organise things in any place, I've sorted out her plasticware box (lids! Why so many lids with no containers?), I've unpacked the boxes in the bathroom and sorted them all out, emptied the perished food from the fridge, I've gone through the all stacks and stacks of  boxes in the attic (which is also my bedroom) and labelled them and moved them around to the other side of the room and reorganised the furniture in there, and I spent a whole afternoon with a hoe in the garden. Yes, a hoe. And the hoe gave me a huge blister. (The Dutch word for hoe is schoffel, in case you were curious. Can you pronounce that?)

And of course I cleaned the floors and the kitchen a few times already, as this house needs to be swept several times a day thanks to the black dust cloud that roams around here (a.ka. dog). Oh, and I cooked my mum my famous Chili Con Carne, and put the leftovers in containers (lids! Where is the lid for this specific container? No, it looks the right size but it doesn't fit!) with labels on them in the freezer. That that is entirely unheard of in this household.

And there are about a million things that still need to be done. Probably more than I've already done so far. But that's ok. I like getting things done.

Every time I tell people back in Australia that I'm going to Europe and for how long, they get jealous and excited and wish me a wonderful trip, envisaging the kind of trip that most Aussies who go to Europe experience: galavanting from country to country eating food and seeing sights. But that's not my trip.
In parts yes, it is very enviably that I can visit Europe every year. But I feel that they often don't realise that I do more cleaning and organising here every single day than I do at home, and that I go first and foremost to see people that I love. I know I don't have to do any cleaning or tidying. But my Mum has looked after me all her life, and I want to do the same for her. Also, as I said before, I can't relax when there is mess and disorder around me.

I am also writing my news articles every day, to make euros for us to spend on fun but mostly necessary things. I have to work 7 days a week, 365 days a year. It's not a huge amount of work, and it's great that I can do it anywhere in the world (well, except Dubai, because you are not allowed to visit online casinos there, or even access a wordpress page that has 'casino' in its title) but it's still a daily responsibility that I need to attend to.

I do have a fun trip planned, I am taking mum on a trip to France, to England and back to France, all to see some great people whom we care about so much. I love my family in the UK, so I always make an effort to go and see them when I'm in Europe. And there are some very precious friends that I will get to see as well, so I'm very excited about that. But it's only a very short time in comparison to the time I spend sorting and organising and cleaning, but that's ok.

I'm not complaining at all. I hope I don't come across that way. I choose to do this and it makes me happy. I think I'm expressing this because I don't want people to think I'm a spoiled brat who gets to go and play in Europe for months every year. And because it helps to write down what you feel to sort out your thoughts.

And in my down time here I do get to read heaps, I am halfway through the Divergent Trilogy (thanks for the tip, Sherrie) and I intend to read lots more while I'm here. And the weather is much nicer here than it is in Australia.

Also, I get to drink lots of tea with my mum and hug her heaps. And that's the best.

Words for myself

Hi Team. I know, it's been years. Sorry. Well, it's not like I had a huge following of people, or tried to get people to read my blog or cared whether people read my blog. It's just some words I'm writing, just 'cause. And I haven't had time or inspiration to do so for a while.

But I had promised myself to write for me again, and now that I have time, I am doing it. I have spent a good while writing for others now, and it's my turn again.

I am in the good old Dutchlands, where I grew up. Where I once belonged and now I don't but I still feel like I am attached here and it ties in quite well with the situation going on with my ears.

One of my ears is blocked, and the other has a burst ear drum, courtesy of one of the most unpleasant flights of my life, and being a Dutchstralian, I have taken a few flights in my life. My stern warning to you is: DO NOT FLY WITH EVEN A HINT OF A SINUS INFECTION. But then again, I was so keen to get over here, I might have quite possibly told myself this a few days ago, but I didn't listen. And now I'm struggling to listen because I just can't hear very well and it's hard to follow conversations. Especially when most of the conversations here (other than the ones with my mother) are in a Dutch dialect called Brabants, and well, it's hard for me to follow it even with fully functioning ears, not that they ever worked that well.

Has my life changed in the last few years? Hell yes. I am possibly the happiest I have ever been. My life might be the boringest it has every been, (or maybe not), but it's because I am content. I am a happy little Dutchstralian and I am so grateful that I am.

It's quite strange being so aware of the slow disconnect I am experiencing from my childhood, my teenage years, all that is normal to Dutchies, my youth was here and now I am not young anymore, or specifically Dutch. I am Dutcher than an Aussie, but I am too Aussie to consider myself Dutch entirely.
It's not like I don't belong in either category, but if I had to give myself a description, I would say that I am an Aussie with Dutch tendencies.

Dutch people and Australian people are very different as a society, but they blend well. They both appreciate a good beer (not that I do) and they both like a good football match (not that I do), and at the moment the Dutch are united in hoping to win the soccer world cup, and the Australian are united in feeling irate about a certain Tony Dumb Dumb. I dislike both of those.

Me, I feel kind of tired and jet-lagged and far away from people and puppies than I want to look after because I love them and I feel I could make them feel better. My little dachshund pup Louis has just had surgery today, quite unexpectedly, and I can't stop thinking about how small he is and how much I can love something so small, and how much I can worry about a little dog that tends to be just fine.

It's in my nature to care and look after people, I do it every day. But over here, I can kind of look after myself a bit more than I do at home, and it's quite nice. And to be fair to myself, I need to because my ears are totally busted and need to heal, and my body and mind are exhausted of a few stressful weeks finishing assignments for my postgraduate uni course amongst other things. Life back home is lovely but hectic.

Here, it's slow and though I have spent a serious amount of time being the handy woman that I am yesterday, and I only arrived the day before yesterday, today I did a bit less and it felt nice. Nice but weird. I am not used to having not a million things to do. I love my little doggle, but it's nice not to have to walk him every day. And I love my comfy house and my wonderful husband, but it's nice to not have to look after either one of them.

Mum's house is a mess no matter what I do, mostly thanks to her big black monster of a giant dust cloud dog, but I'm not responsible for the house or the dog or anything at all really. It's really nice.

So now I'm going to do another thing I had promised myself to spend time doing: reading for fun and leisure. Divergent, if you must know.

Fixy

Those of you who know me quite well, and most of you do, know that I like to fix things. It's not only that I enjoy fixing things and the end result, it's also a lot to do with not being able to let broken things be broken. If it's fixable, I will try my damnedest to do so. Lucky for me, I am also quite handy and resourceful, and not too shabby with tools (even the human variety!) I like things to be in perfect working condition, from drawers to computers. Things need to work, run smoothly, life needs to be as easy as possible so that there are no delays and frustrations. That's why I love Apple products, they make my life easier, they are super efficient and help me be organised. I also love the extent to which you can customise everything so it's optimised for your life. (I am not paid by Apple to say these things, but I wish I was.)

I am the only one in our little family of three to be like that. Both my mother and sister are quite able to deal with something being broken in their environment for an extended amount of time.
So I ended up doing quite a bit of fixing at my sister's place last year. For at least six months, if not a year before I arrived last year, her bathroom sink was broken. And by broken I mean that she accidentally pushed her push-down drain plug so hard that she pushed out the actual plumbing underneath. If you dropped something in her sink, it would fall through the plug hole and end up in the cabinet underneath. Of course, this also included the water from the tap. So she stopped using it. When I went to stay at her place, I couldn't believe she could live without a functioning sink in her bathroom for months, when it didn't seem that complicated to fix. I had never really fixed plumbing to such an extent before, but I was sure I could manage.
So I went to her local hardware store, explained the situation to the nice man who owned the place, got the necessary advice as well as what I needed to fix the plumbing. It wasn't hard, the hardest part was the lack of good tools. For example, I had to measure the circumference of her drainpipes by circling them on a piece of paper and taking that into the hardware store. This was mere days before Phizz and I became close friends. It would have been fantastic to have know Phizz then as well as I do now, he would have had all the tools I needed. Nevertheless, I got the job done and it is still fully functioning.

Phizz is, like me, also very fixy and I love that. He is probably even more fixy than I am. He fixes leaky taps in public toilets and other things around that the world not owned by him, which has often made people think he was the hired engineer rather than just a good Samaritan. I don't go that far, but I go further than most. I fix things for people, but often I fix things that belong to others that I need to use just because I cannot stand using broken/inefficient things. My sister's shower and mixer tap really need to be fixed at the moment. It is only because I didn't have the tools with me that it is still spraying water out the side where it shouldn't.

But it is also a new way of thinking that has stopped me from fixing everything: sometimes I just need to let things be broken, because it's not mine to fix and the person I fix things for might not appreciate the time and effort I put into fixing their things, and/or they don't even care it is broken. Often they are things I would only use a few times in my life. They are not my problem. Half of the halogen lights at my sister's place aren't working, most notably the two bedside lights. It frustrated the hell out of me the few nights I have slept there in the last two months, but I haven't replaced them because I couldn't afford to and that's also probably why my sister hasn't. It's not a priority for her, why should it be for me?

But I do love the satisfaction I feel when I have fixed something and it is restored to a fully functioning order. Today I fixed the two spring-loaded dog leads that Mum's dog had broken (by chewing through the cords when we used them to tie him to something when he rather just run around) and now they are just fine again. She bought the second one to replace the first broken one, and she would have had to another buy a new one if I hadn't been around. Those things are not cheap. So I feel extra happy when I can fix things like that.

And so I have a million things that I fix around the world. I like fixing things, I will keep on fixing things until I will be frustrated to the max when I cannot do so anymore because I am old and no longer nimble. But until then, fixy is my middle name. Florence Fixy Nulens.

Lost and at home

Hilarious this! I just downloaded the 'blogger' app so I could finally enter another post on my much neglected blog while out, and it turns out you cannot tilt your screen sideways to write in it with a wider screen/ keyboard. Talk about ironic when it comes to a app which one would use for writing mostly.

That's besides the point. The point is, I haven't been blogging like a good little writer ought to. Mostly because I am extremely busy and occupied while in Europe, more so than usual when I'm in the Netherlands. I have also been unable to sleep, so at night time instead of writing I lay awake with my mind racing and then shutting up said thoughts by watching tv series online, four or five episodes back to back and then feeling my eyes droop and gratefully falling into a coma.
Then I wake up later than I want and rush to get stuff done during the day. Sounds like a healthy way to live, no? No. It's not, you're right.

But I did get stuff done, believe it or not. I have spent a lot of time cleaning my mother's house, garden & car, though you wouldn't be able to tell at all since she and her big black adorable nightmare of a monstrous dog make a bigger mess than all of the children I have ever looked after put together.

I also have spent a decent amount of time watching my friend Phizz pack for his move to the US. I was supposed to help him, and I did in small ways, but he insisted he had to do most of it himself, and that my presence was all he needed. So I was present, though slightly frustrated by the fact I couldn't do anything. We had a lot of fun in the hours that we were not packing, got up to the same sort of shenanigans that we did last year, driving around in fast cars in the middle of the night to random places, watching movies and eating all sorts of vegetarian Asian foods. He is a most awesome friend. I have to say knowing him has really enriched my life and knowing we will be friends far into the future always makes me feel happy and excited.
The thing about Phiroze is that he is just so different from most people, but we are similar in many ways as well and we love random spontaneous actions of crazy fun. He is optimistic, generous, funny, adventurous, caring and sincere. And he is, unlike nearly all other men I know, incredibly easy to talk to and communicates better than even some women I know.
Phizz is also truly interested in everything. And with that I mean everything, from how you're feeling to how the world works and everything in it, as well as space and beyond. Fact is, he is awesome and he, unlike most men I know, and even some women I love, frequently tells me that I am awesome too. Do you know how nice it is to have a friend who expresses their appreciation of you often? It is wonderful. And sadly in my life not very common. I am easily thrown into self doubt and sometimes even self-loathing and to have a friend who often tells you you're awesome is in one word, awesome. So, it's been wonderful spending time with him, and I miss him now that he's no longer in Amsterdam. Sure, we will have awesome fun together elsewhere around the world, but I will not be able to spend as much time with him while he lives in the US, because I just won't spend months over there like I do here. But as he says: The future is long. And exciting.

In true Phiroze style, for his 'final hurrah' in Europe, he brought five of his friends together in Paris, and we spent one glorious night being the pink brigade. I drove a rental car from the south of France where I was with my mum in Les Bernardies, two other friends were flown from Berlin and two already lived in Paris. The six of us have created a truly amazing and ever-lasting memory together, thanks to this one guy. Who else has a friend like that? Well, yes, Phizz's other friends, haha!

Anyway. I did also see other friends, most notably my friend Emily, whom you might remember as being my partner in crime last year traipsing around Amsterdam looking for cocktail bars. This year, things have been quite different as she last week gave birth to a gorgeous little girl called Olivia. She arrived nearly three weeks early, which is nice because this way I could meet her before flying back to Australia. I have to say Olivia has brought up many emotions for me, quite conflicting ones. I loved seeing my oldest and most treasured friend being pregnant, I cannot tell how much she was the shining example of the the glowing mum-to-be, for some reason it gave her tremendous power, and she became even more self-confident and determined. It was amazing to witness. I am thankful to Olivia for that, she did that even before she was born.
But when Em told me she was pregnant, I cried. And she knows they were not tears of joy, and I am not embarrassed to admit my selfish reaction. She and I had many discussions last year about the change a baby brings to women's friendships and how I am not ready to give up my friends to their children. I have spent a disproportionate amount of time with little people for one who is not a mother, and I treasure my grown-up time with my few friends.
Though of course, it didn't take long for me to get used to the idea and I have in the last few months spent quite a lot of time creating a nappy bag for her, which I finished just yesterday and gave it to her when I met Olivia for the first time. Thankfully seeing Em yesterday was just like it has always been before Olivia arrived: two good friends, enjoying each other's company, laughing, feeling good. Olivia doesn't need too much attention quite yet, so that's nicely designed by nature, giving everyone the chance to ease into the fact that she will slowly need more and more attention, which means everyone else will get less.

It is just the way it is, and should be, with children. They demand, and deserve, a lot of attention. They are new to this world, and it is our job as adults to teach them, answer their questions, and make sure they become happy, confident, responsible adults. I guess I just have to get used to the fact that, at my age, more and more people will be happy with spending more time with their kids than their friends. I'm just not ready for it myself. I still feel 24 when it comes to taking responsibility. Paying a mortgage, renovating a house, thinking of children, worrying about your mother getting older and needing help, I'm just not ready for any of that. But sometimes you don't get a choice.

Anyway, being alone in Amsterdam with my thoughts yesterday with time to think after seeing my best friend as a mother for the first time came down on me like a ton of bricks and I sat in my sister's apartment crying for quite some time. There were just a lot of things feeling bigger than I was able to handle. Phizz moving to the US, Em a mum, my mother's troubles, my having to defer Uni and still being an aimless wanderer felt just hopeless for a moment there. But nothing that packet of choc chip cookies, cups of tea and watching tv series online (see!) couldn't fix.

I am witnessing a lot of people change their lives, mostly for the better, through their own hard work and skill, and it makes me feel like a loser. It makes me feel like I might just be sabotaging myself into not taking charge of my own sense of achievement because I am too scared to do so. I feel weak and unable to become successful. There, I said it. I really want a satisfactory career, and somehow I just can't accomplish starting it. Maybe that can be my challenge for when I get back to Australia. No, not maybe: that WILL be my challenge. It is the one thing I have to do for myself. Go out there and get successful. And don't get me wrong: I don't desire making a lot of money or anything, I just want to feel like I've accomplished something. To be successful is to have success in what you're trying to achieve. But I don't know what I want to achieve quite yet. I just want a satisfying job.

But for now though, I will achieve the following: hopping back on my bike and riding through Amsterdam to my sister's place, enjoying every canal and cute house I pass. Feeling ok with how I am right now. A little fatter than I'd like to be, a little more lost emotionally than I'd like to be, in a place where I am not physically lost because I know my way around more and more, where I feel at home but where my heart always becomes a mess. That's ok. Ok is not bad.

The Help

Hi. If you read both my blogs, you might have clued in to the fact that I posts some things on both this blog and Return to the Nesterlands, and other things only on this blog. This is my 'secret' blog. This is a blog for the inner circle, if you will. Last year I sent a whole heap of people (including my mother and mother-in-law) a link to my other blog, as I wanted to inform far away relatives and acquaintances of how things were going. But sometimes it's hard knowing who's reading what you're writing. Especially if you want to write about them or write how you feel about something when you know certain people will want to give you advice you don't need. Though there are other people whose advice I desperately want, but they never post or comment. Go figure. I want a blog that is very popular and will win awards, but I don't want some people to read it! That's the problem with blogs, you can't really be choosy about your audience. I trust my life to strangers more than to the people I love. I can't keep a diary these days either, my words just do not come out in private. I can only wear my heart on my sleeve nowadays. Have I become an exhibitionist?

The truth is that I am finding it harder and harder to be at my mother's house. It used to be the best place in the world, this house. Really it was. It was the horn of plenty. Food, love, fun, it was all here. Too much of everything. The good life to the point of overkill sometimes. But like an over-ripe mango it has just gone past its sweetness and has become messy and a little disgusting. I can see so much truth now, so much reality it hurts. This place is like a cracked mirror and I can see a completely disfigured version of my life that is grotesque and a little scary. It has become a source of hopelessness and it overwhelms me. I don't want to lose this place, but it's already gone, and I can't let it go, but I want it to be gone.

I wonder why I come here, why I stay for so long and why I do what I do. I love my mother, I want to help her. I have always wanted to help her, and I always have helped her. I hope I always will. I have always cleaned things for her, done her super disgusting jobs and sorted out her mess. She has always showered me with love and support and gifts and generosity and the only way I have ever been able to repay her is with my amazing cleaning and organising skills. It's one of the few things I feel confident about, these skills. I might even boast about them. I kick ass when it comes to organising.

I have also learned in the last few years that I am a natural helper. I am constantly offering people my help, sometimes when people don't want it. I am a helpful person. Just yesterday I was at the hardware store and in the queue in front of me was a dad with two little girls. He had two bulky boxes and some smaller items and he told the lady at the check-out he would have to come back for one box as he was unable to carry both boxes to the car. So I offered to carry one, and helped him and his girls to their car.

I hold doors, lifts, hands, secrets.

I care. I just do. And I wish everybody did. That's one of the things I love about my friend Phiroze. He's super helpful, I think he is even more helpful than I am. Everybody needs help with things, and if only everybody used some of their skills to just help other people, we'd be more connected, more grateful and probably happier.

Nearly everything I do is helping people. I haven't really realised that until just now. I am here to help my mum, to help Phizz pack for the US, the help my friend Emily prepare for her baby. My current job is a helpful job. Looking after other people's children is one of the most helpful things one can do, I think. I tidy up, I do dishes, I fold clothes. I help my husband with his renovations to our house, I help him with his presentations and his reviews for work. I help my mother-in-law with her computer related questions. I help my friends with things all the time. I help my sister with handyman jobs. It's not hard. It's easy. I want to do those things. It makes people happy. I want to make people happy.

But it's not easy when I need help. Because the help I need is not necessarily easily available. I could really use some help to build my confidence when it comes to finally starting my career. I would love a coach. I would love to know how to network better. The difficulties for me are not really ones that helpfulness would sort out, like my citizenship issues, my finances, my split life. I need emotional help. Hahaha, god that sounds a bit sad. I need emotional support. And quality stuff, I want people to really care. Sometimes I feel that people don't care as much about me as I care about them. I know it's a common feeling, I am not alone in that.

Maybe I am a needy person. I think I might be. I am clingy and needy. It's embarrassing but true. When I meet new people that I like I can be like a puppy. I want to be cuddled all the time. I want people to want to be with me. I want to be the most amazing company. And I want to hear it. I often tell people that they are awesome, because I know it's a nice thing to hear. I don't hear it often enough. But maybe I just need to hear it more often than I others. I don't know.

Anyway. I best get off the computer. There's jobs that need to be done. 

Amsterdam Days

Well, that was fun. I have spent some wonderful days in Amsterdam this week, mostly hanging out with good friends, my cousin and my sister. I spent two of them playing tour guide, which was fine, except of course for the fact that I know very little about Amsterdam. But I know little quirky facts and I guess I know my way to the most interesting landmarks.

One place that I discovered for the first time myself with my friend Dunja, who had just landed from Melbourne wednesday morning, is the new Public Library of Amsterdam. It's a really great building with wonderful architecture, and there are floors and floors of books, music and films. I really enjoyed the children's section, where there is a very large dolls house, or rather, mouse house made by Karin Schaapman with more than a hundred different little rooms and mice. It was amazing.

I spent more time than usual just roaming around Amsterdam and pointing out its loveliness, and the more I see it, the more I appreciate its beauty and quirk. Amsterdam is a nice city. It's old and cute and amazing.  The Dutch are a funny folk and our language is ridiculously tricky and silly. I wish I had had my bike with me, though and I was so pleased Dunja and I got to ride rental bikes for a few hours on our lovely day together. I have really come to the realisation this year that they only way I really enjoy seeing a city is by bike. I am a bike person. Walking starts to hurt my feet way too quickly and it's way too slow. Yes you can appreciate the streets and sights a bit better on foot, but when you ride, you can always stop and take a short walk around if you see something you like. Bike beats walking for me hands down.

I also really enjoyed seeing my best and oldest friend Emily who is only two months away from giving birth to her first child. This time last year we were talking about how we were far off having children, but Emily's child had other plans! If you have followed my blog regularly you will know I am currently more likely to say I will never have children myself, and that though I find them amazing and fun, I would not want to have them around all day every day. I have the utmost respect for people who can manage their own happiness and that of their family. I struggle to get out of bed and put one foot after another some days, and to have to manage children at a time like that seems impossible. And the biggest worry I have about having children is that my family is all here, and many of my friends, and I would have to travel with my children if I want them to know these people. Shudder. I find flying 24 hours by myself hard enough as my tolerance for anything seems to not travel with me, let alone tolerance for tired and cranky children.

But all around, my friends increasingly bring those little people into their lives (and inevitably mine), it's what people my age do. And the truth is that your friendship changes. Children claim all the attention. They need it. They have so many questions, they want to know everything, they are amazingly observant and fantastically curious. But sometimes I want all their mum's attention for myself. Luckily Emily and I have talked extensively about this phenomenon and she's very aware of the changes her little one will bring along. To be honest I cried when she told me she was pregnant. And not out of joy. I have very few friends left who are not bound to a child. She understood, though, and of course it took me very little time to become excited and happy for her. I have to say pregnancy has given her a strength I have not seen in her before, a confidence, a content enriching her whole being and life. I am thrilled for her. It's amazing what a person who has not yet been born can do!  

I'll be heading back to Amsterdam soon, to help Phizz with getting ready to move to the US and an expense report, and also to see my friends and sister as much as I can. I will also attempt to do some exercise there at a gym and hopefully ride a bike. I feel at home in Amsterdam these days. And I am beginning to know my way around which is awesome, especially when riding. I no longer have to stop at every street corner to check on google maps whether I'm going in the right direction.

Today is a really wet rainy cold day and Mum and I are doing chores around the house. I am also playing a ridiculous amount of Rumble (an iPhone words game) both in Dutch and English which is good for my bilinguality. According to my spellchecker that's not a word, but you know what I mean.

So my dear readers, that'll be all. I have to say my last few posts have hardly been as good and witty as I would like my blog to be, but it's just the way it is. I miss my words. They used to come so easily, but we had a messy breakup (a stranger interfered with our relationship) and now we don't always connect the way we used to. It still hurts. Anyway. Ciao.

Home

Hey. It's Thursday morning, the first day of my new health regime, as I sip my fresh OJ and eat muesli before I head to the gym. The last four weeks have been an absolutely wonderful time filled with fun and food, oh, glorious food! Italy does know how to feed its visitors. They serve cakes and biscuits for breakfast, need I say more?

Last night we dropped my wonderful husband off at the airport and he is flying home as we speak. Or, as I write, I should say. (I do wish people would 'speak' back more!) It was very quiet and empty coming home without him, I have had a full month of spending all day with him, something which I have not had since we were on our honeymoon three years ago. And I can honestly say I love him more than ever before. We have had so much fun, travelling in foreign countries in a rental car can be stressful, and spending so much time together can lead to frustrations, but not with us. We have just been so happy. We are still super happy. I have to say that I think we're more in love now than we were on our honeymoon, we have grown more in our relationship, learnt more about each other's happiness and always make an effort to make sure the other is ok when things get dicey. It's a great relationship and I feel really blessed.

I am once again at my mother's dining table, where I have written most of my 'Return to the Nesterlands' blog. It's a good place to write. It's home in many ways. But every year my house in Australia feels more like home to me in many other ways: it's full of the things that make my life wonderful and easy, it's where Ash and I are happy together. I miss that feeling of ease and comfort when I'm away. But it always helps to be reminded of all the lovely things you have that you might otherwise take for granted. I love my  Tefal pans. I love my comfy couch. Etc.

Life here is a little less relaxing. I have to admit I feel anxious about what is going to happen if this house never sells. A lot of my mother's things are in storage, and the house was clean and presentable (to a point of display home tidiness) after I had finished all my work last year. But the house has not remained that way, because nobody can live in a display home. Everyday life happens, dogs join the family, and cats move into bathrooms. My mother will be the first to admit she is not a person with much discipline when it comes to housekeeping and a slobbery dog that is very fond of going into smelly ditches and ponds does not help either. I find it hard to live in a messy house which perpetually has sand and dirt on the floor, even after I have just vacuumed and mopped.

Let's just say I have a lot of work to do. People are always envious when I tell them how long I go to Europe for. But the honest truth is that it's not all lounging around wonderful countries and eating glorious food. The majority of the time I am trying to help my mother adjust to a lifestyle of getting by with very little money and it's not easy at all. For either of us it's hard to keep an eye on every cent we spend. We like to go out and share food, we like to treat people, we like to buy people presents, we like to buy ourselves presents. We've done that all of our lives. It's hard to reign in your enthusiasm. But we're getting there.

Now, it's also time to bring some discipline back to my body, which has not seem much exercise in the last month. So I'm off to the gym and hopefully get back to a shape which fits into my jeans a bit more comfortably. At the moment they're a bit tight! Luckily the weather is warm enough for skirts at the moment so I'm ok for a while.

More soon. x