The good news is : OUR SHIPPING CONTAINER ARRIVED. We are now putting together our home in New Zealand. My shoulders are a little more relaxed, and my breathing a little more steady, as we all get to fall asleep in our own beds! We watched these things get packed into boxes many months ago and there were days where we wondered if we would ever see them again. I must say that these last few weeks have felt like a bit of a vacation haze. Now, with our things around us it has sunk in. There has been a bit of walking down memory lane. We have moved. We live here now. Crazy.
In other "memory lane" news : I opened Design Mom this morning, as I do many mornings and saw this image :
I was immediately transported to the smells, sounds and feel of the sun in Kenya, our equatorial home for several years. Before I even started reading I KNEW I had been to this veranda and remembered sitting on those chairs while my children frolicked. I remembered sipping tea and talking about design, life as an American expat in East Africa, organic cotton, and fair trade, with Erin. I remembered the look of Kenya's red dirt on the hands and feet of the children. I remembered hospitality.
As I began reading I realized it was not simply a veranda like the one I had enjoyed but in fact the very same where I had sipped tea. It was a home tour with Erin of Toto Knits. Years ago (maybe 2009 or 2010?) I had contacted Erin while looking for organic yarn for the girls to use for knitting. As it turned out she lived in Nairobi and we periodically made the 5 hour trip from Eldoret to Nairobi to stock up on supplies and the little treats that we remembered from "home" , like goat cheese and sushi nori. Erin insisted that we come by and was extremely hospitable. My husband had some business to take care of in town so our driver brought the children and I out to the area on the outskirts of Nairobi where Erin lived. We talked, toured the house as well as the gardens, and the office/hub of Toto knits and bonded in a way that only people who are caught between two worlds can. Believe it or not her home is MORE lovely than the images are able to transmit and her hospitality was just the recharge that my heart needed that day. I walked away with arms heavy with yarn (and more than a couple of knit items) and a heart content. Pop over and read her wonderful interview if you have a chance!
