In my life of 28 (almost 29) years, I have called 17 various houses and apartments “home”. That is an average of 1.78 homes per year! But, as you can see from the chart above, I have lived in most of these homes in the past ten years!

So, when I decided to join in on Pin It Forward, a blogosphere ring-around-the-rosie collaboration between sfgirlbybay and Pinterest asking 300 bloggers to blog about “What Home means to Me” through words and images, my first thoughts were about my literal homes and the people I have shared them with.

8 Homes in Tennessee (2 in Hendersonville, 1 in Collierville, 5 in Knoxville), 1 Home in Denmark, 4 Homes in Oregon, 1 Home in Thailand, 1 Home in China and 2 Homes in California. The square footage has ranged from 200sf to 3000sf. They have been on three continents. I have shared 4 with family, 7 with roommates, 2 with no one and 4 with the love of my life. Five have been in enormous apartment complexes. One was extremely decadent. One was over 300 years old.  Seven have been within walking distance to a grocery store. Two of them were on campus. And I do not know who is living in any of them any more (except my current home, of course)!

Hendersonville, Tennessee : At Christmas

Collierville, Tennessee : At Christmas

Hendersonville, Tennessee : The house I grew up in

The University of Tennessee: My side of the dorm room

The ladies that made living in the dorms better than I ever expected

We shared some good times in our first off-campus apartments

Copenhagen, Denmark : Our flat in Christianshavn

My Partner in Crime throughout Europe

Knoxville, Tennessee : The house we called our own

And these were the ladies I shared it with

Beaverton, Oregon : My Uncle's bachelor pad that I crashed!

I'm sure he never imagined I would move in with him 23 years after this photo was taken!

Portland, Oregon : The first apartment I had all to myself

Portland, Oregon : The apartment I never dreamed I would live in

And she is the one that shared it with me.

Portland, Oregon : Perhaps the last apartment I will ever have all to myself

Chiang Mai, Thailand : Our first apartment together

We spent a lot of time at that table!!

Shanghai, China : Another apartment I never dreamed I would live in

San Francisco, CA : The one that gave us time to settle in

San Francisco, California : Finally, our very own Home Sweet Home

Many of the Pin It Forward bloggers are designers, and have filled their Pinterest Pin Boards with the most amazing eye candy!! In addition to the above photos, I have filled mine with a little bit of my own. So, if you haven’t already heard of Pinterest, be sure to take a gander. It is the best bookmarking site I have found for inspiration images, and I recommend that you give it a try. The boards that have been created will amaze you, and you will then want to have an account of your own.

Screen Capture of my Pinterest Boards

The final piece of Pin It Forward is that I would like to literally, Pin it Forward (and backwards!)

Yesterday, Casey Keasler of the K.I.D. Collective posted a great little story about how she came to call Denver home, and how Portland will soon be her new home. The funny thing about Casey is that she also went to the University of Tennessee AND she was in my sister’s interior design class. I reconnected with her via Pin It Forward, and her design blog is now one of my favorites.

Tomorrow, Kate and Jack of the Union Jack Creative will be posting about what home means to them. They have a wonderful eye for photography, design and all things whitty, so check it out!

To see the entire schedule of all 300 Bloggers, click the icon below!!

Loy Krathong at the River in Chiang Mai

Thailand time is coming to a close, and I have not been very good about telling you about it!  We leave for China in 4 days, and there is a lot to do.  Today we went to the train station to buy tickets to Bangkok only to find out that they were all full.  We moved on to Plan B, which was to take a bus instead.  Honestly, I prefer the bus.  They are smaller and somehow more personable.  I also enjoy the scenery from the bus more because you actually see towns and people and their homes because you are using the same streets they are.  AND on a bus you get to stop at the crazy Thai rest stops with tons of food!!  Nik prefers the train because they are safer…which is true…but I don’t think we should be scared of crashes and horrible things because we can’t predict the future.

So what have we been up to since we left India??  A lot and not much, all at the same time.  We have started to prepare for re-entry into the real world, which I am looking forward to.  I’m ready to have an income and a little responsibility.  We are still hoping to find work in Shanghai or Tokyo, and hopefully we’ll find out if it’s possible soon.

We have also been preparing for our trip to China.  Our itinerary is set…Beijing-Shanghai-Gulin-Hong Kong…and we have places to stay in Beijing and Shanghai.  We’re still working on Gulin and Hong Kong, but those will happen soon.  Our month in China is much less ambitious than our India trip because we feel like each city has so much to offer.  We have heard from several fellow travelers to stay out of the big cities…but you know what?  We like big cities!  We can’t help it.  We love wandering around for days in the midst of all kinds of people and getting lost.  We love finding the little respits of calm in the midst of chaos.  And I love the buildings, and the food, and the shopping, and the music.  So we’re sticking to our guns, and if you have any suggestions for the 4 cities mentioned…pass them our way.

Despite all of this prep work, we have also gotten out a bit.  I think we’ve visited four different waterfalls at least twice each.  We drove out to Hung Tung Tao Reservoir for lunch twice…once by ourselves and once with some couchsurfer friends.  We participated in the Loy Krathong festivities, some of which you saw with the 10,000 Wishes post.  We spent a couple afternoons reading in the park.  We went on walks.  I found a modern building in Chiang Mai!!!  It is a designers’ studio off of the Canal Road near Huay Kaew Road.  I was too shy to take many photos because people were working.  We have also quenched our hunger for sweets…at Dunken Donuts and the Milk Zone…among others.  And just today, we drove out to Bo Pang to see the handmade umbrellas.  More than anything, we’ve been enjoying our time together in an amazing city….what more can a girl ask for?

Oh, and I almost forgot!  When we were in Bangkok, we saw the current King of Thailand, Rama IX!!!  We happened to be there on October 23 which is King Chulalongkorn Day (in honor of King Rama V) so we went to the Dusit Palace hoping to observe some activity when people started congregating on the sidewalks.  At first we thought they were waiting for a parade, but found out that they were waiting for the King!!  We decided to wait with them, and right at 5:00pm, the motor brigade drove up, the King paid his respects, and the motor brigade drove away.  We waited there with the crowd for at least 4 hours.  All to see the King step out of the car for 2 minutes.  I was impressed by the Thai people’s devotion.

King Rama V Memorial in Bangkok

Crowds await the King's Arrival

Our favorite waterfall off of Huay Kaew Road

Near another waterfall

The kids' area at the river during Loy Krathong

Princess Galyani Vadhana memorial at Tha Pae Gate

A little taste of Modern Architecture...and a water tank!

Sweet Tooth Recognized

Sweet Tooth Recognized again with a Banana Split at Milk Zone

A couple days at the Reservoir

The unfortunate result of Loy Krathong is that we now see Khom Loy littering the sidewalks, roofs, power lines, construction sites and open spaces.

The Physics Building at Chiang Mai University...a study in details and color

Red for emergency circulation

Green for public spaces

Blue for classrooms

Bo Pang Umbrella Village Welcomes You!

My favorite part of today was having my everyday moleskine cover hand painted by a local artist

Of course, Nik has done much better keeping his blog up to date, so you can find several posts about our last month in Chiang Mai, and here are the links to those:

Minor Moments, Tiny Waterfall

Flu & Fire: Loy Krathong in Chiang Mai, Thailand

The Secret Waterfall on the Way to Doi Suthep

Hanging at Reservoirs, Waterfalls and Restaurants

Enjoying the Little Things in Chiang Mai, Thailand

Bangkok Before India, Bangkok After India

**All photos were taken by Nik.

Fifteen hours later, and I am still in awe of watching 10,000+ lanterns float through the sky.  I suspect that I will still be in awe of this moment 15 years from now.  In fact, I think I might look at these photos every single day for the rest of my life.  And the most amazing part is that not only did 10,000+ lanterns float through the sky; 10,000+ people launched them into the sky, and Nik and I were among them!

The Buddhist tradition states that when you release a lantern, Kome Loy, into the sky, you are releasing your misgivings and are to make a wish.  This cleansing ritual makes it difficult to think of anything but how beautiful our lives are as we watched everyone’s wish float toward the heavens.

My wish is to celebrate Loy Krathong with my entire family through the act of releasing Kome Loy into the sky!

I also took a short video of the main release that Nik put to music.  You can watch a high quality version here on YouTube.  It is amazing!!!!

Nik also posted a lot of photos from our day of beauty: Fire in the Sky

The Floating Lantern Ceremony is part of Northern Thailand’s Loy Krathong Festival, also known as Yee Peng, and is held at the Buddhist Meditation Center, Tudong Ka Sathaan Lanna, behind the Mae Jo Agricultural University in San Sai District, Chiang Mai.

Once we get settled, I am planning to do a huge series of India posts….people we met, places we saw, food we ate, etc.  So hold tight, and the exciting stuff will start streaming soon!!

People on Trucks from Nik's Blog

Yesterday, Nik and I spent some time driving around Chiang Mai simply to drive around Chiang Mai.  We have a love/fear relationship with it because it is fascinating to see things here that you would never see anywhere else, but because of these things it seems to be extremely dangerous.  Nik has done a great blog post and below is a video that we took that Nik has added some music to so that you get the jist.

Nik’s Blog: Sitting, Driving, Watching Chiang Mai Traffic