Old times.

p.s. sorry about the tacky lime green superimposed lyrics.

And then I organized a bookshelf by colour.

This is surprisingly easy to do when you have so few books. Since I really consider this collection to be an item of furniture in my sparsely decorated living space, it also makes things look neater and more organized. Generally, I would only organize books by topic, but this is so much nicer to look at.

Paint a Painting.

Last July, I took an art course at the Haliburton School of the Fine Arts. It was a week long course in impasto watercolour printmaking. Bronwen was also at school that week, taking a book-binding course. We stayed at a cottage and had a great time. I'm going to apply for another course for this summer, but I can't commit to anything yet since I don't know where I'll be.

My favourite print, and my class friend's print on my wall in Cornwall.


Close-up of the friend print.



Two of my little square prints near the window in Cornwall.


My giant pile of paper and a week's worth of prints in my portfolio.


And now, for some process shots. This is what it looked like when I was carefully peeling a print off of our 3000 lb per inch printing press.


Myself and one of the instructors, at the press in the hallway of the school.


Some of our work drying on the felt drying boards.


On Thursday, we all walked around and saw what people were making in the other classes.

Weaving was right across the hall from my class.


Bronwen's bookbinding class was at the highschool in town.


Her mini book.


A wooden bird from the birdcarving class, which I greatly admire.


All kinds of amazing art supplies everywhere.


Things to shape jewellery in silversmithing class.


Glassblowing class.


And some of their creations.

Record Player.

For my birthday this year, I received this cute little record player. I love it a lot and I listen to one of my 8 records pretty much every day. I can't have a lot of records yet because they are heavy to move and I'm trying to not bring any more objects into my little house right now.


My favourites albums are: Fleetwood Mac - Rumours, Winter Gloves - All Red, and The Tallest Man on Earth - The Wild Hunt.

p.s. the All Red album is cast in red vinyl. Someday, if I think of it, I'll post another picture.

Small baby puppy.

Today I saved a small, white baby puppy that looked like this, only a bit dirtier:


We were driving to the Sugar Bush to get some maple syrup and go for a wagon ride and on the way there the little puppy was standing in the middle of the highway. Luckily, my friend saw it in time and managed to stop. I was on the road-side of the car, so I checked for cars (there were several stopped in both directions), got out, and got the puppy onto the side of the road and grabbed it's leg. It bit me, but I was wearing super fuzzy alpaca mittens and it's tiny teeth couldn't get through and it didn't like the fuzziness. Then it realized (probably because of my beautiful knitwear) that I was nice person and it jumped up on my leg and wagged its tail and wanted me to help it. I noticed that the puppy had chewed through the piece of clothesline that it had been tied up with. And I also saw that its tag had a phone number, but a guy came running out of the house to collect the puppy. I hope he clues in that his dog could have gotten hit or caused a bad car accident, but based on the condition of the puppy, I don't think he really thinks about responsible things.

The time at the sugar bush was also eventful. We made taffy by rolling syrup in snow. Then we investigated the sap-collecting system. All of the blue tubes take the sap from the tree directly to the sugar shack, where it is slowly boiled down into syrup. They weren't boiling today though, since it was so cold the sap was frozen up.


We also went on a sleigh ride. The horses names are Cruiser and Cory. They are 9-years-old.

National Parks Project - Kluane

Okay, so I was away Friday and I didn't have much to say yesterday.

Then this happened. And once again that Canadian gemstone (thanks Gord Downie), the land of the midnight sun, the coldest, brightest, most terrifying place I've ever been, turns dark to light and magics everything there is from bad to good.

The film itself is incredible, but the extra footage, especially the part filmed at Silver City (an abandoned mining town on Kluane Lake), is really something else. Watching this makes me feel like I'm standing on the edge of the Alaska Highway again, knowing that I am just a small blue thing, nothing compared to the place or time around me.

I'm so glad this is happening and we're really starting to celebrate some of these places in ways that involve things other than oddly-designed, inaccessible silver coins and giant, inflatable beavers. I hope this catches on and millions of people watch these films.

One of the nicest gifts i have ever received.

On Mondays, Res Con at Parks Canada gets together to Stitch'n'Bitch. We all knit or crochet and chat about what's been going on.

Tomorrow, one of our members is moving to a new job, so we had a little going away lunch celebration. Two of the members made us all matching angry knitting beaver t-shirts. They are completely beautiful. My new favourite t-shirt: