The booktown

Fjærland is a tiny, ridiculously picturesque village in Norway. Resting in the shadow of a glacier, at the end of the Fjærlandsfjord, it is home to only 300 souls. That's like a third of the population of my high school.

Fjærland is also a "booktown." Almost every shop in the town sells books and, if you were to put all the bookshelves together, they would stretch for more than four kilometres. Here is a little video about it.

Fjærland - Norway's book town from Fjord Norway on Vimeo.

Bucket list! Will you come with me?

(All images are screen-grabs, taken from the video above)

Hello Bendigo

Over the Christmas / New Year period we spent a few days in Mr B’s hometown, Bendigo. In between visits to Nanna and all the cousins and a birthday barbecue out at Uncle Mark’s place where dust and snags and lollies and water fights made it Scout heaven, we decided to play tourist.

Have you ever pretended to be a tourist in your own town? It’s something I really enjoy doing now and then, just for fun, and I highly recommend it. You do all the things that as a local you would normally skip/avoid-like-the-plague. Visit all the tourist sites. Ride the hop-on-hop-off bus (if there is one). Eat the crappy tourist food in the crappy tourist cafes. The cheesier the better.

Of course I actually AM a tourist when I visit Bendigo, but I’ve never looked at it in that way before, since every visit is all about family. It’s such a beautiful and historic place to visit, when you take the time to look! And for Mr B, who was born and bred in Bendigo but hadn't lived there in 20 years, this was a fun way to reacquaint himself with what was perhaps a different side to his home town.

Bring on more iPhone photos.

Little things - the cowboy

Little things in my home...

This pensive cowboy sits outside his restaurant and on my kitchen bench. I found his photograph in a bric-a-brac shop in Aspen, Colorado, when I was staying up there for a fiction writer's course (called Aspen Summer Words - if you ever get the opportunity take it - it was amazing!).

I almost didn't share the cowboy today because the whole purpose of this series is to tell the stories behind the little things in my home. Like this. Or this. Or this. And I don't know the story of this cowboy. Nor have I created a story for him since bringing him home. But I am so deeply drawn to this picture, and I don't even know why. I never tire of looking at it, or thinking about it, and wondering what is his story? What is the story of this new town?

“Little Things” is an occasional series about the stories behind some of the little things you’ll find around my home. Are there stories behind the little things in your home? I’d love you to tell me about them! Or if you’d like to join in and write a post like this of your own, don’t forget to share a link to it so I can read it.

Seasons pass

As I write this, Mr B, Emily and I are sitting on couches in our lounge room re-watching Notting Hill and dreaming about moving to London. This is one of Mr B's favourite movies, but I am ambivalent. It's Hugh Grant at his floppy, bumbling best and a fantastically quirky supporting cast, but I never could buy into the Julia Roberts character and how they fell in love. She is such an awful character! Anyway, if you have somehow missed seeing this movie during the past 15 years, it's worth a gander for the hilarity and love and community of the sweet little friendship group, and, Oh! London! What a city, huh?

Anyway, there is a "time passing" scene in the movie and I think it's one of the best I've ever seen so I thought I'd share it with you. Look out for all the tiny details that indicate change and stability co-existing.

Have sketchbook, will travel

I’ve mentioned before about the road-trip I took across the USA before I moved from New York to Australia. I was blown away by the diversity - of culture, of geography, of architecture, of food - that revealed how little I'd known about the American story. Turns out the story of the USA is way bigger than the life I knew in New York or what you see of Middle America on TV. Who knew?

A couple of months ago I came across Drawn the Road Again, a blog by artist Chandler O'Leary, and, more than anything else, it made me incredibly nostalgic for that perspective-challenging journey.

Chandler shares little snippets of her adventures and discoveries on the road, through thoughtful words and stunning illustrations.

I reckon I could spend years browsing through her travel journals. They are the roadside scrapbooks of my dreams.

Chandler kindly gave me permission to share her illustrations with you on here. Take a look over on Drawn the Road Again for many more. They are incredible. You can also like Chandler on Facebook, and follow her on Twitter.

Welcome home

Have you been following astronaut Commander Chris Hadfield's poetic tweets from space? Somehow, he made "out there" feel so much closer to "in here." As though we were all part of the same universe, and all connected. Which of course we are. While I have been going about my closed little life: working, walking, writing, loving my baby; Commander Hadfield has been floating above and feeling connected to me and my seven billion Earth neighbours in a way that I can barely understand.

These are some of the photographs he has been sending home from his time on the International Space Station, and his accompanying thoughts.

"Tonight's Finale: The Moon rising over a bed of cloud. A constant reminder to us all of what can be achieved."

"Clouds swoop in on Crimea, a white bird on the Black Sea."

"Hamburg, famed port city in northern Germany, on what must have been a lovely day to take a stroll down the Elbe."

"Canada rocks." (Did I mention Commander Hadfield is Canadian?)

"Spaceships glowing blue in the dawn as we leave Florida headed across the Atlantic."

Commander Hadfield is due home today. He tweeted a few hours ago "Hard to express all of my emotions, but mostly gratitude. I came here on behalf of so many people - thank you." It's an extraordinary world we live in, wouldn't you agree?

ps. If you've somehow managed to miss the media storm, here is the fantastic remake of David Bowie's Space Oddity that Commander Hadfield recorded from on board the International Space Station. I would find it super-poignant, except that moustache gives me the giggles and that brings me down to earth. So to speak.

Favourite things - itchy feet

This time of year smells like school holidays. Long stretches of hot, sunny days spent jousting on Pool Ponies in the backyard swimming pool; nursing grass-burns from the muddy puddles that form at the bottom of the slip 'n slide; jumping up and down on the neighbour's trampoline while the hose creates an ankle-deep lake. Cartwheeling through the sprinkler. That was pretty much every summer of my childhood. We had never heard of water restrictions. Often we'd all pile into the car and take a week or two's holiday on the coast, visiting my Grandpa in Queensland. Every day we'd leap through ocean waves, collect seashells, beg for ice cream. Every night we'd fall asleep with salt crusted in our hair.

Family holidays today seem to be so much more sophisticated. Before she was officially a teenager, Emily Rose had already been to India, America, Europe, New Zealand, and had accumulated so many domestic travel miles that she was a Silver Frequent Flyer with Virgin while still an unaccompanied minor. Next year, she will be off to Italy for an excursion with her public school.

Part of me longs for the nostalgia of my own childhood. Of the pure joy we found in the simple things. But at the same time, I am positively itching to get back on a plane myself. And I can't tell you what it would mean to see New York and Paris again, this time through Madeleine's eyes.

So to somewhat ease my itchy feet, this is a rather long and roundabout way of letting you know that today's collection of five favourite things are all about the journey. Have a lovely weekend!

1. La Maisonnette du Coteau

I am devastated that I missed out on entering the competition to win a week's holiday in this stunningly renovated holiday home in the French countryside. After three years of work, Stephanie Brubaker of Stephmodo and her family finally finished renovating "La Maisonnette," and very generously offered a week long vacation for a lucky reader! Can you imagine a more beautiful place for a getaway? Here is the full story of the renovation.

2. The travelling notebooks

This is a project after my own heart. Three travelling notebooks are winding their way around the world. One is being filled with recipes, another with photographs, and a third with favourite things. You sign up for one of the notebooks. When it arrives you find a couple of free pages and add your own entry, then send it off to the next person on the list. I first saw this on Rosalilium and you can see her entry in the recipe book here.

3. The globetrotter gift guide

Plenty of ideas in this lovely gift guide from Honestly WTF for what to get for the globetrotter in your life. Or for the wishes-she-was-a-globetrotter. I'm just sayin'.

4. Babes on a plane!

I have bookmarked this post called Traveling Abroad with Littles from Rockstar Diaries, as well as this one on flying, for the day when I actually am brave enough to take to the skies with Miss Madeleine. I am so excited to show her the world. And so afraid of taking her on a plane, with no escape, and all those other people who also have no escape!

5. An unexpected journey

The long-expected release of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is scheduled for Boxing Day in Australia. I'm really looking forward to this movie. I liked the Lord of the Rings trilogy but didn't love it. Kind of how I felt about the books, too. But as a child, I LOVED The Hobbit. I still remember my father giving me the book to read, when I was quite young. His version had a picture of the dragon on the front and, for the first few pages, I was quite confused because I thought a hobbit was a dragon. What do you think? Will you be going to see this?

What to pack for London

Have you seen the Kate Spade city guides? They offer stylish advice on places to sleep, eat, drink, shop, explore, visit and even what to pack for five fabulous cities, and more to come. For anyone lucky enough to be heading Olympic-ward, this is the packing list for London. Isn't it cute?

Sydney weekend

In which I woke up at 4am because my body knew I had to get up at 5am. I flew from Melbourne to Sydney and, when I arrived, the sun was high just like I remember it always being in Sydney and I thought all those Wettest Season Ever claims must have been imagined. In which I had toast and tea with my parents in a cafe in my old neighbourhood of Surry Hills, and it was oh so familiar but also not. I realised that yet another place no longer felt like home, but that I was ok with that.

In which my dad and I roamed around The Rocks taking photographs, and my mother exercised the patience of a saint. Also, on seeing the photograph of myself at the top of this post, I realised I really should invest in some actual maternity clothes.

My parents have just returned from China and they brought back a bounty of cute outfits for Baby B, and a hand-engraved ink stamp with Mr B's and my name and the symbol for 'love' to celebrate our first anniversary. While opening these presents I devoured a Thai lemongrass and basil stir-fry for lunch, and the chilli gave Baby B the hiccups.

In the evening my friend Sarah and I met up in Chinatown for noodles and dumplings and green tea ice-cream. The owner of the noodles and dumpling place came outside and played his violin for the crowd while we waited for a table. Once inside, Sarah and I had one of those brilliant creative brainstorms during which everything fit into place. Don't you love it when that happens?

Later that night I watched incredibly bad reality TV in bed in my hotel room, and it was an unspeakable luxury. Morning. In which I caught a taxi out to Rozelle to meet my friend Cara, and the driver was friendly and actually knew the way. This being such a short visit, Cara and I sipped chai tea and fresh juice and shared our lives on fast-forward. It is amazing what you can get through in just an hour when you have to.

Cara and Sarah had booked a private room for all my friends at the 3 Weeds, but we arrived early and I had to submit to the indignity of being a pregnant woman loitering on a pub stoop until it opened. Once indoors, I proceeded to sit like a fat, round queen bee for the next five hours while my friends dropped in as the afternoon suited them, to say hi.

My mum made a black forest cake for Baby B and it was sublime (and very cute). I was thankful, not for the first time or even the 100th time, for the wonderful friendships I have, and that love trumps distance.

How was your weekend?

Around the world in 80 pages

Hooray for creative people: writers, journalists, designers, photographers; who take the initiative to showcase their creative work on their own terms. Journalist Brittney Kleyn, for example, garnered her creative friends and produced a zine from her holidays in Europe. Called Around the World in 80 Pages, it's a celebration of travel, discovery, journey and destination.

It's not a travel guide, but it does document the weird, wacky and wonderful discoveries made by Brittney and her friends. Think designers in London, librarians in Berlin, and baristas in Spain. Right up my alley!

I can't wait to read this zine but, more than that, I applaud what Brittney has to say about taking her burgeoning career into her own hands.