Again, it’s been a while since I posted here hasn’t it! Well, since I wanted to keep this blog for mainly crafty stuff and photography, and I haven’t so much as looked at any knitting/goccoing/sewing in months, it’s a little sad. But I have a good excuse! After weeks of sleep deprivation and no contact with the outside world I have finally finished the dreaded DPhil thesis! Yes, it is done! And as of about an hour ago it is safely deposited at the exam schools in Oxford thanks to a friendly man at the printers who took it over there for me. PHEW! I still have the viva (defence) to contend with in February, but for now I am a free woman!

Hope everyone had a nice christmas and new year!

It’s been quite a while since I blogged here, ooops! Since I arrived in NYC things have been quite hectic; only last night did I finally unpack the last box of stuff which had all of my craft and gocco supplies in it, yay! Anyway, me and Mr Paperleaf have started a blog about our NYC adventures over here, which you might want to check out if you’re interested what I’ve been up to! In the meantime I’m keeping this blog for my crafty endeavours, of which there aren’t many at the moment, so might be a bit quiet. I have 2 weeks to finish my draft PhD thesis and then I have a friend arriving for a visit, so not much time at all for anything craft-related unfortunately. I’ll leave you with a photo of me and my mum, who visited last week. Hope everyone is doing well!!

Things are progressing fast in the relocation build-up. This weekend we packed everything that is going to be shipped, as the relocation company will come in a couple of days to pick it up. We couldn’t quite believe that it all fitted into 8 boxes! Granted, they are quite big boxes and we did use a couple of vacu-bags for the clothes/bedding, but still it feels great to know that we don’t need much ’stuff’. We still need to sort out everything else – either to go into storage (mainly books), or ebay/freecycle the junk. I would love to have a yard sale but I’m not sure – we don’t really ‘do’ them in this country! Plus I think the snobby people in our apartment block might get a bit annoyed… but it could be fun! What do you think?

Alas, one of the downsides of moving is that my bizness will have to come to a halt, since I am not technically allowed to do any kind of work including freelance or my own business on my visa. It is kind of insane, but the US immigration system is all a bit complicated and scary, so for now it is safest to put the ‘closed’ sign up and think of something else to occupy my time. Every cloud has a silver lining though, and it will be nice to get back to my crafting roots without having to spend all my ‘make time’ on Paperleaf. For example, I am looking forward to getting back into knitting – I haven’t picked up a pair of needles for well over a year! And I think in NY there are lots of knitting groups so it will be a good way to meet some nice people. I also have an itching desire to have a go at embroidery after seeing Katie’s post, And I hope to spend more time on my photography. So all in all, I’m looking forward to new things, and who knows, once the dust has settled hopefully Paperleaf will be reinstated sometime in the future! In the meantime I’ll of course keep on blogging about my goings on in NYC – Craft In The City anyone?

Soooo, with all that said, I’m having a little sale! I’ve got quite a lot of cards which I don’t really want to haul all the way to NY, and it seems a bit sad to pack them away in storage. So until further notice all of my cards are available at Etsy/Folksy for $8/£4.50 for 5, including p&p within the UK. Pop over and take a look!

photo by Jasoon at Flickr

Thanks for all the comments for my little competition! I have consulted the random number generator and the winners are…. drumroll please….

The first prize of a notebook, 5 cards and a pack of gift tags goes to Kitschy Coo! And the second prize of 5 cards goes to domesticali! Congratulations ladies, I’ll email you for your addresses and the prizes will be on their way tomorrow

In other news, I’m exhausted! Last night I helped out my friend Mark from acooldryplacephotography at St Hilda’s college ball – we were the official photographers! It was lots of fun and the results should be on his website tomorrow. I have 2 wedding invite orders to get on with this afternoon and tonight, so I will crack on with that now!

I’ve been invited to take part in a crafternoon which is part of Ladyfest Oxford in a couple of weeks! I hadn’t heard of Ladyfest before but apparently it’s a festival that’s held all over the world in support of female artists. It all sounds very exciting and I’m honoured to be there – I’ll have a stall selling my goodies along with other local craftsters/artists, and I’m also baking my famous lemon cake for the cake sale which is in support of the Oxford Sexual Abuse and Rape Crisis Centre. As well as the craft stalls there’ll also be workshops demonstrating knitting skills, textiles, zines and DIY culture. So if you’re in Oxford, pop along and say hello! It’s at St Peters College, New Inn Hall Street from 2-6pm on Saturday 23rd May. More info here and here.

This week I will celebrate the 1 year birthday of my little blog, and also the 1 year anniversary of opening my Etsy shop! When I started out I never thought I would get so consumed by the craft ’scene’ and meet so many lovely people – it’s been a super year and I’m grateful to anyone who stops by to read my rambling, random and occasionally <geeky> posts!

To say thank-you I’m having a little giveaway – and there will be not one, but two prizes! The first prize is any 5 cards, a notebook, AND a pack of gift tags of your choice – the winner will be chosen randomly from everyone who subscribes to my blog via the ‘Friend Connect’ widget in the sidebar! The second prize is any 5 cards, open to anyone who comments below You can of course enter both and I will ship internationally… As a ‘runner up’ prize for everyone I’ll also be popping some little extras with all orders from my shop this week (and also orders from Etsy/Folksy). I’ll be choosing the winners sometime next weekend. Good luck!

And just because I happen to be going through them right now, here’s some cute animal pics from our day out last weekend to Shugborough Hall!

I know I said I would be away all week but I had some sad news this morning. Our little family rabbit died last night. Shredder belonged to my brother but after a fraught custody battle with an ex-girlfriend he was relocated to my mums house after my brother moved into non-rabbit-friendly accommodation. Shredder was quite a character, always trying to make ’special friends’ with people and famously chewing everything in sight (hence the name), with a particular penchant for electrical cables. Just this weekend I was practising my wildlife photography skillz on him, and he was very photogenic and camera-friendly. RIP Shredder.

More at flickr.

Just a quick note to say thanks for all the lovely messages on my last post, it’s so nice to hear from everyone! We are very happy and excited about our move! I might be a bit absent this week as I have a big work deadline (as in my ‘day job’, not paperleaf stuff) so have a great week and I’ll be back soon!

I don’t often like to get too personal in the blogosphere, but this is something I can’t keep to myself for any longer, and now all of the official stuff is sorted I can finally tell the world…

Remember we went on a long weekend to New York in March? Well it wasn’t just an extravagant mini-break, my dear hubby had a job interview, which he of course was offered and accepted!! That was just the beginning though, we then had to go through the long and convoluted procedure of applying for visas… which we have now got!!! Yippee! Still can’t believe it’s happening, but sometime in September/October we’ll be packing up our little Oxford apartment and heading to NYC! Not 100% sure what I’ll be doing yet, where we’ll be living (job is in Brooklyn though! Much coolness!) or how long it will be for (9 months initially) but it’s going to be a crazy fun adventure and it’s NEW YORK! ohmygodiamgoingtoliveinnewyork.

That is all

Just realized I never blogged my NY photos, so here are some (more at Flickr) !

Remember last week I mentioned that my stationery supplies for some wedding invites hadn’t turned up? Well, by this Wednesday they still hadn’t arrived and I began to get worried. I phoned my supplier who gave me the Parcelforce tracking number, which according to the website, had been delivered last Thursday at 8.38am and signed for by me! Erm, noooooooo it wasn’t!! Many phonecalls between the supplier and the Parcelforce depot ensued… The parcel was destined for my college, since the reception is open 9-5 it’s safer than getting things that need a signature delivered to our flat… Well, to cut a long story short, as it arrived before the college opened, there wasn’t anyone around to sign for it so the driver took it upon himself to enter my name into his handheld gizmo, sign for it himself in a totally illegible signature and leave my parcel down a side alleyway underneath the smoking shelter. I KID YOU NOT! It had been there all week, and it was only after watching the CCTV footage that this became apparent, and I was beyond furious. Fuming! I have a hate-hate relationship with Royal Mail, and it drives me mad that they whine and grumble when privatisation is mentioned, because they’re a “public service” and can do a much better job than a private company. Well I don’t think a private company would last 5 minutes if they started signing for recorded delivery packages themselves and leaving them outside! Luckily it didn’t get wet so this weekend I WILL be a printing machine! Thank goodness for lovely understanding customers!

OK rant over, sorry, just had to get that off my chest..
have a great weekend!