Wander & Nest

We’ve been back in California for almost a week now and it’s been really interesting to think back on the year. It was a truly incredible year.

We covered so much ground and also managed to stay in places long enough to really get a feel for life there. We lived in Christchurch, New Zealand, Toulouse, France, and Gothenburg, Sweden, and every place exceeded our expectations in some way or another. Nature in New Zealand really is all it’s cracked up to be and then some, the food and wine in France cannot be matched, and the social support for families is evident everywhere in Sweden.

We were also met with so many nice surprises during our travels. Christchurch was such a pleasant place to live – it was so laid back, everything moves at a slower pace, people were so friendly, and generally life was just easy. Even though I had never been to Toulouse I immediately had a sense of familiarity and comfort since we had lived in Paris before. But life in Toulouse is nothing like Paris. It’s easily to navigate, people are friendly, life is calmer, and it has everything we want out of a city but without the overwhelm of Paris. Just another reminder that France is so much more than Paris. And then Sweden probably had the most surprises – the food and sweets were amazing, people were friendly, and sustainability is actually a core value of society.

Wylie and I had both traveled quite a bit before Mara so we were used to packing, flights, trains, metros, busses, etc. but this year was a whole other level of travel for two main reasons. First, of course, because we were doing it with a two year old. And second because we were treating each of these locations like a full blown move, not a visit. And on top of those moves, we took mini trips – A LOT of trips. Mara has already become an expert traveler before her third birthday.

Looking back, the year was a fun and wild ride. It was exciting and nerve-wracking, eye-opening, really really difficult at times, but also peaceful, interesting, fun, and (my new favorite word) delightful. Sometimes it felt like all of those feelings at once.

I feel so grateful for this incredible year for our family, and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. We planned this year as a sort of shopping trip, to experience life in 3 countries to see where we might want to move. That changed when Wylie got the job in Toulouse. We weren’t interviewing countries anymore, we just got to soak up the experience of living in them. Our next step is to move to Toulouse in August and I’m really excited about it. People have asked if that’s it, are we done, are we living in Toulouse forever? And I can’t answer that question. Nothing is permanent. So maybe Toulouse will be our last move, or maybe it’s just the next one in our larger journey. We’ll see.

Thanks for reading our blog. Kia ora, Au revoir, Hejdå, Bye.