This weeks thrifty find isn't mine.  It's my daughter's.  She spotted the little pirate toby mug and exclaimed "just like Mum's!".

The shopkeeper carefully wrapped it for her and added "It's always good to have collections," before handing it to my beaming 6 year old.

Their providence is nothing exceptional.  A simple "Japan" back stamp. They both have little chips.  However, they make me smile and they make my daughter beam.

*Linking in with Op Shop Show Off

Spring comes at the other end of the year in New Zealand, but it is celebrated just the same.  We could lay claim to fields of Wordsworth's daffodils.  But we often forget have our own poetry too.  What better way to celebrate a spring in full flight, than with a little Baxter, wrapped around a teacup.

Blow Wind of Fruitfulness

Blow, wind of fruitfulness,
 Blow from the buried sun:
Blow from the buried kingdom
 Where heart and mind are one.

Blow, wind of fruitfulness,
 The murmuring leavers remember;
For the deep in doorless rock
 Awaits their green September .


Blow from the wells of night:
 The blind flower breathes thy coming
Birds that are silent now
 And buds of barren springing.

Blow from beyond our day.
 The hill-borne streams complain:
Hear from their stony courses
 The great sea rise again.

Blow on the mouth of morning
 Renew the single eye:
And from remembered darkness
 our immortality.

James K. Baxter

After a week in Oslo, we parted ways.  My sister and Dad traveling to Sweden and me heading home to  a very patient family. 

Dad enjoyed every minute of showing his girls around the land that so captured his imagination.  A land with a history of exploration, both ancient vikings and pioneering polar races.

Vikings, polar ships and symbols

It is also home to many people who are dear to my father's heart.  It was a privilege to spend time with them. 

Detail from Oslo Town Hall mural series

Someone asked what took him to Norway in the first place.  The reasons are as complex as they are deeply personal.  Their meaning shifts over the years.  In spending the time with Dad, I sometimes feel we only got a glimpse of his version of history.  Yes, it offered adventure, and yes there was a woman involved.  But at a time when Dad was feeling most broken, in every sense, this distant land also offered the time and space that he needed to learn to walk again.

The Hytt, the car and the adventure