HOW TO: TRAVEL

I had several titles for this, like, "How To Travel With Only A Backpack" or "How To Travel For Three Weeks" but really this post is just a condensed master-list of all the things I've learned about traveling as a student abroad. I'm super hungry, so I'm going to write the rest of this after I've made pasta.

LADY DINAH'S CAT EMPORIUM

 Welcome to the most important post I have ever written. I knew about Lady Dinah's Cat Emporium before I even went abroad (I came in just after the donation period), and it's been on my list before I even made a list. I remember a few months ago, when it wasn't open yet and the opening date hadn't been announced, I reluctantly resigned myself to having to go home without experiencing it.

And then I was riding the Stansted Expressed to go to Sweden.

I was trying to snooze on the table because it was six in the morning or something ridiculous, and I heard a girl sitting at the table across from mine exclaim "Oh! The cat cafe is open!" and I SHOT RIGHT UP.

I booked my reservations sitting at a Starbucks in the airport, and managed to grab a date when my Mom and sister were visiting London.

Okay backstory over, now onto the important stuff.

FROM A SMALL ISLAND // 8

DIY TWIN DUVET COVER

Over the summer, when I was eager to start blogging but hadn't left the country yet, I put together a bunch of DIY posts that promptly got lost in my drafts. To fill the void between now and my month-long trip around Europe (oh right, that's happening), I'll be posting some of these blogs to avoid the radio silence that's becoming all too common on this blog (because all I've done of note recently is clean my room and start watching Bob's Burgers). Enjoy!

Because I'm trying to be quirky and fun and whatever, one of my goals this year was to have everything in my room be handmade (I'm currently writing this post in May, almost a full four months before I'll be in Exeter, so when I speak in past tense it's because I'm, what they call, lying. Hello future Kate (Ed: hi)). I started with making my own duvet cover. The only tutorials for duvet covers seem to be for infants. If you're a mom lookin' for a quick and simple baby duvet tutorial, this isn't where you wanna be. I'd suggest looking here, which is what I based this tutorial on.

WHAT YOU'LL NEED:

• sewing machine & thread
• 12 yards of 44" fabric
• snap kit
• scissors, pins, a duvet, etc.

FROM A SMALL ISLAND // 7

)

CORNWALL

 

 

Abby and Carolyn are gonna be mad at me for writing this instead of going to see The Room with them, but this weekend took a lot out of me in more ways than one (not sure what that's supposed to mean??) and I really do have a lot of work I'm just really bad at starting it.

STOCKHOLM

This was the tiniest of all trips, but we booked in on a whim and showed up without a single idea of what we were going to do here, and that ended up making it pretty, as the Swedes say, shveet (they do not say this).