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It's no secret I'm sort of involved with local roller derby , so when I heard about a children's graphic novel that included the sport, I had to give it a quick read! Roller Girl By Victoria Jamieson 2015 240 pages Astrid is twelve, just about to go into junior high, and is in the process of losing her best friend to ballet and boys. Her life changes though after she attends her first roller derby game, and promptly falls in love with the sport! But attending roller derby camp turns out to be not as easy as it looks, and adding friend drama and pre-teen girl drama means it's going to be a rough summer for Astrid. Will she find her feet? Will she find a new friend? Yeah, so I'm not the target demographic for this book, but I tell ya, I probably would've loved reading it when I was twelve years old! It's the story of a misfit girl, one who isn't into boys and fashion (like me as a kid), and about how she deals with jealous-girl-friend-drama issues (like me...

Recently, I blogged about a knitting book I had taken out of the library that was full of roller derby patterns. It then occurred to me that I've never blogged about roller derby! Which is crazy, because it's been a big part of my life for the past couple years. Why wouldn't I archive my involvement on my blog? Admit it, you're all sick of hearing about curling anyway. Years ago, like years ago - 2008 maybe? - I went to my first roller derby game. I think it was one of my classmate's birthday and a group of us went. I had no idea, no idea how awesome of a sport it was! One game in and I was hooked - derby is the best mix of fast, loud, violence, and girl power. I didn't grow up watching the banked track games of the 70s, but flat track roller derby in Edmonton became a staple in our lives. For a couple years, a rotating group of friends and I would attend local games semi-regularly. We had our favourite teams and our favourite players. They were like rocks star...

Normally I get my knitting patterns from Ravelry , but I recently took a couple knitting pattern books out of the library... Knitted Dinosaurs: 15 Prehistoric Pals to Knit From Scratch By Tina Barrett 2011 128 pages I'm really into dinosaurs lately, because apparently I'm a 10yr old boy trapped inside a 35yr old women's brain. Sigh. Anyway, this book was great because the patterns weren't stupid hard. That's usually how I feel about knitted toy patterns, so this book was refreshing in that respect. The illustrations are colourful, the text seems well laid out and easy to understand, and there were a few pages devoted to knitting/toy making techniques at the end. Each of the 15 dinosaurs got their own pattern, as well as a small section with interesting tidbits of info. I took this book to work to show to the library staff crafting group that I'm trying to get going...and they loved it! I'm sure many people of all ages will be getting dino gifts in the future...