Awesome! I loved this book.

As a very old teacher once said, “Most times, the lowest rungs of a ladder are the best ones for learning to climb. I always hate to ask a child to jump to the top rung without them.”

Just to round out this week's reading - a Scottish detective novel.

I didn't cut a stencil for the daisies, and made them in a mini-muffin pan and used a stainless straw to cut the holes. I also sliced them in half and added more lemon cream - cause you can never have too much lemon cream - right?

"Foosh! Foom!"
I love the imagery and sound effects :)

Knit for Noella who loves lizards. Entertaining summer knitting project ;)

Set in the former Yugoslavia, this book explores the feelings still simmering there.

This is the first book by Eoin Colder that I have read that was written with an adult audience in mind. I find his main character quite appealing but I think I prefer his TA style.

Now I'm just cranky that the library doesn't have book 2.

I found this book strange and moving as it follows the internal dialogues and struggles of a family trying to keep surface appearances "normal".

I enjoyed this - a little dark, but kept me up late to finish it.

"Well, now I know that your sixties feel the same as all the other ages, and your seventies. You never stop being yourself on the inside, whatever age people think you are by looking at you from the outside."

That's what winter is: an exercise in remembering how to still yourself then how to come pliantly back to life again.

...part of the difficult, essential work of unruliness is shaking the status quo so thoroughly, so persistently, so loudly that everyone -- even the very women behind that agitation, many of whom have internalized the understandings they fight so tirelessly against -- can see their value within it." (Internet photo)

Think of Clinton graciously conceding to a man so much less qualified than her. At this point, a young woman who's watched the election and still wants to enter politics risks being labeled a masochist.

As the first borrower of this book from our library, I shared in the story of the young woman who laminated the jacket and then despaired "too crooked" as she failed to line up the spine.

The Celtic knots of the cover photo have enticed me to sign out this book several times.

It may be a bit of a struggle to start with, but once you get the hang of knitting mittens, it's like a game.

Pretty so-so. Okay for a holiday read but I found the plot formulaic enough to rouse me from my willing suspension of disbelief.

With a little twist on murder mystery - the strangers are "shipwrecked" from another planet.

Glorious...Gorgeous storytelling: wry, playful, and utterly alive. - The Boston Globe

"I have never met a pickled vegetable I didn't like."

Private detective, Cormoran Strike, and his new temp secretary, Robin Ellacott, are investigating the death of model, Lula Landry, which had been ruled a suicide.

This is a "Jodi's Pick" from our own public library - one of my favourite librarians :)
It always baffles me when someone says they don't use the library - when my kids were little, it was one of our favourite places to go when we just needed to get out of the house.

"Goats have some of the most wide-ranging and sexy fibers. From the strong and shimmery ringlets of the angora goat to the luxurious down of cashmere, goat fiber can stand alone or work beautifully blended with other fibers. It always brings something a little special to the party."

How could I NOT pick up a book called "MOO"? Set in the US Midwest, at a small agricultural university, it has lots to say about the realities vs academics of rural farm life. Excellent read :)

"Those of us who care about what we eat - and we should all care - must demand that the animals we eat are raised naturally and humanely, treated with respect in both life and death." ... "Paying more for our meat is good in other ways. If our meat costs more, we will not waste it, we'll take more care when we cook it, and we'll eat less of it - a good thing because most of us eat too much meat."

"A coat, a hood, a baby-wrapper; a saleable commodity, or a gift made and infused with love; a functional textile, or a fashionable one - the hap has many faces."
Still totally immersed in fibre arts and all things Irish, the cover of this new book in the Northern Fibres Guild library has a hap (or shawl) by Irish knit designer, Carol Fuller. Here is my version - still in progress.

In the right circumstances ten girls together could probably get drunk without actually drinking anything at all. They're amazing things really, teenage girls.

This book caught my attention because of the author's name. I thought "I know a Marcelle Dubé - the mother of one of my daughter's school friends." As it turns out, it is the same Marcelle Dubé. I am looking forward to reading about Kate Williams, chief of police in a tiny northern town in Manitoba.

I picked this up because of the Irish Times Bestseller tag. The best part was the letters back and forth between the sisters - one who lives in Texas, the other in Dublin.

On the theme of fibre arts in preparation for our fibre tour of Ireland. This novel is set after the war in England - Kate Shackleton, ex-VAC and widowed by the war - officially declared herself a private detective.

This book was a gift from my sister and revolutionized the way I knit not only socks but also mitt, gloves, cuffs, or anything else that generally comes in pairs.

I might need to knit myself a pair of seven league boots :)

Having so much fun trying out the various increase locations.

There's a certain whiplash in being the parent of a teenager, where you have to find a way not to scream like a berzerker every time the kid slows to the pace of a snail on sedatives, and then ten minutes later you're following them around the house saying, "Hold on a minute. Why are you taking the cordless drill to the park?" or "I know you're excited, but have you considered that this rodeo plan of yours might be a little dangerous?" or ...