2025 recap

This past holiday season has been the first time in over a decade that wonder | wander | women have spent together, back in our island home in the Philippines. 

Unfortunately, it was not a happy case of time flies when you're having fun. But more of an overload of challenging circumstances - both personal and global. 

holiday wreath

Same time last year, while our US half spent the holidays with our Spanish cousins in New York City, our UK half spent it with longtime friends turned family - amid the bright Christmas lights in Regent Street and holiday cheer of Piccadilly in London. 

Hudson River & George Washington Bridge with NYC across the water

It's been a while since we traveled in unpredictable winter weather or heavy holiday traffic. The long drawn out hours on a packed plane can be the perfect backdrop for some reflective introspection. 

An ideal cushion to the insanity of landing amid flight delays and missed connections. Island adventuring when traversing between West and East. 

Regent Street's Spirit of Christmas 2025

After the storm and the short stay in Edinburgh, these gorgeous scenes passing across our train window - like a spooling film, were both cheery and soothing. It might not be our home waters, but the North Sea and passing streams in each town were a lifeline - adding beauty and vitality to the land. 

the Holy Island of Lindisfarne, a legendary place &
the setting for epics like Vikings and The Last Kingdom

The world turns and seasons change - so do our rhythm and activity. Bursting through our old shell we replace resistance with sprouting intention. The old melts off with the snow - new growth springs up, ideas are attended on and nourished to prosper. Our hearts warm up as budding tendrils reach out their feelers. 

coming in for our landing back in our island hometown

Being writers and visual artists, we love collecting and filling up notebooks. Each journal serving a specific purpose - Morning Pages for stream of consciousness journaling, planners for scheduling and keeping track of events, sketchbooks and art books for creative outlets, idea factories and honing our skills. 

commonplace book & current reading - 
a good combination for getting more out of your books

Our post at the beginning of 2025 featured a notebook review and the journals filled up last year. While Mahala fills hers with her special brand of art and illustrations, Issa applies skills to craft and embellish their covers. 

handmade crochet cover

The cost of love of course, is being vulnerable to loss, to heartbreak. There has been too much of that recently - as we celebrate this time of divine victory over death, we emerge renewed from another Easter celebration. Meanwhile we face many firsts in our daily living without our parents' human presence in 2026. 

matched pair of handcrafted burled wood urns

May we be. May month, May Day, Spring, Beltane - all are here as nature celebrates our connection above and below. A time of opening arms thrown wide as we dance - wild and full of earth's abundance. 

The land we live in, the homes we have created for ourselves, how our lives turn out - these are all the accumulated histories that have led to the times we are living in today. Is this what we wish to pass on to our descendants? 

stormy skies over our island home