Due to growing conversations where people mention they've 'only seen our bathroom', I want to keep you in the loopity-loop---our apartment does have other rooms, and they are sprouting more furniture each week. I’ve been in a bit of a photography slump of late, but photos will be soon. They will.

What I wanted to talk about today was that we are getting fabulously close to our first anniversary (just under a week now). This year has been so jam-full of goodness together, and as the blog has been a bit neglected of late, I'm swiping my chance to relive our adventures. We have come together this year, and I can't imagine anything better than coming and going with my best friend. He is a gift, and I love the depth of memories sifting together already. Today, I'm running my hands back through their grains. (photo credits to the incredible Vick Photography)

After a year in different continents, on a fallish summer day last September, we started this permanent together, enjoyed our changed status in paradisal Maui, and celebrated again at a fabulous art museum.

Month One of marriedness entailed not only parties and hulas, but long flights and visa woes. The day we were to leave for Scotland, my visa hadn't made its expected appearance, and I cried that my new husband might have to go ahead of me. Three hours before my flight, my passport was handed to me. We flew together and made our first home in a stone Scottish flat near the sea. We picked apples in our charming garden, ate donuts and are both fairly sure he carried me over the hearth.

Month Two. With pumpkins from the farmer’s market and enough apples to run a small cider mill, we consumed pounds of apple crisp and found colors in nether-green Scotland. We hosted the most epic apple party, and enjoyed a lot of people around our wee table in our delightful town.

Month Three. In November, we started decorating the house, and took our first married European trip, feeling like old ex-pats already. We gobbled vanilla-pudding-soaked waffles at the Viennese Christmas markets and reveled in the glory of Austrian subways and bratwursts. Month three also found us in one of my bucket list destinations, Prague where the spires spired to fairytale height.

and the next week I managed to extract my first giblets from our first turkey which we shared.

The unusually snowy winter started early and it poured snow on St Andrews’ Day when we celebrated with Scottish pipers and fireworks bursting from the sea.

In Month Four my man brought home our first tree and we decorated our wee place for the conifer season.

I made his first birthday cake banoffee

and we walked the icy cobbles to the Christmas fair in our resident city, Edinburgh. Month four also carried us back across the ocean for the first time together, where we visited the Big Apple and our families for a restful holiday season. We rang out the year we were married in joy and walked into 2011 holding hands.

Month Five found us back home in bonnie Scotland where the dry snow brought out our wellies often and didn't stop us from our walks by the North Sea. My first farm box full of vegetables from a local farm came in January. We made friends with squirrels in London,

flew back to the Land of the Free, and took a road trip down the East coast to my favorite ranch, and the rich Smokies that surround it. We shot photos together and laughed until our stomachs hurt on that special trip.

Month Six brought us our first Valentine's day together, and Mr. Romantic himself created a surprise I'll never forget.

Walker's parents flew in for a short trip, and brought us to the West coast of Scotland and the Isle of Mull for some shockingly barren landscapes. Back on the other side of the country, Prince William and Kate visited, and Walker (of course) shook the Prince's hand.

The beginning of Month Seven brought us our half-anniversary, which we celebrated in classic style on the foamy beach.

The glory of Scotland is that spring blows in fresh and early. Walker was busy with the radio station he led, and we all the more enjoyed our trip to Italy which led us into Month Eight. We squeezed orange juice from garden oranges in Sorrento and felt the cart-ridges on ancient roads in Pompei. We braved the Amalfi coast in a rain-storm and braided fresh mozzeralla in the cheese experience to trump all others. We opened our windows over the Arno in Florence, and breathed in those famous Tuscan tones for a few days before another few days in Rome.

We walked along canals and touched exquisite tulip petals near Amsterdam, and oh, we spent a delicious time among chocolates and farmland in Bruges (we couldn't get enough of that place).

Back home, the beach burgeoned with sun and volleyball, and our town hosted the annual funky history parade. The month rounded out with us sipping champagne in our British friends' home waving imaginary Union Jacks as the most famous couple from St Andrews married.

And on into Month Nine (May) where our garden was stuffed with colour and we went with some friends to London for walking, tea, and the Lion King. And then the packing started, and the month of goodbyes that somehow feels like it hasn't ended yet. We ended our year of fabulous dinner parties with a Great Gatsby themed extravaganza that still makes me laugh.

Walker finished exams, finished university, and our attempt to visit Ireland was thwarted by winds that blew us to a family castle for the night.

Month Ten we traversed the Atlantic to search for a new place, found one, and started a crammed European trip that included a stop in Scotland, a blissful time in Geneva and then the most stunning place I've ever been---the Swiss Alps.

We met up with Walker's parents for a foodie and garden trip to Paris. Our last five days in Scotland, Walker graduated, we visited all our favorite spots, and on a cool, quiet evening, we set off fire lanterns over the beach. (Goodness, I can hardly write for the ache of missing it all still.) And then, like that, we left. We left behind the storied city where we met, fell in love, learned to love.

Month Eleven found us moving into our first place in America, into a city, into the new normal.

We spent our first days apart when I traveled to Maine, and time slipped into August, our Twelfth Month of being married.

And now? Travels have diminished, and I've shocked myself by missing flying. Walker works, I search, and we are more grateful than ever for weekends. This month has been so much quieter than the year, and I'm working on finding a place for this blog again, without crazy destinations to describe. I've missed writing to you. Thanks for coming back to read!

This year, better than all the European pastries and mountains have been the welcome home hugs and mornings waking up and realizing we are married, we belong. We’d planned to take a wee roadtrip up the coast to conjure some salt-air walks, but our car’s out of commission. So, we're figuring what to do. More soon!