"Would India please stand up?"

This weekend I had my training camp for India! Where everyone traveling overseas with Antipodeans (the company organising my travel) in the next few months, met up and learnt about the essentials before we go. This also meant I finally got to meet the 5 girls I'm going with. I have met one of them before - Sophie - but the others I only knew through Facebook. I was so nervous and had butterflies in my stomach all the way there. I walked into the hall and felt like I was starting high school all over again. When the 6 of us finally found each other, it was so exciting! 


The weekend flew by and was really helpful (we learnt how to teach the kids english and how to run a class). Except the whole time I couldn't stop thinking it was like high school with all the cliques, because everyone spent the whole time with people in their country and that's what we were called by. "Where is the Kenya group?" "Brazil, you're in room 18" "Nepal you're on cleaning up duty tonight" "Would India please stand up and follow me". It was quite funny actually. It was sad when we had to leave (especially when we realised we wouldn't be leaving for another 2 months!) but we're planning on meeting up again before we go :)

These are the 5 lovely girls who will become my 'family away from home"

Annierose, Maddy, Sophie, Lauren and Hannah 

Get the picture: Home

This is the second installment of "Get the picture", which is Lauren's fun, photo sharing idea from Outside Voice. You can read all about it here. This months theme is:

HOME

"Home
Let me come Home
Home is wherever I’m with you"

(I think this song has captured the way I feel about home)

To me, home is more than just the place I live:

Home is a feeling, that is hard to describe. I suppose it's when you feel safe and 'complete'. When you're somewhere, or with someone, that makes you feel like nothing in the world could go wrong and everything is perfect - that is home.
So because my blog is all about the photos, I suppose I should try and show you what home means to me, but really, it needs to be felt:

Photos from the weekend

Before you say anything, yes I know, there are a lot of photos here! But it was a huge weekend full of celebrations for mum and I.

On Friday night we had a family dinner at the local Chinese:

Saturday night was mum's 50th, where everyone dressed up (which is always so much fun), and Will and I were the bartenders:

We were all so exhausted after Saturday night, but we pushed on and did the whole thing again, with my friends this time:

Then finally on Sunday it was our actual birthdays! It was a horrible day weather wise, it bucketed down with rain and the wind was torrential (but it didn't dampen our spirits). We started off with lunch at Ripples, down at Milson's Point (aka Sydney Harbour for all you non-Australians) with my grandpa and step grandma:

 (Creme Caramel with Turkish fairy floss...yum!)

Then we headed off to my grandma and step grandpa's house for drinks, before Will took me out to dinner:

 (This is the beautiful ring Will got me)

I had a fantastic birthday weekend and am looking forward to my last year as a teenager!