L E O N I E . W I S E

dear friends,

my heart is full to bursting because of tiny jewels, of happy accidents: chance encounters, random crazy moments of what-the-fuck-just-happened, feeling my heart change beat to sing in time to the drummers in the park, noticing the sound of the tap in the kitchen dripping and the hum of the refrigerator in the corner, finding the best coffee in the neighbourhood and making new friends of strangers.

magic lies in places like this. the discovery of a new friend via the blog world that leads to a meeting, then a trip to her fair city. i`m referring specifically to the lovely jeanine, whose house i sit in as i compose these first few lines to you.

i have so many photographs of this trip and a feeling that, even if i wrote for days, i simply could not portray to you just how much fun these few magic-filled days have been.

so instead of trying, i shall simply share some glimpses with you:

wandering the mile end streets

canon 5d mkII, diana+ lens

(i walked by the day after i’d taken this photograph to see the guy polishing his unicorn)

quirky shops, filled with interesting assortments

canon 5d mkII, diana+ lens

an amazing garage sale find. i mean who could resist the temptation to buy the polaroid spectra close-up stand duplicator for only $2. WHO? (i suspect this one purchase alone now qualifies me as a camera junkie of the strangest kind)

crossing to the other side of the tracks (loving the discovery that my jeans were folded up to different lengths)

to visit the fresh food market

interesting locals

tam tams in the park

the montreal jazz festival

great shop windows (yes, i did buy the moustache)

and gardens bursting with colour

a visit to beautys luncheonette: a montreal institution (for a full diner breakfast experience – including the crap filter coffee)

then to another for sodas

renting a bixi bike and cycling to the top of mont royal in the evening to see the city

the exhilarating ride back down the hill through the cemetery and a beautiful encounter with a raccoon

the BEST vegan food i have ever tasted in. my. life.

back streets and alleyways full of surprises

pizza and wine in the back yard, complete with tiki lanterns (which prompted this post by jeanine)

canon 5d mkII, diana+ lens

and a photobooth session for the finale – the results of which had me laughing so hard that my sides hurt & i had tears running down my face. i still need to work on my photobooth face!

there has been life, love & laughter in spades.

with love to you, wherever you are
-leonie

p.s. more photographs up on flickr (with more to come as i slowly sort through them all)

my bag is packed and i’m all ready for my next adventure: off gallivanting* in the english countryside.

see you when i get back. i hope you are having some fab adventures of your own!

* i LOVE this word, don’t you?

dear friends,

so many stories to tell about new jersey… we had an amazing long weekend, staying with kiki and her family in maplewood, new jersey and travelling by train into new york city each day. i am so pleased too that bella’s schedule meant she could come hang out with us for the day on sunday and that we also got to lunch with the lovelies elizabeth and  christine. good times!

marc digs us out from underneath all the snow

there was a LOT of snow in the city

we mostly stayed away from the big attractions. we’d been up the empire state building last time we were in new york and didn’t want to queue for an hour to go up there again. we’d also already seen the statue of liberty, ridden the subway here, there & everywhere and been to times square, so we avoided those too, choosing instead to explore the meatpacking district and greenwich & east villages. here’s [some of] what we found….

what looks to be a banksy rat is blown up by this finely dressed geezer

street art in the meatpacking district

cupcakes from magnolia bakery on bleeker street, greenwich village

pizza in a cone. quite good actually

stumptown in the ace hotel. great coffee, but poorly laid out premises. we’ll forgive them as the ace hotel has an awesome photobooth. i think i have a new addiction – photobooth shots to come in a separate entry

central station

pershing square. i love the colours and lights on this place!

otto’s shrunken head tiki bar & lounge. east village bar with attitude and a rockin’ photobooth

more photos of our trip can be found here on flickr

i have been thinking a lot about feet this week. primarily due to a prompt for the first week of unravelling.

i’m not going to go into any detail about the assignment, because it’s not my place to tell you about the content of the course (it’s susannah’s baby and she absolutely deserves all the credit). it’s also partly because i consider this course to be an invitation… as a way that i can also question myself and begin new conversations that bubble up to the surface of my mind along with my responses to the course work. i see unravelling as a light, showing me the way into unexplored parts of me; a set of clues given to me by someone who hasn’t walked my path, yet has trodden one of their own that i can gain insights and wisdom from.

me and these feet have been travelling for a long time.
lifetimes perhaps. it feels like a long time ago, i left a place that was dear to me, part of me fully knowing that i would lose my way and spend a long time finding a pathway that would return me to the place that feels like somewhere i can belong.

i think i have also been runing from myself for [almost as] long as i’ve been travelling…
choosing to pack up & move when life got tricky rather than sticking around to work through my shit. this happens less frequently now as i get to know myself more. i travel now to move towards things like adventure and new friendships, rather than away from places of pain & discomfort. and it’s not that i don’t have these anymore, more that i am learning to sit with myself, dive into and explore those places, make them my friends and journey with them, accepting them as parts of who i am and what makes me whole.

these feet rollerbladed me on my first date with my beloved, and were barefoot as i held the arm of my father and walked along the beach to where i would make him my husband. they have danced me through festivals, helped me find balance in the standing leg series of bikram yoga, carried me to the doorways of both old & new friends, wandered over many pathways (both literally & metaphorically) and borne me through many countries. they were right there with me when i decided that i wanted a life of travel and adventure and not one with a house, a mortgage, two kids, two cars etc. the latter life is valid, it’s just not the one for me.

i find myself most grounded when not wearing any shoes.
that being said, i do love shoes and select them based on how much fun i think we can have together. i have dr martens, funky el naturalistas, a pair of pointy ones that seriously make me feel like getting up to mischief, some cowgirl boots and always, always a pair of funky birkenstock thongs.

i was looking back through the [very few] photos i have taken of my feet and found an unsurprising theme. in most i am barefoot & close to the sea. the ocean is one place i guess i could call home… my spirit home if you will. a place that soothes me, simply by being near her with my toes dug into the sand, or walking through her laughing waves. the sea is where i wash my taonga (treasures), one of which is a bone-carving of a mermaid. we know each other, the sea and i, and i miss her like a treasured friend when we are apart.

my beautiful, mostly uncomplaining feet have carried me to this place where i now sit (barefoot), with words tumbling around in my head craving to be made sense of. these feet are an essential part of the same body as a heart that is finally learning that all of this travelling to faraway & magical places is leading me closer and closer to the home that i will always carry deep within my most present and grounded self.

we are here

this hotel chosen for (i) it’s proximity to the blue lagoon (the name of which always makes me think of this movie) and (ii) the fact that it’s out of the city of reykjavik and we are more likely to see the northern lights.

fingers crossed we see them tonight.

panoramic – taken by nic – best viewed large

the view from our room

how to cool a bottle of veuve clicquot kiwi-style…
hang it out the window (in the -5 degC temperatures) in a plastic bag tied to a shoe-lace.

{ for darlene’s december views }

we’ve just had the best long weekend in copenhagen

city of bicycles

this is a place i fall completely in love with whenever we visit

hanging out with friends,

finding the most interesting places

away from the main streets

elegance

and love are everywhere

there’s amazing coffee

some great places to eat

and the weather was perfect for being outside

love,
-leonie

maxim bar, copenhagen

5 things i am excited about today

1. discovering that anthropologie is opening a store in london in just a few days. joy!
2. visiting friends in copenhagen this coming weekend (jellyfish salad anyone?)
3. record the day – by lobster & swan
4. the brilliant insider’s guide to my secret london from wee birdy & friends
5. lo-fi london, from notes by naive, reveals to me some yet undiscovered places (not for long)*
6. a journalling tutorial from curiously crafty

what’s got you excited today?

*it was only 5 this morning, and i’ve since found this gem. for a new zealander living in london, this is an awesome find, as it’s often hard to even know where to start looking for delights like this page has

the above photo was actually taken in provincetown, though i thought it appropriate as the opening shot for these postcards to you…

art really is a way of life…
as important to me now as breathing.

and how wonderful it was to go to SAW and be surrounded by such beauty & creativity. sometimes, i wished the magic few days would never end though in my heart i know that if i could have this all the time, some of the sparkle would wear off. i also know that i carry that magic around inside of me and can connect into it whenever i need.

speaking of beauty, check out the breathtaking view from the dock outside my cabin at squam lake… i’d been in for an early morning dip and was in the water, floating quietly in the stillness of the morning as the sun rose over the horizon. those are my footprints along the dock as i jumped out to also try and capture the beauty of this place in order share it with you.

it really is a beautiful,

beautiful,

beautiful place…

i realised on this trip that i AM a little bit country (not sure about the rock ‘n roll – i’ll get back to you on that one). these boots were found in provincetown and they completely satisfy my alter-ego’s cowgirly desires…

i’ve got a couple more posts coming, as i want to share with you some photos from a couple of the classes i did and tell you more about the wonderful, wonderful people i met. hopefully you can get a sense from these few photos of how inspiring and suited the rockywold deephaven camp on squam lake is to getting the creative juices flowing.

with love,
leonie

#17 in my 101 things in 1001 days list

dear friends,
we’re having a great time here in new england…

we’ve been whale watching,

making tiny moments of zen with gifts from the altantic ocean

and generally kicking back relaxing

this place really is quite magical.

with love,
-leonie

dear friends,

we’ve been tripping around quite a bit recently – the new spring weather has us creeping out from beneath warm feather duvets, flinging open doors & windows and venturing to new places.

last weekend, it was an overnight visit to prague. we travelled with friends (also originally from new zealand), to support our friend running her first marathon in prague.

prague is beautiful, virtually untouched by world war two. the locals are friendly, the beer cheap (and delicious)…

the weather was gorgeous and the main city areas are easy to travel on foot.

nic and i walked up to the palace through the gardens from the streets below

the city lay out below us, a beautiful bohemian city covering both sides of the river

sunday, we cheered our friend on as she ran… the layout of the marathon meant we could walk to different parts of the course to see something new and offer some more enthusiastic encouragement.

the trip was far too short and we’d love to go back. with so many other places still to visit over this side of the world we’ll definitely have to plan for it – perhaps a visit in winter to go snowboarding!

with love and my thoughts of you…
x