Our new home: We moved to Australia!

Dear friends, and readers. It’s been a while since I last posted, but life has been pretty busy of late. I apologise for leaving you all in the dark for nearly a year, but as you know, one of the core values here is that family life comes first!

It may also come as a surprise to some of you, but I don’t share everything about our lives here on this blog. With most things I am pretty transparent, but there are certain boundaries that are healthy to have. There are so many elements to our lives that I have no business sharing, and I really respect the boundaries set in place by my husband and members of our extended family. As it happens, I sought permission to share this news with you from my husband, not every facet of our lives and those in it are “blogging fodder”. I have always kept much of what I’ve written here solely about “me” and from the perspective of my part in my marriage, and my role in the home. You have to be careful with what you share, and I’ll admit that having stepped away from Instagram for a time - I realise it crosses so many boundaries, and warps how you view yourself and the world. Not every moment of a family’s life is a photo-op for others to see. I needed a while to step back, assess, make peace, and decide how to move forward.

I very nearly gave this all up, but the moment I got here I had an email request to speak to a New Zealand based magazine. It was unusual because I’ve never had much to do with the media this side of the world - it felt like a little “nudge” to keep going, despite my bruised heart.

But I’m back! This blog is my passion project, and as we settle into a routine I want to continue sharing my experiences, home, heart, and personal journey as a homemaker with you…

However, it would be really hard to keep blogging, as I fully intend to do, without being honest about my whereabouts. Some of you may not care, some of you are very kind and are genuinely interested in our story, (and others care a bit too much) - but I just need to let you know for practicalities sake! Sharing pictures flooded with sunshine and parrots in the garden would seem rather out of place without context!

So near the Ocean now: You call me out upon the waters...

Why we decided to move to Australia

My husband and I have always known that at some point in our later adult lives we would live in Australia, it wasn’t a case of if, but when. I never felt it was a topic to share on my blog, because until it happened, it wouldn’t have been relevant - and I’m only sharing it today because my seasons will be a little upside down now! The outlook is a lot brighter, literally and figuratively, but my values are still just the same as they were. All that has changed is the location of my keyboard!

If it were my husband’s choice we would have moved many moons ago, he spent 10 years living in Sydney, after spending his teenage years in New Zealand, and considers Australasia his home. His business is also set up in such a way that he can work from anywhere, and most of his clients are international. If he has a computer and internet connection, he has everything he needs.

My Father has also lived out here for 25 years, with my lovely Step-Mum and two brothers, and I actually have Kiwi blood myself - but despite this, I didn’t feel quite ready to make the leap. However, last Summer a series of events happened that I just knew in my heart were the nudge I needed to take a leap of faith and finally say yes!

This was always our plan, but it happened sooner than I expected. As it turns out - in God’s perfect timing, but we’ll get to that in a bit.

Our hearts were no longer in England

We almost bought a house back in Gloucestershire, it was a lovely 1930s “doer upper”, but in truth, it needed so much work it would have been like purchasing a job. My husband works full time so the process would have been painfully slow, labour too expensive on top of the mortgage and materials costs, and I am not exactly the best at DIY. With the housing market the way it is too, it would have been a bit of a chain around our necks - and as I think it’s probably evident from our lifestyle choice for me to stay home, “lifestyle” means more to us than anything. While the house was lovely and would’ve been a great project for those more experienced in renovations, in truth our hearts weren’t in it - and it really felt like a sideways step.

I was also in a situation whereby I felt a little nervous in our old home. I deliberately chose to use a generalised location for blogging and media purposes, but my privacy, and our family’s safety, was ultimately violated by someone online.

We lived on the edge of the Cotswolds so that’s where I’d say we lived, and it in truth our lives were actually in it. Every weekend we would spend our time enjoying all it had to offer, we’d visit gorgeous pubs, and stately homes - but our village wasn’t one of those “posh ones”, I never said it was… Our old village was large, and our garden backed onto a main road, the house a 3-bed 1960s semi, and certainly not “Pinterest worthy” but I loved it, made some amazing memories, and certainly the best of it.

It was a real home. Warm, comfortable, and humble.

The village was the best part as it had a wonderful community feel, I absolutely adored our neighbours, and it felt like we knew everyone. But someone on the internet had decided to ruin it and share where I lived on a gossip forum! This shook me to the core, because while they felt they were doing no harm and just being “snarky”, it would only take someone who had bad intentions to use that information to find me. I was quite active in our community so they could have asked around and found me very easily. I’m still mad about it to this day. Grown adults hiding behind a keyboard putting a family at risk like that?!

The house we were planning to buy was just down the road, and it didn’t have enough distance for me to feel safe.

Overall 2023 was our “Annus Horribilis”

We almost bought a money-pit. The economy was getting everyone down. We barely had a summer at all. To top it off, a few things in my social circle really made me question certain people and their intentions. I have a pretty charmed life, but something that could have been life-changing happened one evening in the summer - and in the week that followed, I really needed my friends around me, but sadly they were too busy with on social media.

I felt very let down.

It really puts things into perspective when you form friendships that turn out to not be mutually supportive. It has taken me a long time to understand what exactly happened, but I know now this person was prone to a set pattern of behaviours (the same that have since affected a few other people in the community in the same way) - behaviours that are not aligned with your values at all.

That’s all I’ll say on the matter. It’s disappointing to have been fooled so easily, and I am really embarrassed about it but we shall let bygones be bygones.

It was a canon event, finally having my eyes opened in such a way, and in a strange way, I now see that I was being given the opportunity to have a fresh start.

Sometime’s God does a bit of a brutal pruning in your life, but it’s so you can grow back stronger. I see that now, even though it left me reeling, and crying (a lot) at the time.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results. Albert Einstein

Despite the negatives and uncertainty my husband and I were experiencing, we had the power to change it! The whole premise of The Darling Academy, and especially in Ladies Like Us, is about making positive changes and starting afresh. Living in God’s promises… He didn’t want us to be sad, so He gave us a nudge! An abundant life isn’t just about riches and fame, it’s about the little things that you need to live a life that’s right for you, even if they seem insignificant to others.

My husband loves adventures, big open skies, the ocean, and is a warm weather creature. The hotter, the better for him! I wanted to wear dresses every day, and as pathetic as it sounds, I really wanted a pretty house with a lot more space. We couldn’t quite afford the Georgian houses, or crumbly old farmhouses that are advertised on the front of Country Living Magazine that I used to swoon over, and the architecture that was within our budget wasn’t exactly setting our world on fire.

Arlo just wanted to play outside - he has, at the very moment I’m writing this, returned from a bike ride and showed me a video he took; his first time seeing Kangaroos in the wild! Oh, and he wants to learn to surf, of course. Australia just seemed to make sense when we sat down and discussed what we wanted out of life.

I hadn’t lived anywhere but Gloucestershire or London, had never had a big experience exploring the world outside my comfort zone - the opportunity presented itself, we had the financial means, and I knew it would make my husband and son happy too - and so here we are!

Having moved internationally before, my husband said it would be cheaper to buy everything new as shipping costs are so high. So only our sentimental and “most loved” items were packed into a crate, and are still on a ship on some ocean bound for Oz.

I set about selling everything on Facebook Marketplace (what a trial of patience that was!), and donated so many things. I even parted with my much loved Beryl collection, as I was too nervous to ship any china, and also felt it needed to stay in England. I gifted a fair few items to friends who were collectors, sold some duplicates of the “rare” stuff, and the bulk of it went to a lovely lady who follows this blog.

As the house slowly emptied, (and while we certainly had emotional moments), we had such a sense of peace in the whole process - that God was in this - and it was exactly what we were meant to be doing. I can’t share much more because it’s too private, but there were many things that happened in our personal lives that felt like a “severance” to that chapter of our lives, and too many coincidences - ones that could only be of God, or fate, or the Universe (however you might like to understand it for yourself).

I did mention an international move in my Facebook group, so many of you were aware of us emigrating, and I was coy about the location at the time because I really needed to pray about whether I would even continue blogging. Many of you thought it might be America, and it nearly could have been because of my husband’s work, but Australia is where we will be for now. Will it be forever? I’m not sure - no one is ever really certain of what the future holds, but that’s what makes life exciting!

Homemaking (and writing) somewhere new

I love blogging and writing, I really do, but certain experiences and people I have met have really put me off it lately. As such I have taken time in the past few months to reassess my own boundaries, and I’ve decided I’m going to blog like it was in the “early days”, before “influencers” were really a thing. I’ve blogged in different iterations since 2010, and it would be odd to stop me. It’ll be just me and my keyboard, my thoughts, and the things I love sharing, and hopefully I’ll see you with a cup of tea or coffee in hand, popping by whenever you like.

The content will very much centre around homemaking, and a few “heart to heart” pieces here and there. What I don’t like about social media these days is the focus it puts on people looking a certain way, or having the right stuff in their homes, and pretending life is perfect and rosy all the time!

What you read here will always be honest, but with healthy boundaries, and hopefully an encouragement to you too. I’ve always been honest in that I’m not a perfect person, or that I lead a perfect life, or lives in a picture perfect house with a fancy postcode. I’m just a housewife who is happy (and lucky enough) to stay home, and is making the best of it - wherever it may be!

I’m not a perfect person, or that I lead a perfect life, or lives in a picture perfect house with a fancy postcode. I’m just a housewife who is happy (and lucky enough) to stay home, and is making the best of it - wherever it may be!

Oh and Anglophiles, fret not! This blog isn’t about to lose any of its “Britishness”, I can imagine I’ll be upping the ante when it comes to keeping the culture alive here, so as to make it feel homely. I’m fully expecting to lean into the ’Pom’ stereotype quite quickly… Christmas in July, anyone? ;)

I’ll say goodbye for now, as the laundry needs sorting and I have a pantry to organise (squeeee, yes, a walk-in pantry!).

I have always wanted a picket fence

I’ll introduce you to the house next time if you’re interested? She’s rather a pretty one, she reminds me of a Doris Day movie with white weatherboarding, a white fence, and a bull-nose verandah, (and joy, a separate games room for the boys’ and their video games), but it was the brick path that made me realise that this house had been gifted to us because He knew the desires of my heart - but that’s a story for another time.

With love from Down Under,