Back in New Zealand!

Hi everyone,

I'm back in New Zealand a little earlier than initially planned (1st November) from Aitutaki after having had a scooter accident and receiving a wound that would have been better dealt with at home. Wound is slowly getting better for those worried. It is being followed up by Orthopaedics at the hospital, so if anything goes wrong, at least I am in the right place for it.

On the bright side, you now get me back in the crafty world and hopefully I will get my crafty mojo back soon. It will be quite busy over the next few weeks as I try to find a new place to live (moving out of home at last), try and study for one little exam in early November (it's one I'm allowed to fail!), write my elective report and get my life back together before work starts on 22nd November!

I did make a new purchase on PTI the other day, so hopefully that will get me kick-started on my Christmas cards as it is approaching FAST.

A little teaser on the photos that will be up on the other blog... ;)

My elective blog, Asian on Aitutaki, will also continue to be updated for those who want to hear stories and see some awesome photos of a tropical paradise.

Thanks for your patience and I will be back in a tick! :)

No card still... but

Sorry! Still no card!

I'm on call again tomorrow and I'm just knackered when I'm back home these days. And I still have a few cover letters to pump out which I am forever denying the need to (until last minute!).

I just thought I'd share something that arrived in the mail yesterday!

It looks like that card I submitted to PaperCrafts in January and got accepted did make it to the States in one piece! This is rather exciting getting paid for something made for a hobby! So a quick shot of proof. I am dying to see what magic the photographers did to the card in the mag! ;)

And... did I mention we got snowed in last week?

I mean, really snowed in. Okay, maybe this is nothing compared to Canada in winter, but in my 15 years in New Zealand, we've only been snowed properly like this a handful of times. And I don't ever recall it snowing in June either! Usually we get a random decent fall in August/September (Spring) when we do get them.

It literally started snowing as I left home for hospital at 7.30am and just snowed and snowed all day!

This shot's one that made its way to our weather forecast website, MetService. It just got picked as the photo of the week! Well really, in all honesty, I think there were only about 3 photos submitted last week. It was more of a fun thing to submit than anything. No prizes for getting it picked either. I do reckon I should have sent it to TVNZ, then if it did get picked, then our famous weatherman, Jim Hickey, would have had to have a crack at saying my name right! Haha. 

Oh, I forgot to say what the photo was of. This is the Christchurch Botanic Garden looking down from 4th floor of Christchurch Public Hospital (technically the temporary student common room).

 

The funny thing is that literally every student who turned up to school last Wednesday took a photo of this exact same scene on their phones. I've already seen 3 different, yet the same versions on Facebook! However, I'm now copyrighted since I submitted this photo first lol

Sorry for keeping you all waiting for new cards. I'm sure if I dug around, there might be a couple of cards that I forgot to upload. I still have to upload all the other images that got lost when I got my new phone too. I'll get there eventually.

Have a great week!

Going Home

I'm finally getting out of my dungeon (my room with inadequate lighting) in Timaru and back home to "shaky land" tonight!

It has been great fun here and I really enjoyed Psychiatry (somewhat surprisingly). Loved the people I got to work with.

Nonetheless, it all must come to an end. I shall be back home tonight to where all my crafting gear is :D

I do have a wedding in Queenstown over the weekend, so probably no crafting till next week, but hey! I'll try and update the blog a bit more often :)

Lake Wanaka & Summer Sunshine

As promised, some shots of Lake Wanaka.

Wanaka is a beautiful town in Central Otago in South Island of New Zealand. Lake Wanaka is the 4th largest lake we have in the country and is just b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l. It's only about 40 mins drive from Cromwell, so it's nice and close to where I am currently!

I'm staying with a couple who run a motel in Cromwell. They had some friends over and decided to go for a wee trip to Wanaka with their jetboat. They were kind enough to invite me along :)

It was such a beautiful summer's day here in Central Otago. Really hot and scorching under the sun. I don't think I put on enough sunscreen, but I managed to get away without getting burnt.

Here are some nice shots off my shocking quality camera. Thank goodness you don't get to see it in full. I can't wait till I get my own DSLR!!!

Isn't it just gorgeous? And it's a lake. Not even out in the ocean. A very calm ride today. Loved it. Better than any family holiday I've ever had!!!

I would share other photos, but they're all either shocking, or look more or less the same haha.

Thank you for coming by. I hope to share some more things later on :)

Mother Nature's Way of a Christmas Party

Just in case anyone read the news (seeing it's currently on BBC frontpage on the web) - we just had another series of aftershocks. First one hit around 2pm and was of magnitude 5.8 (and shallow). We've had another several of similar magnitude (at least what felt like) since though not officially reported yet by GeoNet. I am ok and so are all my family & friends.

Just putting it out there in case anyone worries.

It had neen pretty quiet in the last few months with hardly any noticeable aftershocks. Well, Mother Nature sure knows how to party. Last year she shook us with a decent one on Boxing Day (day after Christmas & biggest shopping day of the year).

Here are some attractive seismic drum images I nabbed off GeoNet website. Ooh here's another aftershock as I'm typing. The first image shows all the different major seismographs we have in the country. As you can see by the big thick black lines going across, we've had some decent shakes here. 

Ooh, another sharp jolt. After over a year of shakes day in and day out, really, you get used to them. I didn't even duck under my desk although we hadn't had a decent shake in months.

*SORRY IMAGES GOT LOST*

 http://geonet.org.nz/earthquake/drums/

 

 This one below is specifically the McQueen's Valley seismograph. It's the closest one we have to Christchurch. All the red bits indicate where the graph has been cut short to prevent it from cutting across into the other lines (indicating it was a reasonable shake - usually if the red bit's quite thick like it is here, it's a big shake). You can see how quiet the graph had been up to about 2 hours earlier, and BAM! Surprise from Mother Nature!

*SORRY IMAGES GOT LOST*

 http://geonet.org.nz/earthquake/drums/mqz-drum.html
  

 Thank god we still have power at home. I hear phone lines have been out since the first quake.

Anyway, I just put that up for interest, because I've always been into earthquake stuff even before we had the September one last year. I used to look it up and such way back in high school as well.

I'm alright here. And by the look of Facebook updates, all my friends are too :)

Take care everyone and I'll update you with some cards soon - when I can be bothered replacing the batteries in the camera LOL