I've been talking about nouns at work for the last week. Definitions, common vs proper nouns, and compound nouns so far, to be exact. It turned out perfectly because my supervisor is also talking about parts of speech in her curriculum. For those of you who may not know me (if I have any such readers ;) ) I love talking about these things. Grammar, parsing, parts of speech: nouns, verbs, adjectives, prepositions... these are all Old Friends. When I discovered Linguistics in university, I couldn't believe my luck in discovering a field in which I could geek out about grammar!

So, as I drove between home and the reserve (not a long drive, but still...) I was thinking about nouns. Nouns just seem so solid, so concrete--even though there are plenty of abstract nouns, the category in general always comes out as the more dependable, vanilla parts of speech. On the one hand, I am rather fond of them, and they make me feel more comfortable because they are easy to define and identify. They sit there in their solid 'nouniness' and are the first category to study, since most people can grasp the concept fairly easily. They're like the comfortable sedan, the Ned Nickerson of heroes, the reliable pair of khakis that you use as a fallback outfit when you're staying home. I like them because they name so many things that I really love--trees, food, love, family, adventure, yarn...

But on the other hand, are they a little too solid? Though I would never want to hurt Noun's feelings, I think that if I had to pick one, I would rather be an Adjective. Think about it. The power to describe anything! Description just has so much scope for the imagination (to borrow the words of a certain red-headed fellow lover of descriptive speech). And adjectives can be so mysterious--sometimes they look like a noun, but they're really doing a descriptive job! Look at 'brick house', 'ice road', and so on. So sneaky! Adjective isn't really even a car, let alone a dependable sedan...more like a canoe, or a sleek bicycle...probably changes as per the situation. More about the type of ride than the vehicle. It's a more mysterious hero; a less definable outfit...more about the feeling than the definition. I don't know if you can pick your own Part of Speech Role or if you must depend on Destiny. I've never heard anyone else talk about it before. So I'm going to decide for myself and I will be an Adjective! I won't be all Noun-y and try to define any situations for you. But stick around and I'll have lots of fun describing the dickens out of life! ;) (At least until we happen upon a situation in which I have more definite Opinions...I'm sure my inner Nouniness will resurface sooner or later.

Okay. I'm finished mooning about grammar for now. I may read this post tomorrow and decide that it doesn't even make any sense...we shall see! I keeping with my Adjective-y mood, I'll show you a recent wordy project I've been working on. I'm feeling crazy for embroidery lately, researching stitches on Pinterest and planning all kinds of pieces. I'm going to bring some embroidery in to several aspects of our wedding decor, including our invitations! (On a side note, I'm almost finished designing our invitations! V. exciting. After I've sent them out, I maaaaay post a little sneak peek. We'll see.) Anyway, I printed out my favourite Annie Dillard quote from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, which I've posted on here before. I'm using the printed quote as a guide and embroidering it to a t-shirt to practice my lettering. I'm a little concerned that it may turn out rather crooked, in which case I'll just cut it out and frame it instead of wearing it. Here's a shot in progress:

Pincushion Peter really seems to like it.

In case you can't read the tiny font in the photo, the quote goes:

"The world is fairly studded and strewn with pennies cast broadside from a generous hand. But-and this is the point-who gets excited by a mere penny? If you follow one arrow, if you crouch motionless on a bank to catch a tremulous ripple thrill on the water and are rewarded by a sight of a muskrat kit paddling from its den, will you count that sight a mere chip of copper only, and go your rueful way? It is dire poverty indeed when a man is so malnourished and fatigued that he won't stoop to pick up a penny. But if you cultivate a healthy poverty, so that a penny will literally make your day, then, since the world is fairly planted in pennies, you have with your poverty bought a lifetime of days. It is that simple. What you see is what you get."

(Annie Dillard)

Printing my guide out on regular printing paper presents some challenges. It would probably be easier if I used something lighter, like tissue paper, but it's still doable. It's an addictive project! I also have a few other arty things I'm working on: altering some sweaters for a friend, sewing a pair of stroud mittens, Etsy knitting, a mens' shirt upcycled dress, and more! I've had a fairly busy week, with lots of fun things--a Valentine's Day hiking date with gorgeous Northern lights on Tuesday, and on Wednesday I got to go out on the lake in a Bombardier to a fishing camp! I hope to have lots of creativity time this weekend, so we'll see what I can come up with. Maybe even some blogging! ;) So until we speak again, I hope you have lovely days with lots of Interesting. Keep your eyes open!

I've been wanting to raise the quality of my Etsy shop for a while. I have plans for some new branding; I want to learn more about graphic design and come up with a good logo. I've done a lot of Etsy surfing and have really been impressed by the level of effort some sellers put into their photos. I took almost everything out of my shop over Christmas and I've decided that as I restock, I'm only going to upload items when I have the time to really photograph it well. Today was my first practice photo shoot.

So... if you want to take better pictures, but you have a mediocre camera, less experience than you'd like, and somewhat poor lighting, what can you do to give yourself a photographic advantage?

Solution: Les filles franco-canadiennes. If you have cute friends from Quebec, you are in luck! I brought in my friends Édith and Virginie; and seriously- it was difficult to take a photo where these ladies didn't look adorable. We had a great time, and it was an excellent way to spend an afternoon in which most everyone else was inside watching the Super Bowl!

Stay tuned for some of these hats and headbands showing up soon in www.ifihadaboat.etsy.com, and enjoy the photos!

If you feed your models beforehand, they'll be less likely to give you Angry Fashion Face.

A winter forest tea party. Completely believable, no? Well maybe you'd be more likely to enjoy one if you had a cozy toque...

Or a lovely headband.

 We really should have done the photos yesterday, when the temperature was 6 degrees Celsius; rather than today, around minus 17. But rosy cheeks are cute, right...? ;)

These quilt photos are my favourites.

Someone was getting cold...

Overall, it was a lovely afternoon!

What a day! Today was the last day before leaving for Christmas holidays. I have, of course, been way over my head in my numerous Christmas present projects. Every year I plan to make all handmade presents (or, at least, mostly). And every year, right around now, I wonder how on earth I will finish them all! Add in a fiancé with a birthday right before Christmas, a new brother-in-law, and a new niece coming any day now and there are even more to make than other years! So much to do--but it means that I have so many to love.

We leave early tomorrow to go to Kev's brother's wedding, after which I'll fly home. I am not finished my presents but they are packed and I'll work on them in Manitoba. I volunteered myself to bring several dozen cookies for the wedding, which added to the craziness of the day. Here is a basic outline of my day today:

7:00 am: Alarm goes off. Frantic grabbing for snooze button, as have been in recent habit of sleeping until 9 unless forced by some early appointment.

7:15 am: Begin thoughts of getting up. (And begin thoughts in general, as slowly regaining consciousness.)

7:30 am: Groggily make coffee and start pulling out baking ingredients (still wearing PJ's and hoodie).

8:30 am: Cardamom Sugar Cookies are mixed and in freezer. Begin mixing up Shortbread Cookies. I've been loving the recipes from the Etsy blog and from Allrecipes.com lately!

10:30 am: Sugar Cookies and Shortbread completed and begin mixing Molasses Crinkles--adding candied ginger this time.

11:00 am: All cookies finished--just finish glazing Sugar Cookies and time to eat some toast! Maybe get dressed too?

11:00-1:30: Frenzy of Christmas Present Preparation. Details to follow after Christmas Secrecy has eased after Dec. 25. Brief excursion to mailbox results in mildly disappointed return with nothing beyond stupid flyers.

1:30: Kev drives me around town to pick up random Present-related items. Purchase containers for cookies. Run other errands.

2:30-3:00: Visit with friends to meet their lovely new baby.

3:00: Job-related meeting to begin planning next teaching course. (Yay! A job!) Am v. excited about upcoming new job.

4:00-5:00: Back home to more Christmas Present Preparation Frenzy

5:00: Make No-Bake Cookies. Package all of day's cookie product for transport.

5:30: Kev arrives to share in consumption of Pad Thai leftovers supper

5:30-7:15: You guessed it! More of aforementioned Frenzy (with some laundry thrown in.)

7:15: Drive to church for Lighthouse service

8:00: Grocery store run to address coffee emergency (Can you imagine me getting up early to leave tomorrow and drive off completely uncaffeinated?)

8:30: Frenzy resumes.

9:30: Finally start packing

10:00: Ice Cream break. Of course.

11:00: Declare packing complete whether correct or not.

1:30 am: Am ensconced in cozy blankets, watching Pride and Prejudice (Thanks, Kev!), debriefing day, and thinking about going to sleep!

Every year I plan to take photos of my Christmas present projects. This year is no different-except, of course, that I will hopefully actually do so. So stay tuned after the big day to hear what I've been up to on the artsy front!

But for now...Goodnight, all.

Hello all,

I have been having some lovely adventures lately. We went up to the Yellowknife Handmade Festival and sold most of my hats! Fortunate for me, though unfortunate for my Etsy shop--it's looking rather bare for now, but I will be putting up more soon. Included in my sales were both hats I made with the owl chart from my last entry. However, I do have a few photos of one of them:

I also made a little fox chart. I need to take more photos of it but here is a preview:

And here is the chart! For the little circle that represents his nose, I made a French knot, though you could also make a bobble. For the eyes, I put in clear beads. If any of you make things using my charts, I'd love to see the pictures! My fox hat will be available in my Etsy shop soon.

Our Yellowknife trip was short but fraught with adventure! We had a fishtank emergency before leaving and lost one fish :( but were able to save the rest. We almost didn't get to go because the Fort Providence ferry was temporarily closed but got word that we could go after all, though considerably later than we'd planned. On the way there we saw a wolverine in the middle of the highway!!!! I was so excited--I know people who have lived here for over a decade and haven't seen one yet. I didn't get a camera picture but it's burned as a memory picture in my mind... I'll upload it when Apple releases the brain-to-computer adaptor.

We had a great time staying with friends, eating out, Handmade Festival-ing, and such. Kev had meetings (of course) and we made friends with an Ethiopian couple who sell injera, bringing back enough for a feast when we got home. We got to see Craig Cardiff play- it was sooooo good. On the drive up, Kev and I had been discussing our wedding plans- specifically the fact that I didn't want to do the whole first dance thing because I don't like being singled out in front of a crowd. Someone must have been listening because at Craig's show, he'd heard we drove up from 5 hours away and called us up to slow dance at the front! There was nothing to do but enjoy it. ;) Within minutes of sitting down, a girl showed me via her phone that a video was already online. We live in a fishbowl world! I must say that it is a lot easier to enjoy the romance of the experience after seeing the video and confirming that I was not quite as awkward in person as in my own mind...

(photo credit: Galit Yael Rodan. Photo was uploaded to Craig Cardiff's public Facebook page).

So for now, I spend my next little while in a flurry of Christmas present making and knitting (another craft sale coming up). And, of course, secretly re-watching a certain video a ridiculous number of times...

Enjoy your days!

I've been looking through my vast array of photos from this summer, getting ready to post some of my travels, and I realized anew how much I love yummy food. And yummy beautiful food is even better! I seem compelled to photograph meals as part of my trip memories...after all, don't you want to remember as many of the highlights as possible? We had a lot of great meals on this trip. Here are some of the ones I captured:

Great breakfast at Red's Diner in Calgary, Alberta while waiting for my rush passport to be processed...delicious, despite frustrating beaurocratic red tape (on the part of the passport, not the eggs).

Cheers! Glass bottles make it somehow classier...

On-the-road junk food breakfast gets even junkier when they accidentally give you cheeseburgers instead of breakfast sandwiches.

Unbelievably yummy brunch (Eggs Benedict with tomato and avocado, if I remember correctly) somewhere in Wyoming on our way to Colorado.

Smoked trout taco at The Smokin' Q in Divide, Colorado

Stuffed crust pizza at our good friends the Adolphes' house in Woodland Park, Colorado

Grilled swordfish at Danny's Corner Bistro in Woodland Park, Colorado...wow.

Another crazy-good breakfast at crazy-high elevation in Colorado... involving a cinnamon bun french toast concoction.

Disgustingly delicious hot dog at Coors Field (baseball diamond) in Denver, Colorado

Portobello mushroom patty (for me) with organic beef burgers (for Caleb and Kev) with parmesan truffle oil fries at Larkburger in Denver

Watermelon and roll kuchen (Kev's first time, courtesy of my mom's kitchen) in Manitoba. Josh is clearly an old pro at this Menno game but Kev's uncertain... or maybe just gearing up for a Mighty Seed Spitting.

Peanut butter/banana/Nutella goodness from Kawaii Crepe at the Winnipeg Folk Festival!

Fabulous Vietnamese food in Calgary, Ab on the way home

Anyone hungry yet?

These snippets of feast memories (along with the others that I did not photograph) explain why I feel the need to hop on my bike and get some more exercise now that I am home. But first I will pour some more coffee and maybe have a snack...

It is 9:30 in the morning and I am still in bed, looking at things on Etsy. I don't work until later today so I have the luxury of hiding from the weather for a while...it is snowing outside! I guess June snow (after getting sunburnt only a few days ago) is part of the Northern experience! Though we've all been basking in the recent warmth, there is, after all, still plenty of ice on Great Slave Lake. So I won't complain about the snow today...but you won't catch me eagerly jumping out of bed to go out in it either!

I've been noticing some great pieces done with text on Etsy lately. I have a love-hate (well, maybe not as strong as hate... more like 'love-bored with') relationship with typographical art. Sometimes it can be kind of cheesy, particularly when it has strayed too far into the realm of 'inspirational' sayings... in my opinion, we've all seen enough 'hang in there' (with a kitten in a tree) posters or cutesy word art that you might buy someone for a bridal shower. 

But barring this kind of schmaltzy stuff, I LOVE good typography and want to continue to explore the realm of words, fonts and text. I recently bought a vintage typewriter to facilitate my own artistic endeavours.

Right now, it is sitting at home in need of some repairs. When I first got it, I wrote a lot of little messages for my boyfriend and kept giving him tiny, rolled up 'text messages'... I did it way more frequently than could still be considered cute... but it was fun. But suddenly the sliding bar part shot over to the side and I haven't been able to figure out how to lock it back into place...also I need to order a new ribbon somewhere. So it is taking a break from active duty.

I've also recently bought some linocut supplies and I'm really excited to see where I can go with this medium! I used some screen-printing ink and some cheap shirts from Fields in Fort Smith and started creating in my hotel room... here are a few shots of my early efforts:

The red shirt was for Kev...I tried to heat-set the ink by washing it but that washed nearly all the ink off! So I've learned something already...

I thought I'd make an Etsy treasury of some of the great pieces I've seen with text lately.

Photographic Print by Eebee & Jack

What a great saying! This is exactly how I feel about life!

Screen-printed paper by FifieduVie

These are lovely... it's not always easy to say sweet nothings without being saccharine, but I like these.

Digital print by ilovepaper

Somebody else has the same favourite Annie Dillard quote as me!

Look! Sunday afternoon knitting classes at the library are bearing their first fruits... here is my friend Kate modelling her first project! She designed her own cowl. I am so proud...

I wish it would stop snowing. I just couldn't believe the Christmas-ey scene outside the window when I woke up today! I should have known; seeing as it is April in the North; but still. I am ready for Spring!!! On the bright side, it reminded me that I have a new toque I recently finished and I can take advantage of this cold weather to wear it...

My grandma likes to tell this story about an ancestor of ours (I forget whom). He spoke Low German and not much English, and was at a store trying to buy rubber bands. Communication of this goal to the salesperson was unsuccessful until, in frustration, he moved his hands back and forth as if pulling on an elastic and said "She come, she go. She come, she go!".

This is how I feel about Spring these days. She beckons; I respond. I walk in the puddles, I feel the sunshine. And then it snows.

Again.

But I am trying not to let it get to me too much, as this is an integral part of the annual process, and it makes summer all the sweeter. The other day I bought some of the Cancer Society fundraising daffodils and my roommate brought in some pussy willows. No matter that the daffodils were shipped up as buds from down south and my roommate had to put the pussy willows in water to get them to fully open up--these are a sign of spring!

And in other news, I finished making my pincushion today. I crocheted the body and stuffed it with cotton batting left over from packing material:

I did some needle felting and really got into the repeated, satisfying stabbing motion. I even got my roommates in on it.

There were still some holes left from the crocheting and you could see the stuffing through them, so I also wrapped some scraps around it and felted them in. It's not super felted-looking but I think this will happen through repeated use. I was originally going for a kind of an abstract gourd shape, but I ended up adding two buttons and a character emerged...

Kev and his brother were playing in a flag football tournament in Yellowknife, and I went along for the ride. Despite my complete lack of connection with all things Sports, I had a fun time-- the Benchwarming Knitter of the group. And, thanks to my new toy, here is a Hipstamaticized photoblog of the weekend!

Kev's brother brought his family...

Will

Mason (getting a cotton candy sugar high)

Lily

Trey

We missed the Snow King fiddle dance, but we went to check out the ice castle in its morning-after state. As you can see, Kev was really hurting after four straight games in a row!

We spent an absolutely delicious hour at the Vietnamese Noodle House...YUM.

Can I Hipstamaticize the golden arches into being cool? Can a vintage-type border and colouring create ironic commentary out of a dietary guilty indiscretion? Hmm...I'll think about it after I finish my fries.

And, in closing,

I love trees.

I just have to say that even though it makes me even more of a Mac-using cliché, I love the Hipstamatic I-phone photo application. Let all the 'real' photographers I know shake their heads at me...but it is so cool.

Observe:

V. fun.

And here is a transformation about to begin, with two thrift store finds, so stay tuned for the final product...