Go for the Gold!

Who else is enjoying these Olympics already? The athletes are blowing my mind (swimming, gymnastics, shooting, more swimming!), and I love the pageantry of the games in London. The Queen? Awesome. Zara Phillips and the GB team getting silver, awarded by the Princess Royal, a former Olympian herself? Priceless!

All of this has inspired some gold, silver, and bronze crab searches for those of us watching the games at home:

GOLD!

This is good not only for the Olympics, but also for 

steampunk-themed weddings (love you Courtney and Rhys)!

 

SILVER!

Take victory in your own hands claws!

BRONZE!

Bling with a (telson) spike!

And for the top athletes who win a Nike endorsement (because there is NO WAY they could afford it otherwise):

No, I'm not lying when I tell you this GOLD fiddler crab ring is $5,720!!

A fluff piece

Warning: this post contains NO scientific content!

A while back my friends bought a condo and decided to adopt a sweet little kitty for the new place. Well, really she's more like a well-aged woman. I guess you could say, were she tracking down young tomcats, she'd be a cougar. (Because of the age and gender... and feline-ness. Sorry.)

"not funny!" - cougar kitten

Anyway, we wanted to get her a little welcoming present and figured, what better thing to get than a catnip-filled crustacean toy!

who doesn't love lobster?

I checked with my cats to see if they approved

the verdict: it's good to go!

meet Zoe!

I think she likes it!

Success! Have you gotten any crustacean-themed toys, whether for yourself, a friend, a pet, or a study animal? If not, I suggest you get on that.

T-shirt craft by the Amazing Amelia!

When my big sister Amelia saw the Snow Crab Love logo, she told me she wanted it in t-shirt form. Actually, it started way back when she saw this goofy awesome picture of me from the NMFS summer trawl survey in '09:

the original design! although, admittedly, I am eating red king crab...

Amelia has a degree in elementary education, taught for a few years in public schools, and is now home schooling her 3 beautiful daughters. So, true to form, she turned her want for crabby t-shirts into a fun project for the kiddos. And she's letting me share the details with you!

First she had to gather all the materials (and she downloaded a jpeg of the Snow Crab Love logo):

This was a Valentine's Day project, hence the pink shirts,
plus Crayola Fabric Crayons - who knew?!?

extra fabric paint she had on hand from past projects

Second, she taped the print-out to the window so that the girls could color in the image with those fabric crayons. You can see that it's been placed so that their drawing will be a backwards version of the original image, and she used the window to make it easier to see. This way, when it is ironed onto their shirts, it will face the right direction!

(Yes, this was in February. And no, that's not what

my backyard looks like in February either. 

Yes, I am a bit jealous!)

Coloring! And, Amelia says, "Pressing hard"!

A finished drawing, ready for the heat!

Third, Amelia ironed the images onto each girls' shirts. I would suggest just following the directions that come with whichever product you end up using.

this is where adult supervision is handy

ironed on and ready for some glitter paint!

Fourth, everyone broke out the fabric paints for those special finishing touches:

Boo's sparkly shirt
(my sister uses little nicknames for her girls)

Bug's peaceful crab shirt

Bear's sweet shirt - I love the purple bow!

Amelia's shirt, because she's not going to let the girls have ALL the fun!

Great job girls! And thanks, Amelia, for sharing the how-to. These look amazing (WAY better than mine - I guess I'm going to have to make a new one)!

Why I need a lobster cookie cutter...

... like now!

OK, so I don't know how to make a lobster pot pie,

BUT if I had a lobster cookie cutter to cut pie dough

I'd be halfway there!

Don't you wish this was your lunch?

A lobster-shaped quesadilla with all the fixin's!

Last but not least: lobster-shaped cookies!

(I'm also dreaming of those cupcakes, from here.)

So there you have it: three good reasons why I need a lobster cookie cutter.

Oldies but goodies

Check out these classy ladies:

my friend Courtney (from this post) sent me this doll:

her name tag reads, "I. Pinch"

I don't have the source for this one,

but I love her even more than the last!

She understands the importance of

accessories!

(Explanation - as if you need one - of their classiness here.)

Cats love crabs too

We celebrated the cats birthday last weekend (it's late, and yes, we're those people), and boy do they love their crab toy! (The catnip probably helped.)



Scout delighting in crab-shaped joy

Boo checkin' it out

sweet little crocheted crab, slightly worse for the wear love

it can sense the danger nearby

Does anyone else have crab-shaped cat toys or knit/crochet crabs? If you do, I'm sure you'll find some cats that will happily get in on some Snow Crab Love!

Crab Lab Fecundity

Is it just me, or is every other crab student at UAF having a baby? This lab is super fecund! (Take note, all you prospective students!)

For the most recent addition to our crab-lovin' group, Katie Palof (Pacific ocean perch geneticist) knit this amazingly cute little crustacean:

on route to the baby shower, enjoying the view of Douglas Island across the channel

livin' it up at the party!

It's not as cute as crab labber Joel and Karin's new baby boy, but it's a close second! It inspired me to search etsy (once again) for cute crab/baby stuff. Please, enjoy:

This lobster is both cute and educational:

remember how important cannibalism is for crustaceans?

(from this Chi-town shop!)

The simplicity of Lobber the crab-monster reminds

me of my little snow crab cartoons.

In short, I love him (from here)!

This sweet hat would help any little one match

their new crab toys pretty darn closely! Plus the

seller is from Kodiak, Alaska!! Represent!

That last hat made me think of this cute little number

my sister whipped up over at Happy Walrus,

inspired by this very blog! (How adorable is my neice!?!)

It's never too early to start teaching the little ones about crab love, and they can be ever the more cute while they learn!

Classy lady

My friend Janelle sent me this and I thought it was a lovely follow-up to this post:

from www.nataliedee.com (warning, some of her cartoons feature colorful language)

I tell you what, I did feel pretty classy in Sherry Tamone's crab hat!

My own personal crab spy

My sister Emma Yanevskyy is a super-sleuth of crabby paraphernalia. She has a shop on etsy (shameless promotion? Maybe.) so she spends a fair amount of time checking on it and meandering other shops to check out the competition. When she finds something of the crustacean persuasion, she sends it my way (including the crab sign from this post)! Here are some of my favorite crabby things she’s found on the interwebs:

"Now everyone is on the beach!"

found here

he might be signaling a turn, but then again, you never know with fiddler crabs

found here

who doesn't want a pillow with an octopus-baby hybrid munching on a whole lobster?

found here

Please enjoy the benefits of my personal crab spy!

What's on YOUR head?

During the Women of Science and Technology presentation, my advisor Sherry Tamone let me wear her awesome hat. I didn’t have any pictures until now:

Showing the girl scouts how calipers work

(I didn’t want to show the girls’ faces b/c I don’t have their contact info to get the OK from their moms,

BUT I did want to show how the one little girl was looking at my hat:

she was either trying to figure out what was on my noggin or plottin' on me!)

Thus began the hunt for more crabby caps!

The cheapest, most similar one I could find:

find it here

A creative crocheted number:

find this beanie at the Moose Threads etsy shop

Or if you’re not ready to don one yourself:

What do you think they're talking about? Probably how awesome they both look.

(find the print here)

It's a crab-eat-crab world

I’ll admit it: I’m an etsy junkie. I like to type in “crab” or “nautical” and just window-shop away! Check out some of these beauties that I’m dreaming about:

I can picture these on my couch!

Crabby Chris

dictionary pages are becoming a popular surface for amazing drawings, and I LOVE them!

cshadwick and Winterberry Cottage

How cute is this pin cushion???

Peaches Products

I recently broke down and bought two prints from this seller!

Matou en Peluche

While there, I stumbled upon this awesome picture by Heidesphotos:

"Crab eating crab"

It made me think about how common cannibalism is in crabs, and just how important it is for snow crabs. Opies are benthic forage feeders who mostly feed on polychaete worms, clams, and the like (I feed my guys herring mostly, and occasionally treat them with salmon and blue mussels). But their stomach contents have included small crabs, mostly found in large adult males. Because of the small amounts of crabs found, scientists don’t think these large males need the little crabs for their nutritional benefit, but their cannibalism may be an important type of population control. It’s as if they read Jonathon Swift’s A Modest Proposal and followed through on it!