eight years of avenue maria

Photos by my lovely (and very talented friend!!) Lily Quirin

This Sunday I get to celebrate two wonderful things in my life – having this blog for eight years (my first ever post was published on May 13th, 2010), and my wonderful Mum as it’s Mother’s Day. 

When I look back on the kind of "online presence" I've had in the last eight years it makes me quite sentimental and nostalgic for how I've evolved, and also how technology and social media has with me. As much as I love the convenience of Instagram and how easy it is to share snippets of one's life, I miss the Saturday morning's during high school where I'd pull my laptop to my knees, have an issue of Teen Vogue in one hand, and a steaming cup of rooibos tea in the other, just anticipating reading all the wonderful posts my overseas blogging friends had published while I was sleeping. 

Here I am now, 21, working full time, living out of home, paying my own bills, driving my own car and spending time with my lovely boyfriend and my friends - but no longer such an active member of "the blogosphere". 

I think that's okay though, because I'm really happy with my life, and I feel that one of the best things about having a little corner of the web like this is I truly can revisit it any time, and the little flickers of creativity that rush through my fingertips when I'm editing photos or curating ideas reminds me exactly of how I felt back when I was 13 and hit publish for the first time. We're all still here really, us bloggers that've been around for lots of years... we're just sharing content differently, but not any less thoughtfully.

Life is so surreal sometimes, and it's always changing, but I think I'll always be that little girl who decided that she'd like to write a blog because maybe a few people would read it and enjoy. I'll always be the little girl who loves to read fashion magazines and dream up different outfits to wear. I'll always be the little girl that wrote this first ever blog post, and had these photos taken with her blogging bestie at the time, and had lots of ambitions and ideas. 

So... Thanks for reading today, yesterday, when I was 16, or even right from the start :)