Wanted to throw this one out there in case there is a knit blogger on earth who doesn’t read brooklyn tweed. Rowan Lima is constructed as i-cord, taming alpaca fibres and, I imagine, making for some interesting texture. Will I restrain my tight-fistedness enough to buy a ball… or two? Only time will tell.

We may not have enough science funding, and our Prime Minister might be a dork, but I love this country and I can’t imagine living anywhere else. Here are some things I love about Canada:

1. Moose
2. Blueberries in Sudbury!
3. Tommy Douglas, who brought us Universal Healthcare and was voted one of the greatest Canadians. Our healthcare system has saved millions of lives (especially the poor ones, which American media folks seem to have forgotten in their haste to bash the fake Canadian system they’ve conjured up from anecdotes about Medicare), including that of my aunt.
4. Canadian David Suzuki
5. Diversity in Toronto
6. Beach on St. Joseph’s Island
7. Caribana
8. Canadian Snow
9. A deer I ran into on campus
10. Mr. Dressup
11. The beau’s cottage
12. Kingston Sheep Dog Trials

These SweetAmbs cookies are beautiful.

This is called a Sliced Bread Notebook. It’s stylish, but not in the shape of bread. I am both amused and confused.

I started planning a trip to the States a little while ago and suddenly it’s the end of June and I haven’t blogged for a month and a half. Well, now I’m back. Sort of. I’ve been knitting, that’s for sure, but I’ve been working more than I’ve been knitting. Which is a good thing, because I’m suddenly looking at quite a few papers that need just a little more polishing and they’ll be done. Those are the UFOs I’m working on now; by the end of this year, I’m hoping to have published at least 5!

But you didn’t come here for yet another tirade about how my PhD is killing my blog. You came here to look at pretty pictures! So here are some (click on the photos for links):

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Happy Mother’s Day everyone! I hope that all of you, in the true spirit of the day, protested a war or somehow encouraged disarmament.

(I always forget that it’s a protest holiday and get my mom something and make her breakfast anyway, but it’s also important to remember the original intent of Mother’s Day.)

Photo via amysgster.

I don’t really knit socks but I want to buy this sock yarn! It’s called Zauberball. As a German speaker who grew up in Canada, I find this hilarious, because it translates to Magic Balls. Because I am 12.

I’ve sort of disappeared lately, and I apologize! I think this is the longest time I’ve gone without blogging, and I should at least have warned you guys in case some of you folks suspected I was dead. Well, I’m not dead! Only my social life is.

The past four days were, I think, the most stressful of my entire life. I had about 3 days to design a neuroimaging experiment, pilot it with 4 participants so I would know which set-up and stimuli would be most effective, recruit participants and make sure everything was tested so nothing would go horribly wrong. My first participant in the machine came in yesterday, and when that person was finished, I’d gone for four days on 13 hours of sleep. Oh yeah, and in that same time I also had to rewrite a 15-page paper twice. Twice!

But now it’s over and I told everyone that I don’t care what my other responsibilities are, I am taking a whole day where I don’t have to do anything. Here is what I have done today: sleep until 5pm, watch Reno 911, and pet my cat. Now I am going to finish the ribbing on my Bubble sweater, and all will be right with the world.

Sometimes, mere association with one of my favourite bloggers will cause me to want to buy a book. This is a perfect example: Birgitte strikker got a book by Marianne Isager recently, raved about it, and knit a pretty sweater. Now I’m finding out that Interweave is publishing the book in North America, and I want it!

This sweater isn’t the one Birgitte knit, but it’s also pretty.

This isn’t knitting-related but I thought you guys would totally like this.

School assignment to reinterpret the fairytale Little Red Riding Hood. Inspired by Röyksopp’s Remind me.

Slagsmålsklubben – Sponsored by destiny from Tomas Nilsson on Vimeo. Via the ever-brilliant [BB-Blog].

I bought a Holga! My camera collection is scary now. But! But each has its own purpose. I’m not a crazy cat lady who has 9 cats all for the same purpose of replacing children*. I am a crazy camera lady who needs to take pictures of knitting and landscapes and things that are under water.

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