Happy New Year!

Thank you for traveling through 25 years of family pictures!

あけましておめでとうございます！

That's Happy New Year! in Japanese.

The 2011 New Year's picture turned out somewhat wonky. At first, I had planned to give up putting all the animals on one card.

"Too many cats and none of them will sit together. No one is going to be able to see the humans through the menagerie!"

But one of my friends was horrified when I told her that I was making a New Year card without "the whole family" so I dug through my files and found this one picture of 5 cats sitting on a heated sofa pad (and two extra cat cushions in there too). Vel got featured separately as usual and Choco is protesting being out in the yard. You can't tell which cat is which (or if they are really all there) but it is the principle of the thing. Our Family!

Takumi and Leiya were photoed at my mother's house this summer... Tetsu and me photoed standing on the church steps.

Hoping all of you are enjoying your vacation and are making plans for a wonderful 2011! I'm hoping to stay more on top of visiting blogs, limit simultaneous sewing projects to two or three at a time, (oh be realistic, make that 4 or 5) and keep the "get to" philosophy in mind.

"I get to do laps at the pool." "I get to have a full teaching schedule." " I get to cook dinner." (Rather than "I have to.")


Thank you to all my blogging friends!