Oooh Holiday Time!

Well it's that time of year again! 

Technically this is my favourite time of the year, but I'm afraid I don't get to do any decorating or cooking this time around. 

The good news! We made it to Kaikoura and escaped the clutches of my cranky landlords with their never-ending construction noise - minus my bond (for now) but I talked to some lawyers and I'm sure this will get sorted out soon. We're almost done with the hectic part of the whole moving thing. Scubadaddy (my partner) will be driving back with a pickup truck to get the rest of our stuff and bring it back here soon. So he gets more rides on the ferry, but I'm fine right here with my sensitive stomach.

Can I just say ... that was my first ever ferry ride, and I didn't barf. What I did do was get some of these awesome photos from the top of the boat! We left Wellington with an amazing sunset and had calm seas, strong winds and a full moon to accompany us to Picton on the South Island of New Zealand. 

After driving 2 hours from where the ferry docked to Kaikoura, Scubadaddy dropped off me and Moose then skipped off to his hometown to spend the holiday with his family. I've stayed behind in our new flat to get settled, try to get back and work and, of course, to try and mediate Moosifer's protests and anxiety over the big changes. 

Lemme just say, he spent probably the first 3 days refusing to come out from under the blankets of the floor bed. Now he's out exploring, being overly clingy and bossy, and he's starting to play again so he's fine. He is pretending to be still snippy about it to try and get more treats though, which means he's actually super fine. 

Thankfully, my mattress was delivered in record time! So i'm not sleeping on a pile of blankets and sleeping bags anymore, and don't worry, the mattress is Moose approved, as you can see. 

I've also taken the last few days to walk all over this really tiny town and explore what's around and try out different breakfasts. The first place I found was an American 50s diner with a Pumpkin Pie latte, bottomless filter coffee and some good waffles. 

A couple of days ago I think I walked just over 9 miles around this whole town, I haven't found any seals yet, but it was a bit too hot to keep searching and I was burned to a crisp.  

I currently look like a boiled lobster, but I got a few nice photos! 

That porch shot is from my new bedroom windows.

I've got my computer and tablet set up on a little desk in my new bedroom. We've also got some good internet here as well (it's supposed to be fibre!) The next 7 days I'll be flat out sculpting and catching up on all of my work to deliver the December patreon rewards! 

I'm pretty sure this house was built in the 40s ... just sayin', but it's the biggest place I've ever lived in my entire adult life! 

ALSO I've found someone who lives not far away from here who has a very large corner desk that they don't want anymore, and all they want for it is a bag of chocolates! Considering this same desk is around $500-$700 online, I won't complain about its icky white colour. We can fix that with some nice black spray paint (because we've even got a little yard now, that we don't have to mow ourselves. *spoiled* ) 

The current downside is I can't do any cooking or big food shops yet because the fridge I ordered hasn't arrived yet. (it's a full sized fridge! I haven't had one with a freezer in my entire adult life either!) 

I've mostly been eating out or just getting sandwiches that i'm keeping in a lunchbox full of ice in the sink. 

Today is Christmas here in New Zealand, so in a couple hours I might go out again and see if there's any place open for lunch or dinner (hopefully yes) because a ham sammich for Christmas dinner is just sad, even if I'm in an awesome new (cheaper) flat. Seriously, my rent has gone from about $1300USD a month to about $500. 

Because of that, I'm already saving up for that new laptop I've had my eye on so I can start exploring some new software/design techniques and get back into streaming properly! My current computer is about 9 years old and has survived severe abuse, two continents and three huge moves. It's slowly dying, and I'm trying to get the new one before it finally croaks. I'm about 1/3 of the way there already! 

Now, with it being the end of the year, Twitter is afloat with people posting recaps of their art year. Obviously I haven't sculpted anything yet for December, so I'll do a proper update of this as soon as I do! 

So, the last few weeks with all the time I wasn't able to do any 3D work because the landlords kept switching off the internet and how everything had to get packed up and put into storage, I actually spent a lot of time working on my writing projects to take my mind off of all of the crazy insanity that had been going on (from the last update post). 

I've got a lot of writing projects, but I focused on two of them. 

The Dead Wolf Diaries is an ongoing serial-fiction series I started a couple months ago that's available on Kindle Vella or my other Patreon (this is a fun patreon just for my writing adventures). 

Bloody Frost is a novel I've been working on for a number of years that's the main series from The Galean Universe (the same world that the Tor Horse model + D&D monster page is from). I'll be posting the beta copy of the prologue and first 3 chapters of this soon to the other patron. 

I've thought about doing STLs for both of these but that's a future project. <3 

So there we have it! Those are all of my updates from the last few crazy crazy days. I hope everyone is at home having a good time celebrating and enjoying time off from work to be with family and friends! It's been an insane 2 years for everyone and you all deserve some time off to chillax. 

I hope you all get new paints, brushes, resins, books, and other nerdy things in your stockings!