My pen holder is a vintage Birks pewter tankard from the 1960s. I found it at a yard sale and was instantly drawn to its warm patina and hefty weight. It features a unique glass bottom, but the stamp on the lower rim is what really hooked me: BIRKS, Made in ENGLAND. ENGLISH PEWTER.

How did Canada’s premier luxury jeweler end up stamped on British-made pewter? Slipping down that historical rabbit hole revealed a fascinating connection.

Birks

Long before opening his first Montreal boutique in 1879, founder Henry Birks’ family were master silversmiths in Sheffield, England which was once the global powerhouse for pewter and fine metalware.

Following World War II, Canada experienced massive economic growth. In the 1950s and 1960s, Birks took this opportunity by expanding its catalog beyond diamond rings into premium pewter barware which was made in Sheffield. Stamping “Made in England” onto these pieces added an elite sense of Old World prestige, making them popular corporate and wedding gifts. Eventually, consumer tastes shifted away from formal tableware, and during the 1970s and 1980s, Birks phased out its pewter lines in favor of contemporary crystal.

Pewter Tableware

Using pewter mugs to drink beer actually dates back to the Roman era. They reigned supreme in pubs for centuries because raw tin is so easy to work with. By the 18th century, pewter tableware was ubiquitous across Europe as a status symbol of a family’s position and wealth.

The primary metal in Pewter is tin, other metals (such as lead, copper and antimony) were added to make soft tin strong and long-lasting. Historically, those old formulas often contained up to 20% poisonous lead.

Modern formulas are lead-free. Britain officially phased out lead in tableware in 1974. And while the US FDA doesn’t have a flat limit on lead exposure in the raw material itself, it restricts the actual lead leaching in drinkware to a strict 0.5 µg/mL - a microscopic 0.00005%.

Because Birks produced lead-free mugs as early as the 1960s, that “English Pewter” stamp represents a strictly controlled lead-free alloy consisting of 91% tin, 7.5% antimony, and 1.5% copper.

A newly opened art supplies store nearby caught my eye. It carries many tools for Chinese brush painting. I’ve been intrigued by this art form for some time. I picked out a few supplies - brushes, an inkstone, and an ink stick. I couldn’t wait to try them once I got home.

After my first attempt, I realized I had lost my beloved beanie. I retraced my route, but with no luck. The beanie had random color variations, like a wandering creek. I knitted it last year using self-striping alpaca yarn I bought a decade ago in Salt Lake City.

Tomorrow, February 17, is the second new moon after the winter solstice. It marks the beginning of Lunar New Year 2026 and the Year of the Horse. This year carries the element of Fire, making it the Fire Horse, one of the most dynamic pairings in the Chinese zodiac.

The Fire Horse brings together two powerful forces:

• Horse: freedom, movement, independence, adventure, and forward momentum.

• Fire: passion, courage, boldness, and transformative energy.

It’s a rare combination, last seen in 1966. In the Chinese zodiac, 12 animals rotate with five elements : Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. It forms a 60-year cycle in which each pairing appears only once.

Lunar New Year is celebrated by nearly two billion people around the world. It’s known as Spring Festival in China, Seollal in Korea, and Tết in Vietnam.

May the Year of the Fire Horse bring fresh energy, good health, and meaningful progress in the year ahead.

I’ve drawn every day since last January, using my cat as a reference. That practice led me to create my daily newsletter, Meet Max the Cat.

This year, I expand to other themes. I use photos taken on the same date across different years as references. I name this project “Postcards from Bree”. Revisiting old photos allows me to relive moments and reflect on them in a new way. It also makes me realize how many random, meaningless shots I’ve saved. Now I declutter my digital album day by day.

We may not have sketch-worthy moments each day, but we have so much to draw from the everyday life we’ve already captured. Even the same photo can be drawn differently, it only takes a new way of seeing.

Shocking Discovery

I was surprised when I spotted a small Health Canada warning label on a box of Quaker Raisin Almond cereal. It read: “High in saturated fat and sugar.”

I checked other Quaker cereal flavors, and thankfully, they don’t carry this warning. Quaker has long been a breakfast staple in our home because of its fiber and protein. As someone who usually reads food labels, I had checked other Quaker flavors before- but not this one. I had assumed the different flavors were nutritionally similar. That assumption, it turns out, was wrong.

The Label

Since January 1, 2026, Health Canada requires packaged foods to display a front-of-package (FOP) label if they are high in saturated fat, sugars, or sodium. The threshold is set at 15% of the daily value (DV).

Although the rules were introduced in July 2022, food companies were given a transition period to comply, which runs through the end of 2025.

The Basis for Calculation

To prevent companies from using smaller serving sizes to avoid the FOP warning, Health Canada uses a standardized reference amount rather than the serving size listed on the nutrition label. This means that even if a product shows a lower % DV on its own nutrition label, it might still carry a front-of-package warning.

Labelling Rules: Canada’s FOP vs. The U.S. FDA

Canada’s FOP rules are stricter and more cautious than the U.S. FDA’s current requirements. the FOP labeling is mandatory with lower thresholds that flag nutrients of concern earlier.

Rreference (s)

• Health Canada

‘s 30 days of drawing challenge has been such a joyful ride.

Three unexpected delights:

1. Learning about the artists behind each daily prompt. I even ended up buying Making Comics by Lynda Barry.

2. Drawing my first comic selfie, never thought I could finish one in just 10 minutes.

3. Drawing everyday things with stories, boots, a teacup, a set of keys, brought back small, fond memories.

Two cool discoveries:

1. I can draw with my non-dominant hand, turns out they’re not bad at all, some are even better than my dominant-hand drawings.

2. Bilateral drawing is such a great way to loosen up. After a 3–5 minute warm-up, my right-hand drawing feels much more relaxed.

Seeds

A bunch of my sketches are off, even total misses. Those failed attempts gave me a taste of creative directions I hadn’t thought much about, like visual storytelling, or didn’t even know existed, like abstract comics. They’re seeds, some may grow someday.

I finished my first knitting project of the year last week, a belated New Year gift to myself. It’s the second makeover of this Aran sweater. I bought it for my partner almost two decades ago. With a few small twists, it starts a third life in a slightly different style. I couldn’t be happier.

I did my first sweater makeover three years ago - my very first one, and it received more compliments than I expected. Since then, I’ve altered a few more.

I find real joy in small makeovers. Working with old sweaters turned out to be much more fun than I expected, and far less intimidating.

• Quick rewards - This makeover took less than 5 hours; my first one took around twenty hours. Small wins keep me going. I’m still not ready to knit a sweater from scratch.

• Little pressure. No expensive yarn to worry about, no guilt if I change my mind halfway through. I once abandoned a scarf project using expensive yarn simply because the color stopped feeling right.

• I know this yarn well. After twenty years, there’s still no pilling. New yarn can be a gamble. It would break my heart if a project I worked on for a year started pilling after a month of wear.

• Freedom in being imperfect. I don’t count rows when I alter the bottoms of the sleeves to make them match, I just eyeball them. One or two wrong stitches don’t bother me. Uneven knitting is fine.

I see yarn as a medium and my knitting as loose sketching. For me, knitting is about relaxation and creation of something useful. When I get stuck writing or sketching, I often pick up my knitting to clear my mind.

Deep red - a winter color

On cold winter days, I often reach for cups in deep red. Their warm, earthy tones somehow make every sip of tea taste better. I think of kitchen ceramics as usable artworks, and I rotate them seasonally by color, chartreuse for spring, deep red for winter.

I was gifted this gorgeous lidded teacup. Its oxblood glaze moves between deep crimson and rich burgundy, glowing softly as light travels across its glossy surface. It’s one of the most beautiful cups in my kitchen.

A Small Cup of Its Own

This small cup is a gaiwan, which means “lidded bowl” in Chinese. It’s used for brewing loose-leaf tea, and it is far from an ordinary, store-bought teacup.

Small Lid

It plays a big role. It traps heat and aroma, allowing the tea to steep fully. When pouring, it gently holds back the leaves, no separate strainer needed, just a slight tilt of the lid.

Glossy Deep Red

It is a classic Chinese oxblood glaze. Oxblood is not just a color name, but a specific and notoriously difficult ceramic glaze. Its color comes from copper oxide, forming only under extremely precise conditions during cooling. Copper is volatile at high heat, and the window for success is very small. A slight misstep can turn the glaze brown, gray, or green -or result in total failure.

China has mastered oxblood glaze through centuries of experimentation and experience. The oxblood glaze is known for its inconsistent surface : colors shift from ruby to dark oxblood, with subtle mottling and clouding. This variability reflects a Chinese ceramic tradition that values natural ceramic variation, where what might be seen elsewhere as flaws are often embraced as beauty.

Known as sang-de-boeuf (French for “oxblood”), this glaze emerged in the Ming dynasty (1368–1644 CE) for imperial wares. Its deep reds, pooling into darker tones, give each piece a quiet, living beauty.

Snapped this while waiting at a traffic light. It was −10 °C, a sketcher was sitting on the snow near a road fork, leaning against a metal traffic control cabinet, doing plein air sketching on a piece of packaging cardboard. A small cup of coffee sat beside them.

Even bundled up in a heavy parka with a fur-trimmed hood and mittens, being outside for just five minutes would be freezing , yet the sketcher seemed completely unaware of it, fully absorbed in drawing. It’s the power of art!

After more than 1.5 years of experimenting, I finally found my favorite sketchbook format: palm-sized sketch cards (1.5” ×2.25”) cut from dollar-store sketchbooks, similar to index cards.

These little cards work so well for me:

1. No precious pressure - With loose cards bound by a small ring, there’s no “first page” anxiety. I can rearrange, remove, or add cards anytime. Each card costs less than 1 cent (USD)!

2. Less overthinking - The tiny size keeps me from obsessing over composition or color schemes and encourages more spontaneous sketching.

3. More practice - They’re super handy and easy to carry everywhere, so I sketch more often.

4. Better-than-expected paper - Somehow, this cheap paper handles water better than many branded sketchbooks I’ve tried.

I started using these small sketch cards last summer when even my minimalist sketch kit felt like too much for trail-heavy trips. These cards are perfect for quick sketches in in-between moments, waiting, short breaks, or just pausing for a breath.

I don’t worry about whether my works on cheap paper will last forever. I’m more into visual journaling than making art. I save my sketches digitally, and that’s works perfectly for my purpose.

Fellow sketch newbies, what’s your favorite way to sketch more and stress less?

A Little Spark

Since learning sketching around two years ago, I’ve grown used to looking for small beauty around. On a cold winter day, a beanie in a shop display caught my eye. Its pattern was striking - variegated stripes in earthy tones, each color softly melting into the next, like a loose watercolor wash.

I stepped inside for a closer look, tempted to buy it. But I left empty-handed. As a loyalist to natural fibers, the synthetic acrylic was a compromise. I disliked the messy floats on the reverse, and the price felt steep. Still, the image stayed with me. I wanted to knit one.

A Perfect Solution

For a long time, I couldn’t figure out how to knit that painterly effect without floats on the back until early last year when I rediscovered a self-striping alpaca yarn tucked away in a drawer. It’s perfect for my project.

I knit the beanie in a week, using only simple stitches and alternating freely. The stripes emerged spontaneously, irregular bands of color, no two sections the same. The finished piece was exactly what I had imagined. It reminded me of wandering creeks along a mountain trail.

Two Forgotten Skeins

I bought the yarn over a decade ago from a small shop in Salt Lake City, Utah. The owner introduced me to alpaca wool, luxurious, lightweight, and incredibly warm, something I had never encountered before. She shared fascinating stories of alpacas from her home country, Peru.

I was drawn to a swatch in an earthy palette: deep reds, burgundy, olive green, muted purples. The colors transitioned so naturally. I walked out with two skeins and no plan. At the time, I wasn’t much into knitting.

Connecting the Dots

Sketching teaches me to blend art into the mundane, turning those yarns into a beautiful, useful beanie that might otherwise have remained simply part of my collection.

Yarn’s Forgiveness

I love yarn’s forgiveness, it lets me rewind and begin again. The piece I’m working on now was the only scarf I ever knitted years ago using only basic stitches. Early this year, I unraveled it and reknitted it into a simple pattern of my own design. I chose knit–purl stitches so mistakes would be highly visible. The stitch pattern shifts every twelve rows, creating subtle visual and tactile texture.

Self-Forgiveness

About a week into the project, I realized I had miscalculated the rows in one section near the beginning. Redo or ignore the mistake? I was torn. Correcting it meant unraveling almost everything, and the frustration made me stop.

Only last week, after spotting it in a drawer, I picked it up again. It took time to locate the wrong section, and even then, it was barely noticeable unless I counted the rows. I decided to continue from where I left off. Now I’m comfortable eyeballing the row changes instead of insisting on precision.

Knitting as a craft

As a knitting beginner, store-bought knitwear is much better and cheaper, considering the cost of yarn and time. Still, I enjoy knitting. It gives me space to explore, experiment with different yarns, and add a personal touch.

Knitting as drawing

Knitting feels much like sketching, just in a different medium. Knitters who follow patterns remind me of realistic artists. I’m not good at that. I’m drawn to loose line drawing and prefer relaxed patterns. Like line hatching, stitch patterns build form and texture. But knitting offers more:

• It creates tactile texture.

• It allows multiple undo and redo moments, something line drawing rarely permits, except with light pencil work.

Cat

Earlier this year, I wanted to build a sketching habit. Instead of drawing random subjects, I chose to focus on one theme. My cat, Max, naturally came to mind - an ideal model, available rain or shine, 24/7, all year round.

Tools

I keep things easy to stay consistent. I limit myself to two or three colors to avoid decision fatigue. I started with colored pencils because they’re easy to control and forgiving, then later switched to watercolor for its looser, spontaneous feel. To ease the pressure, I I use cheap dollar-store sketchbooks, which surprisingly work better than many branded ones.

Start

I began quietly. Unlike the usual 30-day or 52-week challenges people announce online, I was too intimidated to make it public, as I had no idea how long I could keep it going, though I do have an ambitious goal of turning this into a lifelong habit.

Reward

I’ve made progress. I sketch faster now and feel comfortable drawing directly with pen, without a pencil underdrawing. I’m happy with about 6 out of 10 sketches. The unexpected bonus is the connection. The real bonus is the community - connecting with fellow cat lovers who keep me motivated.