While things have been going smoothly since landing in Wellington, the past few days I’ve been constantly reminded that I am, in fact, not a Kiwi born and bred. This all came about due to my desire for pumpkin chocolate chip cookies.
Yurmm
I love these cookies and make them often in the winter as they’re warm, fluffy, and utterly delicious. As we’re going into winter down here, my body was like, “Time for pumpkin chocolate chip cookies, Julia!”, so off to the store I went.
I’ve had many wonderful and unique experiences since moving to New Zealand, but one that was an absolutely novel delight was experiencing a SUMMER Christmas! 
Continue reading
I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard some variation on “People grow so much between 18 and 25.” You can know something without really knowing it. For example, I knew moving to NYC would be hard. I had no clue what that actually meant until I moved there and experienced it for myself. Similarly, the years between 18 and 25 were just some vague notion that something might happen and I’d become a different person. Something in those 7 years would somehow, miraculously, Make Me An Adult. Continue reading
The past two weeks have been a whirlwind of activity. It was a massive undertaking leaving behind my life in NYC – my world for the last 7 years. Packing up an entire apartment and putting on a solo concert certainly strained my resources to the max, but I came out all the better for the stress and hard work. I not only blew others away with the concert, but I surprised myself. I hadn’t performed in several years, but my voice has never been better and I was able to sing pieces I’ve longed to sing for some time but didn’t have the power or finesse to pull off even two years ago. This project was a huge reminder that even if you don’t feel/think you’re ready, just take the first baby step, then the next, and eventually everything works out and you’ll be so glad you tried!
The happy face of triumph
I’ve decided something. Finally. After months of pondering, weeks of calculating, and countless seconds agonizing, I’ve finally decided something big. But let’s take it back to the beginning, shall we? Continue reading
After spending 4 days at Garrett’s wonderful apartment in Cork, my journey continued with a road trip to Dingle. It was my first experience where the cars are on opposite sides of the road, but thankfully Garrett was at the wheel. I got to sit back, navigate, and soak up the breathtaking countryside views.
We stopped to explore beaches and coves and make new friends along the way 🙂
We were only in Dingle for a day. It’s a small, quiet village with not a lot going on and only two pubs. Sitting on the dock, you’re surrounded by water and green hills dotted with sheep. It was so peaceful. One day, when I’m a highly popular writer with advances for my next series of children’s books, I’ll go to Dingle for three months to write and just be.
I got an unexpected addition to my SEA trip – three days in Tokyo! Turns out it was easier to fly to the west coast of America instead of across Europe to the east coast. Color me totally ok with that!
My time in Japan was a mixed lot, but I’ll tell you one thing – the food did not disappoint.
*Note, I am NOT a food photographer. I am a food EATER.
I thought through a technical glitch that I’d lost all my pictures from Nusa Lembongan, Indonesia, and half of my Tokyo pics. Turns out I found them!!
Nusa Lembongan is an island off the coast of Bali. It’s part of a cluster of three island that, unfortunately and unbeknownst to me, are major tourist sites. Everything I’d read made the islands sound like they’d barely been explored or exploited. Turns out that wasn’t true. But I still had a fantastic three days hanging out on my own on this beautiful piece of land.
Pulling into harbor – that’s a volcano straight ahead! 😀
A definite highlight of my trip was getting to see so many waterfalls. It wasn’t the rainy season so they often weren’t running in full glory, but they provided some of my most blissfully peaceful memories.
This is the waterfall in Pai:
My own natural foot spa
