Finally some downtime!

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Things have been exceptionally hectic since my last update.

Bella's shipping notice arrived just at the start of my exam period and she arrived on the day of my first exam so I didn't get to open her until 10pm. :C After exams I had about one day before my boyfriend's parents arrived to stay with us for 10 days, during which we had to drive to and from Virginia for a wedding. Then it was Christmas celebrations and finally New Year's Eve... and now it's today... and I must say, I'm very glad for the break from all the running around.

So... with that out of the way, time for the updates!!

For the curious:

Bella is safe and sound and sporting a temporary face-up. Her new eyes, wig and extra sleeping head have all arrived as well. The eyes are stunning, but I'm still not 100% sold on the new wig. She has two full outfits and a PJ shirt and has claimed many bracelets. I hope to give her a new face-up when it warms up again now that I have more of an idea how I want her to look. :)

My holidays were busy but otherwise lovely. The wedding was very sweet, and worth the 9.5 hour drive to get there. I was gifted a new printer and have been playing around with printed t-shirts. Also, I was given a 60mm macro lens by the aforementioned boyfriend's parents, which I finally had a chance to try today.

This is my favourite photo from my first lens test. It's not the best, but the cropping is straight from the camera, and that's pretty wonderful. Definitely need to practice with it more, but I don't think that's going to be much of a hardship. ;)

Lastly, I've been working a lot on prototypes and samples for a bunch of new items. They're all in varying stages of completion, but I hope to get at least a few photos up this weekend since I start classes again on Monday. :)

I hope everyone had an excellent holiday as well and I wish all of you a very happy and productive 2014! <3

Shipping Notice GO!

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EEEEEEEEEEE!!!!! Bella's on her way home! :D

I woke up to a shipping notice from Fairyland this morning and promptly turned into a squealing version of this:

To be honest, I'm not quite ready for her arrival. Her wig is with the GO host in Toronto. Her eyes... well... they'll get here when they get here. The weather is really fluctuating, so no face-up for quite a while... and I don't know when her other sleeping head will show up. I DO, however, have some clothes for her so the poor girl won't be naked (though I doubt she would mind :p), and she has a pair of shoes and a temporary wig, so she'll at least look slightly less alien until I can get everything sorted.

Still, I'm so happy to have her on her way home and even if she won't be 'finished' for a while, she'll still be here physically and that's the best part.

Giveaway Winner!

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Jonas helped me pick the winner of my recent giveaway:

Really need to make her a more winter-y outfit. Poor dear is going to freeze. </3

Congratulations to siruveru! :D Go check out her photos! She's an awesome knitter/crochet...er...? ^^;

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UPDATE: siruveru picked a Dollshe sized bracelet in soothing earthy tones for her prize. :) Here's a photo of the finished product as compared to a MNF sized bracelet in similar colours.

Dollshe's are so big!!! 

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Thank you so much to every one who entered. This was a lot of fun.
I think I'll try to do another one some time in the future. ^^

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Hope everyone has had a good weekend so far!

Major Update - Custom Orders and Giveaway!

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OOOOKAY!

So, I've recovered from my sickness, and finished all the major assignments and tests from the last 2 weeks, so I finally got a chance to play!

I have a new bracelet I've had finished for a while updated in the shop, plus some new photos of the inset top in a different fabric and with different closures (I am so in love with this fabric I can't even). AND! Bonus bracelet to match (though available separately :P).

In addition, I have some super awesome news (well, I think it's super awesome anyway...)!

I've added (a few) custom orders for the MNF Inset Tops, MNF Butterfly Cardigans* and Wrap Bracelets! Woo~! I'm going to try this as a way of doing (limited) commissions and see how it works out. :) Hopefully, it will be awesome!

To celebrate, I've decided to do a giveaway on my Flickr for a fully custom Wrap Bracelet + free worldwide shipping (not tracked). :D Yay!

Some of the available colours. :)

So if you've been wanting to get a bracelet but haven't yet, here's your chance to win one for ~free~! If you'd like to use this chance to get an SD or other non-MNF sized version, that's also an option!

Also, if you win and would like to order other things, I will still pay shipping for one regular sized bubble mailer. More bonus! :D

Anyways, if you're interested, head on over to my Flickr Giveaway page and leave me a comment!

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*More MNF Butterfly Cardigan photos are on their way, but I don't have a definite answer on when they will be ready - we are currently being plagued by rain and sadness...

Zoo De-Stress

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As I hinted at last post, I've been having a lot of trouble keeping up with school work this term, so yesterday, I went to the zoo with a few friends. I haven't been in a number of years, so it was really nice. It was threatening to rain as well (but it didn't - win!), so there weren't very many people there either, which was amazing since I'm not a fan of crowds. :)

It may seem a bit non-sensical to take a day off school work when there's so much to do, but I think it helped more to let me get over the 'HOLYCRAPSOMUCHTODOI'MGOINGTOEXPLODE @w@' feelings I've been having and come back refreshed and ready to work. There's still a tonne to do, but it doesn't seem as insurmountable now as it did on Friday. Odd how that works.

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Here are some of the photos I took. I think I got about 250 this time?

These are soft-shell turtles. I really like their noses. For some reason, while we were watching them, the big one kept smacking the smaller one every time it swam by. :/ Meanie.

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There are two Giant Pandas visiting right now, Da Mao (male ~5 years old) and Er Shun (female ~6 years old). Er Shun was 'sleeping' when we went - by which I mean rolling around and putting her paws over her eyes, but Da Mao was munching on bamboo. I got a few photos of him, but most have a bunch of bamboo in front of his face. :P

We didn't get to see two of my favourite animals - the Snow Leopards and the Red Pandas because they're completely redoing that area. Hopefully next time I go there will be some positive changes and I'll get to see my fuzzy buddies again.

Since I couldn't get photos of those animals, here's an Emerald Tree Boa chilling out on a branch. He's pretty cool too.

I probably could have stayed and taken snake photos all day, but since they don't move especially much, they weren't very interesting to my companions. Oh well.

Now to get back to readings and papers. Too bad I can't be a Polar Bear instead.

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There are a few more photos on my Flickr, along with these here. I'm still having trouble deciding what I should post where, so for now, there will be some overlap.