Today’s love: heart-spotting in my homemade toast with jam.

Luckily, the love of handmade permeates everyday life.

Bur right now my mind is on other things, and I’ve had to make the decision to put my Tea For Bini etsy store “on vacation” for the next couple of months while I focus on finishing my degree.

I’m sure after its all over my mind will be bursting with new ideas and I’ll relish in my return to crafting handmade goodness. For now, let absence make the heart grow fonder…

Take care x

I took Mr Bini to Point Walter last weekend, and we walked out along the sand right into what felt like the middle of the river.

The water was cold and lapped at as from two directions.

I know that feeling well. With two months until graduation, I’m the busiest I’ve been in my whole 6 years of study. Everything is happening at once.

But even when the two tides meet and the path becomes completely covered in water, your feet and calves numb, your rolled up jeans wet at the knees, all you can do is take comfort in feeling the sand under your feet and use that as your guide forward.

And Mr Bini and I, well, we will always feel pulled in two directions. With homelands on opposite sides, the pull is a persistent sensation, a gentle nagging, a wistful inclination.

scrumptious almond croissant (the real kind, with almondmeal in the middle – none of this custard nonsense)

+

great coffee

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mini green suitcase bought at market

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warm sunlight

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gypsy music from nearby buskers

=

Lovely lovely morning.

These are the last of my pictures from Belgium.

On one of our last days we went on a day trip to West-Vlaanderen (West Flanders). First stop was Ieper (Ypres in French). If you know a thing or two about the First World War, you might recall that it was a bloody battleground between the Germans and the Allied Forces.

Tyne Cot Cemetery, in a town called Passendale, is not far from Ieper and was constructed in memory of many unidentified soldiers who died during the battles,

including many Australians.

The cemetery would have to be one of the most beautiful ones I have ever visited with brightly coloured, well maintained flowers growing neatly beside all the graves.

And the garden is full of ‘Hommel’ bees (which are real, fuzzy bumble bees, not the comparatively tiny things we see in Australia).

One of the most poignant graves at Tyne Cot must surely be that of Arthur Conway Young’s, which reads:

“SACRIFICED TO THE FALLACY

THAT WAR CAN END WAR.”

Some more pictures for you, this time from Utrecht and Amsterdam.

This is what I call living next to a canal!

The lady in red with an apple bicycle. Best job in the world? Quite possibly.

We had some visitors while dining canal-side.

Amsterdam in its full sun-shiney glory.

A serious cheese shop. Wall to wall!

Tomorrow we’re on our way home – see you soon, Australia.

Some pictures for you!

Lovely coffee and croissant in Ghent. You know you’re in Belgium when you are served some Cote D’or chocolate with your coffee.

Heart-spotting is a hard habit to break. This is the sweetest of 3 that I spotted in the Bokrijk open air museum (think nature reserve combined with olden-day villages).

Carnivalesque scene at Bokrijk.

At the Sahara (the nature reserve, not the desert).

Corn fields.

Sleeping Flosje style.

Come back in the next day or two for photos of Holland!

x

We are in Belgium!

It is just lovely here. When we arrived we were greeted with a hot spell, which was actually quite welcome after shivering through Perth’s cold streak. Now the rain has come and it is starting to cool down to the comfortable low-twenties.

I have been eating chocolate, drinking cherry beer and attempting to speak bits and pieces of Dutch.

We have 11 or so days of adventures left so I will be back to post some photos soon!

x

PS: Good news – Typepad were super nice and sent me the backup of the images from all my old posts, so they should be back up as soon as I find the time to sort it out.

Yes….oops. As is turns out, the export I did when moving blogs didn’t include all the photos from my old posts. *sigh*

I’ve emailed Typepad and batted some lashes, so hopefully I will be able to get them back.

Today has been a super crappy day!

I’m trying to remind myself that one week from today Mr Bini and I will be arriving in Belgium. Happy thoughts, happy thoughts!

Exams are over, uni is all done for the Semester and now it’s time to enjoy the holidays!

I have some travel plans so there won’t be oodles of spare time but on my days at home I’ll be sure to update the etsy store and tackle some crafty projects I’ve had lying around for months. And of course give this little blog the attention it deserves!

Today I decorated this moleskine with a crafty picture and am going to use it for my ideas and designs. I have some sewing and gardening pictures along the same lines and am thinking of making myself a couple more of these moleskines. Cute, huh?

♥

Tea For Bini was featured in The Wire magazine in today’s The West Australian newspaper.

And in case you didn’t spot it:

Hoorah for Perth’s crafty peeps!