how to staycation Amsterdam-style

We had been lusting after a getaway for a year, paging squinty-eyed through our agendas waiting for a weekend to magically open up. When time and space suddenly shifted to uncover three days off… Continue reading →

there and back again

I’m back from Java and Bali, but not really. There were too many moments where I scrunched my eyes shut to etch the beauty like a lithograph into memory. I’m closing my eyes… Continue reading →

back to the islands

Happy Friday, friends! I’m working, playing a show, and packing this weekend. Packing, because on Monday I’m flying to this achingly beautiful country: I’m so excited I can hardly stand it. Are any… Continue reading →

patriotic oomph

July 4th is a confusing day for me. After all, I spent my first two decades in Indonesia, travel on an American passport, and now am stretching taproots down into Dutch soil. Having… Continue reading →

quick fix colour

My mother-in-law is fearless when it comes to colour. A weekend at her house feels like a vacation in the Caribbean. (For more mouthwatering glimpses into her home, hop over to this post.)… Continue reading →

al fresco

This green & coral glory of a salad. With these truffley, ashy, and sharp treasures procured from the cheesemonger’s cave of wonders on the Twijnstraat. And the stone fruit, almost too pretty to… Continue reading →

following the flare

I walked home from work in one continuous stripe of sunlight past the canal-side patios crowded with burnt shoulders.  Past the old slanted houses with their dimpled windows squinting in this improbable burst… Continue reading →

i’ve been…

…spicing up the ole brekkie routine. …playing hide-and-seek. …feasting with my colourful friends. …spending happy evenings here. …shrinking my lofty 5’11 perspective down into four-year-old wonder. Any happy, life-sustaining stuff happening to you these… Continue reading →

there’s a certain slant of light

  The real reason I flew to California last month is that someone I love very much is quite ill. Emily Dickenson seems to have written the brief on how I feel about it:… Continue reading →

party on a plate — Indonesian gado gado

I’m not sure when our little bunker became the family party house. But sometime after the last rager Christmas brunch, my sister-in-law and I put on our scheming hats to scheme up a… Continue reading →