Hello! It’s Been a While.

I cannot believe it has already been two years since we moved from bustling Melbourne to our sleepy little town in rural Victoria. A lot has happened in that time. Too much, both good and bad, to recount here in any detail that would be a proper semblance of the truth. Time is a funny creature and has a way of blurring events. Memory, as we know, cannot be trusted. But I suppose what can, is emotion. It’s always going to present to you the truth of the moment. And at this moment, I am happy. I am content. I am grateful that we decided to stay after the horrendous fires of the summer of 2020. We almost didn’t. We lost one of our lovely little cottages, all our outbuildings and the trees and plants we had planted in the first few weeks of arriving here. Our bucolic green landscape had turned into an unfamiliar scene of scorched, blackened earth. Ash and burnt leaves rained down on us for days after the fires. The smell of smoke was our constant companion. It was devastating, but we came out the other end. And here we are still.

And it has been a little while. I was going to write, “where has the time gone?” But I know exactly where it has gone. It slowly trickled away while we made the move to rural Victoria, lived through (and then mentally and emotionally processed) the massive bushfires that devastated our town, burnt down one of our houses and all our outbuildings, while dealing with the pandemic, which has meant a lot of homeschooling and clever juggling of time. Not to mention, last year I had a rather bad back injury, which meant I could not even hold a camera to take photos. All this has meant that social media took a very big dive to the very bottom of a long list of priorities.

It is the first day of spring. A thick blanket of snow still covers the mountain tops and we wake up to frost most mornings. But you can feel spring in the air. The sun dominates our days again and the garden is waking up. The large elms have shaken off the last of their winter leaves and small fat buds are starting to erupt all over our old fruit trees. Yes, spring is well on the way and there is much to do. The hothouse needs to be cleaned and organised, the vegetable garden prepped for seeds and the strawberry patch is in dire need of a thorough weeding. 

The house is also in dire need of a spring clean. But that will have to wait. The sun is shining and I want to spend it outdoors.

Love and light,

Susanna xo

PS: I hope to return to my little patch of the internet a lot more often from now on. I hope you visit.