The sweet shop

Yesterday I stopped at the Japanese sweet shop to buy sweets (rather than to stand in front of the shop and direct children across the crosswalk.)  Usually when I arrive at the crosswalk in the morning the sweet shop lady and her son are just pulling door and window shutters up and then they spend the next half hour washing all the glass in their large windows.  (In this freezing cold too!  It is an everyday routine!)

Yesterday when I stopped in I could see the son and his wife (and their baby) in the kitchen part of their shop busily making sweets.  I asked if I could watch AND take pictures!

This is the "kitchen" in their shop.  Traditional is a good word for it.  The "stove" is a fireplace made of local stone and the two huge rice pots set into the top of the stone.  The wooden lids are just heavy enough to keep the steam from escaping but not enough to pressure cook (and smash) the rice kernels. The son was explaining to me that originally they would push firewood into the hole at the bottom of the stone stove... but now they have it rigged with gas.  He seemed to think it funny that I asked if they still used firewood.  I didn't think it was such a funny question because I know that they cook their beans in an outside firewood stove.  The smokey aroma fills the air when I am at the crosswalk!

The son (with a sleeping baby on his back... you can see the papoose cross straps over his apron) and his wife were "wrapping" sweet beans in colored steamed rice.  These are called "Sakura Mochi" a typical spring Japanese sweet named for the light pink cherry blossoms (Sakura).  The wife was weighing the rice and making balls and then the son would scoop sweet bean paste with a bamboo paddle and "wrap" the bean paste in the rice with his other hand.  All done in swift, graceful movements.

 
A tray of Sakura Mochi.

This sweet shop must make 10 of 15 different types of sweet bean paste sweets of all colors and shapes and every so often I'll buy a couple (or be given a couple) for Tetsu and my evening tea time.

Here is the sweet shop's cat planning her escape into the snowy outdoors.  No one is happy that this cat has decided that every time a customer comes into the shop she will dash through their legs and into the outside...While I'm at the crosswalk I blow my whistle at her when I see her prowling around the door so the cat doesn't like me.  I figure maybe I'm saving its life by keeping her away from the street so who cares if we're not friends.  The cat didn't realize I was the same whistle blower yesterday and made a dash for the door, but I'm wise to her tricks.  She had to watch the outside from her window perch while I was buying sweets.
 

Here a cat, there a cat

Thank you, thank you, thank you for your kind words to Takumi yesterday.  You don't know how grateful I am for your congratulations to him.  I will point him to the comments page of that post the next time I e-mail him.  I have always played down my emotions dealing with Takumi's teenage years and in retrospect I really should have trusted him more.  Such a lesson to learn in life.

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Not too much going on at the Watanabe house.  Here a cat, there a cat, everywhere a cat, cat.

Y-kun loves Mi (and cats in general.  I see he has Cleo there too.) and Mi loves Y-kun.

Chip napping on a quilt.

Velvet in the middle of a cat ball.

Cats always find a sunny place.
 

Takumi

We don't hear much from Takumi usually but we finally did get an e-mail from him that included a picture of him holding a diploma.

Takumi has lived in California now for... 9 years?  Wow!  Already that long!  I see him once a year in the summer when I visit my mother but I think he has only been back to Japan once in that time.  He must feel that he fits pretty well into American society.

(Picture of Takumi when he was in high school.)

After the tiring (on my part) teenage years, Takumi settled down to American education in a community college.  He spent the first year polishing up his English skills.  As he became bolder he transferred to another community college and then another trying to finish up his general education requirements and get the REAL American experience.  (He spent a year living in Hollywood and he lived in someone's living room for awhile...)  Finally he transferred to Cal State University Long Beach as a Mathematics major and he happily and diligently pursued his studies and worked as a waiter.

And then about two years ago Takumi approached us with the plan to go on to graduate school.  He thought we might be getting a bit tired of supporting him (um... true) but he felt he needed his Masters if I wanted to stay in the States and get a job.

Wow!!  Takumi wants to continue studying?  Is this the same teenager whom I feared wouldn't get his high school diploma?  By all means!  Do what you can with student loans and go for it!!

(As a motorcycle rider in Takumi's late teen years.)

So Takumi has studied (and Tetsu has asked me periodically when he might be finishing) and finally this week we got a picture of smiling Takumi holding his diploma.  My son has graduated with a Master's Degree in Computer Science.  (A great big grin on my face right now!)

Well, I can't brag and boast to Takumi's old Jr. high and high school teachers and friends who probably didn't think he'd go very far but I can brag on my blog... so I am.

Takumi, we think you are GREAT!!!!

Now... he is looking for a job.....

Patchwork homework

I've started quilting the Scrappy Trip Around the World.  It will take me some time though because I'm going to do this is small increments.  I am NOT going to mess up my neck again!!!

Oops...  I just went upstairs to take a picture of the quilt on the sewing machine and I see that it is being occupied by Toi.  I guess he approves of it.  Look at those eyes.  Toi is such a pretty kitty... Too bad he doesn't like other cats.... 

"Thank you...  Please move over a bit."

There.  So this is the over-all pattern I'm trying to quilt into this quilt.  This will be a first attempt at overall quilting on a large scale.  We'll see how it goes and how well my neck holds up.

In the meantime, I've finished another Pine Burr block.  Not too thrilled with the lack of contrast on the last one but I had the same fabric in two colors and I thought that it would be appropriate.  As I say, this looks like it is growing into a quilt.  I just turned my camera to take this picture, wondering what an on-point setting might look like.  This might be nice too...

And the other day Mrs. Ochiai and Mrs. Furui and I laid out the four blocks we had completed for the bazaar quilt to see how we are coming.  Eventually we'll have 25 blocks but this gives us an idea of what we might do with the white space later etc.  Coming along... coming along.  I brought home homework.

And here is Mrs. Furui's attempt at making a summer quilt for the hospital wall where she volunteers.  This is quite an out-of-the-box technique for Mrs. Furui.  She usually stays with traditional blocks.  Next step for this is appliqueing little circles all over...  What do you bet she passes this around for some applique help!  More homework!

Field burning

Yesterday morning the local farmers were burning their fields, ridding them of undergrowth and insects and getting ready for spring planting.

There was a haze over all the countryside and the stringent smell of smoke.  I took these pictures from the church's front steps.

Oh look.  I'm glad to see there are fire engines attending the field burning.  The volunteer firemen were out patrolling the fields.

Traditional red fire trucks.  No sirens today.
 

Setsubun

It is already evening here and Setsubun is almost over but I thought I'd get in an explanation of this bean throwing custom.

Setsubun is connected with a ritual to drive evil out and good fortune into the home...  I don't know why the beans are used but anyway, people will throw beans out their door or window and yell "Evil out!  Fortune in!"  Tetsu and I just came home from a trip to the supermarket and our neighbor had just opened his upstairs window (he lives alone) and was tossing dried soy beans OUT onto the street and INTO his mouth.

Tetsu thought it very funny that the man was doing this all by himself... it is usually a custom that children enjoy with Dad wearing a demon mask and being driven out of the house by bean throwing munchkins...

That is until I stepped out of the kitchen wearing a demon mask myself...  Might as well get into the mood of things.  I had bought peanuts rather than soy beans (peanuts are acceptable and easier to eat) and allowed Tetsu to toss a few at me...

And then Tetsu played the demon for me...  If I do say so myself, Tetsu makes a better demon than I do.

You would think we nearly 60 year old adults would have better things to do with our time...

Process in pictures

Yesterday Mrs. Furui and Mrs. Ochiai and I had an "advance class" patchwork day.  Just the three of us.

It all started a couple of months ago when Mrs. Furui showed us the cover of one of her Keepsake catalogs.  A McKenna Design quilt.

"Isn't that the cutest Christmas quilt?  It is really one block of a set of 6."

Mrs. Ochiai jumped at the magazine and declared that she wanted to make the quilt.  Wait... with more browsing she decided she wanted to make one of the other blocks...the larger size Santa Claus quilt.  The cost was a bit of a deterrent and Mrs. Ochiai considered buying just the pattern and trying to choose fabrics herself.

"Impossible!  The quilt is pretty because of the fabrics...  Trying to trace patterns and apply fusible backing and cut out all the little pieces will burn you out.  Go for the kit."

We convinced Mrs. Ochiai to buy the KIT if Mrs. Furui and I would make a block each ourselves...  It might be kind of fun to work jointly and get three mini quilts made.  (And in the end Mrs. Furui ordered 4 kits... no claim to the last one yet.)

Well, the kits have been coming in separate parcels... and we have had an issue with missing fabric that we are still conferring with Keepsake magazine about.  But yesterday we started with one of the complete kits...  Actually the first one that we had seen on the catalog cover...  Mrs. Furui will be the final owner of this quilt.

Following, is a step-by-step process in pictures.

The pattern comes numbered.  Can you see tracing all those pieces onto fabric and then cutting them all out?

We were very pleased with the fabrics used. 

In the kit, the pieces already have fusible backing and are pre-cut.

Still... it took a bit of figuring and placing and ironing together.

Small scissors, a pick and a few tweezers came in handy.

Wait a minute... Do we know what we are doing?

We made the parts and then placed them on the background fabric.

Oh my!  Isn't that pretty!

Next apply the border.

 And add the ribbon frame.

 Then photograph!

So.  One flimsy is made!  And what fun we had!

BUT WAIT!!!  That was the easy part!!!!  Now someone has to machine applique this down!!!!

"Um..  I don't think I can do that."

"Mrs. Furui.  This is YOUR quilt.  You have to sew it all down."

Actually Mrs. Furui and Mrs. Ochiai have never done machine freehand applique.  I've done it once or twice.

PLEA FOR HELP!!!!!  Has anyone ever done one of these McKenna applique kits?  Please send advice!!!  Or give encouragement!

We have three more kits to go and don't want to end up with 4 expensive flimsys sitting in a closet.  Is this going to need a stabilizer on the back?  (The kit doesn't mention stabilizer.)  Do we use monofiliment thread for the applique?  (Oh dear... and a blog friend had just given me advice on using Superior threads and needles.)

If the missing fabric comes in Mrs. Furui, Mrs. Ochiai and I are meeting next Friday too to work on another kit...