Rocks

Tetsu's rocks now adorn our living room window.  He is so pleased with them.  He considers them a focal point of our interior decorating.

"Tanya, we ought to go to the coast more often and collect rocks.  It is exciting to see what we can find!  (He can find.)

After Tetsu had combed the beach for awhile and we were heading back to the car with his arms full of rocks I pointed out one in the sand.

"Look at this piece of wood."

"That's not wood.  That's a rock."

"Tetsu, that's not a rock, that's a piece of wood.  Look, it has a nail hole in it."

"That is definitely not a piece of wood.  That's a rock.  Feel how heavy it is."

"It's heavy, but it doesn't have the iciness of the other rocks...  It's a piece of wood."

Once home the rocks got spread out on the living room table so that Tetsu could admired them and then pick and choose his favorite.  By far, the piece of wood/rock  is our favorite.  It has now become part of our daily topic of conversation.

"Is it a rock?  Or is it a piece of wood?"

I don't know how we are ever going to know.  We'll probably just take a survey of everyone who comes in the house...

"Hello, hello.  Please come in.  Before you sit down, would you give your opinion?  Is this a rock or is this a piece of wood?"

I don't expect a picture on my blog to result in any answers either... But at first glance... Is this a rock or a piece of wood?  (If you click on the picture you can get close up.)

Of course, really knowing would take the fun out of it all.

A blog friend

This weekend a package came from a blog friend, Pratima!  (And she spent a pretty penny sending it to Japan.)

 

A beautiful stylish handmade bag and the inside pocket contained a sampling of teas.  A pretty snap make-up bag with kitties on it.  Some large cuts of fabrics for future projects and swatches of matching fabrics for something muted and genteel.  And even children's puzzle books for my English children!  Pratima often asks about Y-kun and prays for him and she included the books for him and other boys in that class. 

Thank you Pratima!  I'm hoping to get an e-mail from you telling me a little about YOUR likes and lifestyle too!

Seaside pictures

Tetsu and I went for a drive to the Pacific coast of Japan... about a three hour drive away.  Just a drive, no purpose in mind.  We visited the fish market again but I've taken pictures of that place before...  We did buy fish (but mistakenly thought they were well protected in their Styrofoam box...  They weren't... The cats had a midnight feast) and we had a sushi lunch.

The seaside was windy and cold but that didn't seem to stop a lone fisherman out on the rocks.

I wonder if he caught anything.

While I enjoyed taking pictures Tetsu went looking for rocks.  He likes rocks and when I came back to him he had quite a collection of ones he liked.

"This one looks like it has a cross in it.  This one is brown on one side and black on the other.  This one is so white and a perfect oval."

"Tetsu... I think that one is a piece of worn down cement."

Nothing like a wife who bursts your dreams.
 

As we drove by a port we found all these fishing boats tied to the pier and ready for their first fishing expedition of the year.  Some sort of ceremony with each boat flying its own flag from a long bamboo pole. 

The ceremony is probably today so we didn't see the boats setting sail... It must be a colorful exhibit!

And do you know what this character is supposed to be? We stopped at a factory for a tour, samples, a look at a mini-museum... and a large sales area.  This is a spicy cod roe character!!!  Yes, cod roe.  Like in cod fish eggs.  In Japanese, the spicy type is called mentaiko and we were visiting a mentai park...  Mentaiko is delicious and can be used in lots of recipes.  I'm not sure the character is going to outsell Hello Kitty but we bought mentaiko and I will hone my cooking skills this week.

January sewing

I've been up in the sewing room working on the Fiery Starr border.  Feathers seem to complement the inner feathers the best so I marked the quilt lightly with a spine curve and then started in sewing freehand feathers.  (Somewhere it was suggested to mark a quilt I with a sliver of soap...  Memo to myself.  You can't hold a sliver of soap in your mouth like you can a pencil when moving a quilt... Yuck.)

As usual it takes a bit of time to get into a rhythm of sewing feathers.

"Can I really do this or am I just making a mess?"

After a few false starts I sewed one border with half of a feather.  And didn't like it... 

Sigh.  Well my theory with machine quilting is the more sweeps around the less the glitches show so I added another line of stitching within the feathers...  Better!  This is how it is going to go!  I'll keep you updated.

And while I'm downstairs in the warmth I have been buttonhole appliqueing.

Mrs. Furui has been asking me to think up a quilt for her volunteer group at the hospital to make.  She wants to put an autumn quilt up on the hospital wall.  Now I don't know these ladies at all... but Mrs. Furui would not let up.  She's working on a  summer quilt for the hospital wall so that's why I got the assignment of the autumn quilt.

I've seen dual image quilts before... but some seemed too complicated and as I say, I don't really know what these ladies can do...  Simple is best.  So from an Internet picture I made my own simple leaf pattern and have been experimenting.  I think the original pattern was in Quiltmakers magazine but I don't have the pattern itself.  This is pretty easy...  I'll head over to Mrs. Furui's and see what she thinks.

Eek eek.

Let's see...  I don't want to complain here... but I have an annoyance to relate.

Tetsu and I have been talking about getting an iPad since.... Oh, I don't know... last summer?  Maybe even before that when my friend Lorraine was visiting and showing me how hers worked.  And I know I gave it great thought before I went to the States in July just because I didn't want to lug my computer with me to the States.  And while I was in California I admired the way my brother whipped his out and played with it.  And I remember Leiya suggesting we just go buy one and worry about whether or not I would be able to use it later. And Takumi was annoyed with me at the end of the summer when I still hadn't bought an iPad.

"If you had bought it here then I could have set it up for you and shown you how to use it."

But I am a wishy-washy person and went back and forth about why I should or should not own an iPad.  It is just a toy.  I have enough blessings in my life...  a workable computer, a new camera, a workable sewing machine, a Kindle.  I don't NEED an iPad.  I wondered if I was just getting caught up in Keeping up with the Joneses.

"Everyone else seems to have them, why not me too?"

I don't even know what I want to do with an iPad.  I don't even know what they CAN do.

Tetsu does not have a computer and he insists he can't use mine because it is from the States (the keyboard doesn't have Japanese characters on it though of course it can type Japanese).  Tetsu 'sorta' wanted an iPad just so he could play a few games on it...  He definitely doesn't want to bring home work and sit at a computer some more.  He doesn't want to write things or use programs etc.

We admired Marlene's iPad in December when she was visiting.

Let's do it!!

Tetsu visited a store and got information on it (AGAIN.... We did this once with a clerk last June.)

He suggested we go look together at the end of December and we talked together with a clerk AGAIN.  The clerk was even carrying things to the register when Tetsu suggested we WAIT until the beginning of the year.  I'm not sure why...  He thought there might be a sale?  We have done this so many times that I'm feeling like a monkey who is being teased by treats held through the bars and then snatched away before it can reach them!

Yesterday...

"Today is the day, Tanya!  Let's go buy us an iPad!"

But it was still... should we try this store?  No, let's go to that store first.  Wait... maybe THAT store would be better.  Finally we stepped into an iPad store.

"I'm so sorry.  iPads are all sold out.  We had lots of them at the end of the year but now we have a waiting list.  I don't know when they will be available again.  Do you want to leave your name?"

No.  Tetsu didn't want to leave his name...  Hmm.  What a let down...  Maybe it just isn't meant to be.

Red!

Yesterday my neighbor invited me over for strawberry birthday cake.  Her father celebrated his 95 birthday and they had leftover cake. 

While there, the husband in the family decided he wanted to make udon noodles...  Last year he took a class in noodle making and then got inspired to buy all the necessary implements and has started making his own homemade noodles.  Udon actually takes two days to make so I only was able to watch the preliminary mixing and kneading process. 

Isn't this a great bowl?!  It is a wooden lacquer bowl and costs a pretty penny but it is indispensable for Japanese noodle making.

A couple bags of flour...

Some salt water...

While my neighbor and I chatted, her husband spent nearly 30 minutes mixing in (completely by hand) the salt water and then kneaded his dough for another 15 minutes.  He did this on the floor of his kitchen (no counter space in Japanese kitchens.)

When I left the dough was being wrapped and would be kept in a cool place overnight.  Sometime today he will roll it all out and cut it by hand.  Unfortunately I'm not going to be around today to watch that part of the process... Maybe he'll bring over some noodles tonight?  (I can hope!)

A couple of days ago, Choco and I walked past these little stone statues by the rice fields.  They looked a little naked...  Where are their hats? 

Yesterday Choco and I made another jaunt around the the rice fields and the statues were all decked out in new bright red bibs.  Someone (probably a farmer's wife) spends a bit of sewing time each December and makes sure the statues have a bright new set of bibs for the new year.  I'm not sure if the hats were remade or just given a good wash.

Red is a good celebration color!

New Year's Day 2013

I've just spent an hour chatting with Leiya about where life leads us and how we know which way to turn.  A good way to start the New Year.

"Behold, I will do something new"

Isaiah 43:19

This Bible verse was brush painted by my pastor for yesterday's New Year's Day service.  A new day, a new year to start things... to remember that God is with us showing us the way.

Oh dear...  Here I am mixing beliefs.  Well, think of this as a custom rather than a belief.  This was in Tetsu's mother's apartment entryway.  Her one acknowledgement of the holidays.  (It is too much bother to try to follow the customs at her age.)  She probably had one of the care workers who comes, buy this at the supermarket...  A cardboard and plastic New Year decoration that is trying to look like a gold tray with pounded rice balls on top.  The plastic "mochi balls" actually have pounded rice slabs hidden away inside for convenient eating.  Isn't that tied crane pretty on there?  (The crane symbolizes long life.)  I don't know what the other symbolism is but many people will have these decorations with an orange stuck on top adorning their doorways or even the bumpers of their cars.

Are you getting tired of seeing Obaachan?  She's getting tired of posing for pictures with me.

"Come on, Obaachan!  Show us a peace sign pose for the camera."

"Leave me alone!!  I can't believe you can be so silly."

I think we cheered her up on New Year's Day.