Mrs. T's quilt block

Yesterday afternoon I got to Mrs. Furui's with my partially finished turtle block.  I didn't have any stabilized for the embroidery part so I went to get that and also to plan the finished quilt a bit more.

The blocks that everyone is making are based on a set of poems that Mrs. T set to music.  And the instructions were to make a block and put a couple of musical notes in it so that we could honor Mrs. T's compositions.  But it seemed to me that our blocks were doing more to laud the poetry than the music and Mrs. Furui and I set to thinking about that situation...

And came up with this idea.

 WHAT ARE THESE?

No idea?  This is a good clue...  Yes, Mrs. Furui and I decided that the first first couple stanzas (I'm so unmusical I don't know what they are called) of Mrs. T's music could be added to the bottom of each block, making the blocks rectangle instead of square.  Mrs. Furui got on the sewing machine and after figuring out the line width and the note size she made up 9 strips of music score...

I traced around a button onto those various colored felt scraps and then we set about figuring out how to get notes on the score.

This morning I put it all together!

The poem says,

"The sea turtle moves across the ocean.  Slowly, slowly"

Very cute!  Don't you love how Mrs. Furui and I consult no one else on this project.  I don't know if our friends are going to be pleased that they have another step involved to finish their blocks, but mine is done!
 

Sewing things

I've been trying to put in more sewing time, upstairs and at my chair.  I think I have six things on my sewing to-do list every month...   I got four of them crossed off.

My mother's fabric card got made and sent off to her yesterday.  I guess this is trying to be a bowl of ice cream...  I'm not sure of my fabric choices as I used a bit of lace for the whipped cream part and it doesn't show up as much as I'd like.  Oh, well.  It is cheerful.

I have 8 (I don't know why not 9) McKenna blocks from a kit that were given to me a few years ago and I wanted to get some results from that so I've been collaging those whenever I have some free time in the sewing room.  I so love the fabric that McKenna uses! 

Chickens and chicks.

These won't be sewn down and details like eyes added until I get all 8 blocks made, but at least I have a start.

This block actually isn't finished.  Mrs. Furui's group is making a quilt for one of our patchwork members who will be celebrating her 60th birthday this year.  Mrs. T is actually not one for doing much patchwork but she is a composer and teaches music to children at the kindergarten and also to the teachers too.  She has written many musical pieces for the children to sing as well as for the Mother's Choir and many of her pieces are based on simple poetry from some Japanese modern poet.  ANYWAY...  We decided to make a block depicting each of the poems and the corresponding compositions.  This block is for the song about a turtle (obviously) and I will be backstitching the Japanese characters to the first line of the song this week.  (That's why there is that blank space in the "sand".)  I need to consult with Mrs. Furui today about this block.

And I've been making another block of Cathedral Windows...  Same size as the first one I made a couple of weeks ago.  This one however is completely sewn by hand...  the connecting of the white base, the stitching of the colorful inserts.  I think I've decided that there isn't all that much difference between machine stitched and hand stitched.  From a distance the blocks look much the same.  I may decide to machine stitch the base fabric from now on (I didn't like all the whip stitching) and hand sew the inserts making a nice compromise between the two methods.  I still have quite a few more inserts to add to this piece so the going is slow!

 Off to Mrs. Furui's to get her excellent advice!

Garbage!

Let's see.  Not too much going on around here.  Walks in the cold, coffee with friends...  Buying household goods and groceries.

While at the local drugstore, Tetsu reminded me that we needed garbage bags.  A simple purchase but we had to give it some thought.  From April, Nikko City will be requiring all garbage to be thrown out in designated garbage bags.  Until now, we could throw out our garbage in any old bag meaning the cheaper the better.  (Garbage, right?)  On the same drugstore shelf are the bags we've always bought. 50 large style garbage bags for $3.00.  The new required bags are the same size but brown and they cost $4.50 for 10 bags.  This seems like a huge jump in price to me but it will be the city's new rule so there's no complaining about it now.  For this last month though, do I want to start using the expensive bags or buy 50 bags I've always used?  I bought the 50 again.

You would think that there is not much to say about garbage, but I can ramble quite a bit about it.  Japan's garbage policies are extensive and different in every town.

When I first came to Japan and lived in a Christian center with access to a common kitchen, one of the first things I was instructed in was how to separate garbage.  I can remember this as one of my first lessons of 40 years ago!  The missionary at the center explained about flammable and inflammable garbage, sometimes called burnable and non-burnable, sometimes referred to as combustible and non-combustible garbage (the English changing depending on the cities I've lived in.)

It was actually confusing to me...  What is flammable?  Raw garbage and paper was placed in one garbage can.  Metals and glass in another.  Plastics were considered flammable though I thought if we were protecting the environment they should be considered non-flammable.

As the years went by and in different cities, the requirements changed and we had flammable, non-flammable and paper.  And there was the always a garbage pick up date set aside for large objects...

Garbage is a community deal...  We carry our garbage in bags to our designated garbage stations and we take turns keeping the garbage stations clean.  Some stations are covered, some are gated, most are just corner spots that have a net covering them to keep out crows and stray animals.  Garbage can cause a few misunderstandings as one neighbor may get the idea that another neighbor doesn't put out the correct garbage on the correct day or doesn't push their garbage bag under the net fully resulting in a crow party.  If the city decides that some garbage isn't within the rules, the truck will leave the offending bag with an official note saying why it wasn't picked up, and if the offender doesn't come and get his garbage bag, then someone will have to pick through it to see if they can find a receipt or some proof of who's garbage it might be.  Nasty time for all and not good for neighborly relationships!

In our neighborhood, burnable garbage days (that's what we call it in Nikko) are Tuesday and Friday before noon.  Paper garbage, meaning old newspapers and cardboard is on the 1st Wednesday of the month.  Non-burnable garbage, meaning glass, cans and plastic bottles is on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays, and dangerous garbage, meaning broken glass, gadgets, batteries, used light bulbs and small appliances are on the last Thursday of the month.  Anything else (mattresses, furniture, large appliances, tires) must get taken to the Green Center where we pay to throw things away.

It used to be that a truck would come around every other week or so blaring out from the loudspeaker that paper was being collected and the housewives would run out and flag him down so that he would take away newspapers and cardboard and in return give a couple rolls of toilet paper.  I realize writing this post that I haven't heard a paper truck come by in years...  There are not that many housewives waiting around at home to hear the paper truck, and anyway, the city will take the paper away.  Actually I prefer to carry paper and plastic bottles to the local supermarket and get points in exchange for my recycling...

I am also conscientious about recycling Styrofoam trays from meat and fish purchases and also waxed milk cartons which must be cut apart and brought flat to the recycling station in front of the supermarket.  So... you can see, there is a lot of recycling going on and actually a lot of garbage pails in my tiny kitchen that store things until I get them all taken to the proper stations.

I truly understand that the island of Japan does not have a whole lot of land space to throw out garbage for the very large population living here.  Recycling is a must and we really must think of ways to stop producing more garbage...

So now I'm contemplating composting...  If I'm going to have to pay more for garbage bags then maybe I'd better reduce what I put in them!

We do have a yard, but it is not much bigger than a driveway and not directly accessible from the kitchen.  This means I'll have to put aside raw garbage daily in ANOTHER pail which may work in the winter but is not a great idea in the humid summer.  And besides...  Even if we made compost, I do not have a garden to use new soil...  I guess I could dump the compost soil in the forest...

My neighbors and I have been talking about the garbage situation and if nothing else, we all agree that we'd better start de-cluttering our houses before the April date arrives!

Good motivation to give the house a thorough cleaning!  I've got 50 bags to get through!
 

Double Stars table runner finished

I finally have my first finish of the year!  I was able to put in the last binding stitches this afternoon as today was a snowy day and I spent all day indoors.

I had wanted a hand pieced project for these winter months and I found this pattern in an old patchwork magazine.  It didn't really use up as many scraps as I would have liked but it was a calming piece to do.

I suppose this can be a wall hanging but for today it is serving as a table runner/piece.

Here it is up on the wall so that you can see how the stars were inset to each other.

The quilting is also hand done and I think the pattern suggested trapunto (filling in the quilted part with yarn?) but for now I'm leaving this as just quilted.

Chip would prefer this as a table runner rather than a wall hanging.

Flowers anywhere? Flowers!

The February scenery in Nikko is still gray and brown and drab.

Not much color anywhere. 

Even so, Tetsu and I hopefully went out with our cameras on our morning walk but alas, though optimistic, there wasn't much to photograph.  My eyes caught on a pussy willow bush though and up close there is some dark pink hidden away in there!

 Me, focusing on a pussy willow bud.

My friends and neighbors make up for the lack of flora color in the countryside by bringing me flowers!  These are for Choco!!!  Amazing!  My cat sitters are such big animal lovers and when I told the mother that Choco had died she burst into tears.  Yesterday she brought over this beautiful, colorful arrangement of flowers.

And another friend went out specially to a very trendy florist and had this lovely bouquet made.  It is all rather elegant... green and purple hydrangeas and softly frilled ranunculus. 

I'm going to try and dry this bouquet.

We are looking forward to spring!

Meals

Sunday, Monday and Tuesday (and sometimes Saturday) my mornings usually have something scheduled and then I don't get to blogging until later or not at all.  That is why I sort of disappear over the weekend.  Another reason, is that since I tend to ramble, then I know if I sit down to the blog I will probably still be typing for awhile and so I hope for a block of time later in the day...  Not there is really much going on.  Church, preschool, coffee with friends, English ladies.  Still, especially in the wintertime, the days go by so quickly.

So...  Let's see.  I had taken pictures when cooking dinner one night a couple of weeks ago and never posted dinner.  We have been trying to curb down our eating out (going to social security in a few more months!) and I really do cook nearly every night.  But I end up using a lot of packaged seasonings and food so I doubt that anyone is going to get a cooking lesson from my blog...

This night I had made rice which alone is an unusual occurrence these days, and for dinner we had Oyako Donburi.

Domburi means a rice bowl dish with something covering the rice.  Katsu don(buri) would be a pork cutlet rice bowl.  Tempura don(buri) would be a tempura rice bowl.  And Oyako don(buri) is a parent and child rice bowl!  Parent being chicken, and child being egg. 

This is one of the simplest meals I can think of.  I sliced up onion and cut up a chicken thigh (no bones).  Those got sauteed briefly and then I added soup dashi (it is a fish base soup stock but water will do), soy sauce, sugar (in our case I've been using honey) and sake.  It is all pretty iffy.  Sweet probably is what to aim for and a strong heavy on the flavorings rather than the soup as the egg softens the flavor quite a bit.

Warm rice gets put into the rice bowls... deep is better as that chicken dish is going to be poured over all...

And then I scrambled three eggs and dumped them into the soupy chicken.  I did NOT stir the eggs after they got into the pan!  I did put a lid over the pan hoping to set the eggs a bit but not enough to make an omelette.  The thick sweet half'-cooked eggs are supposed to seep into the rice underneath and flavor the whole dish, so don't over cook this!!!

Oyako gets poured over the rice, and yes, this is fully cooked.  There are a lot of dishes in Japan where the eggs only get partially cooked but that is considered the best way to bring out flavor.  We also eat raw eggs with rice or with sukiyaki etc, so my Oyako don(buri) would be considered well cooked.

A couple green beans or a single snow pea or in this case left over greens from the day before are added for color and there you have it.  Oyako Donburi!

And for a miscellaneous photo.  I am still making obentos daily for Tetsu.  Let's see... this day what was in this?  Ah...  An omelette made that morning with sweet beans.  Fried chicken which comes frozen and just need to be zapped.  Pickled radish that comes from a package and was left over from the night before...  Actually, all the rest was just left overs.  Sweet simmered pumpkin.  Sweet and sour pork, and sesame flavored tofu and greens.  I don't know if you could call it a labor of love but it takes me about 15 minutes every morning to put something similar together... Mostly relying on left-overs...

Itadakimasu!  (Let's partake!)

Who, what, where, when, why and how

This year, Julie, Carin and I are challenging ourselves to do something with the Cathedral Windows quilt pattern and I have been thinking about what I should start on...

Last year I think we were all pretty good about not buying more fabric and just using what we had in our stashes, but the Cathedral Window pattern uses A LOT of base fabric so I may have to resign myself to buying more fabric.  Besides which, the quilts I've seen on Pinterest really look nice with a solid fabric background and I don't have much solid fabric in my quilt stash.

But how much of this base fabric am I going to need to buy?  It depends on how large I am making my quilt or maybe the initial decision is WHAT am I planning to make?

A bag?  Well I might get by with what I have in white.

A table runner?  Hmm....  Yes, but a Cathedral Window quilt is rather bumpy and I don't know if cups and dishes would do so well on it.

A wall hanging?  That's my normal path to take but I have SOOOO many wall hangings!!!  Do I really need another?  Does anyone really want to put up a wall hanging I make?  (I could later give it away.)

A wearable form of Cathedral Window?  This idea is playing only on my ego as Julie was such a star of the show at the Tokyo Quilt Festival with her wearable Mola art!  But would I wear a Cathedral Window vest or shirt or whatever anywhere else but at the quilt show next year?  I have a feeling no.  And besides, there is a lot of fabric involved and a lot of weight...

A bed cover?  Agghh!  Again, I have so many bed covers (and we only use two beds).  I already have bed covers designated for both my children in the event that either gets married...  But a bed cover Cathedral Window would be beautiful but heavy and so much work that I'd never be able to give it away (not to mention the cost of all that base fabric...)

So what is a girl to do?

Besides the question of WHAT, the next question is HOW?

Researching this I've found that there are many ways to make Cathedral Window quilts and faux Cathedral Window quilts.  By hand all the way.  By machine.  By making circles instead of origami folded squares!  Which method makes the most accurate blocks?

I have now tried one method. 

A square of background fabric edges ironed around a template and then folded and folded again upon itself. 

This is after the first fold.

This is after the second fold.  I just can't get those corners to match!

This results in triangles that can be MACHINE SEWN together and afterwards the corners are tacked down. 

When a grid is all made, then the color inserts can be sewn, by hand or by machine and I chose to try machine sewing.  A stylus is a must!

Let me tell you!  If I didn't know it before I now know that accuracy is important!!!  The cutting or the ironing or the folding or what I still don't know but just a bit off results in a messy joining of corners with no way to do repairs.  Still I persevered and made THIS.

Okay...  To try the next method.

This one has me sewing a sides together on the sewing machine first and then making a pouch that gets turned inside out and ironed into a square. 

This then gets folded again and, in the case of overhand stitching, the corners get tacked and the squares get whip stitched together... 

So far this has resulted in a more accurate meeting of corners but it takes more time and I haven't gotten to the color insets yet...  Those could still be done by machine at that point or by hand with a whip stitch...  I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

My research is so far inconclusive...  I still do not know WHAT I'm going to make nor HOW.  WHEN, is this year.  WHERE, (depending on the method) is going to be in the sewing room or at my sewing chair or both.  WHO, is lil' ol' me.  And WHY, is because I love a challenge!

The local elementary school

Yesterday I was invited to the elementary school as I somehow got on the board of councilors for the school.  We are asked to come observe classes twice a year and give our impressions to the principal and vice principal.  I think this is my third year as an acting member...  Yesterday I took advantage of the time to take a few photos of inside the school. 

Did you know that in Japan children take off their shoes in school as well as in the homes?  Yes, every time a child comes into the school building they take off their shoes and place them in a cubby (and yes, one cubby for each and every one of the student body) and while in the building they wear these indoor shoes.  When they go outside for recess, they take off the indoor shoes and put on their regular shoes.  This is true for teachers, for visitors like me and for parents who come to observe classes.  The school provides slippers for the visitors but parents are asked to bring their own slippers when visiting the school building.

These indoor shoes were on a rack in front of the gymnasium as one of the classes was having gym class and I'm not sure why they weren't wearing shoes but maybe because there was some kind of tumbling activity going on...  Anyway, the indoor shoes were lined up on the rack.  The sign on the floor shows the proper way of placing shoes on the rack...  Heels pointing out, a pair of shoes side by side and no helter-skelter abandoning of the shoes on the floor.  Of course all indoor shoes (and they all look alike) have the student's name and classroom number on them.

Speaking of shoes and slippers, I took a look in a couple of the bathrooms, this one the boys (obviously... all those urinals).  All bathrooms have slippers also and when entering the bathroom one takes off their indoor shoes (hopefully leaving them heels facing in, neatly set side by side) and uses the slippers.  This is hopefully to keep the bathroom floor clean or vice versa, leave any bathroom germs inside the bathroom.  This custom is also true of homes where a single pair of bathroom slippers will be left inside the door to the bathroom.

The elementary school got updated bathrooms this summer and they are very proud of them.  There are no more traditional squat toilets because most Japanese children's homes all have Western style toilets now.  The children are very happy not to have to squat anymore as they had lined up before in front of the one Western style toilet so as not to have to use the Japanese style one.  The Western style toilets all have heated seats (which the principal glorified about) but alas they do not have the "nightingale" feature with a button one can push to cover up body functions...  sometimes rushing water sounds, sometimes a melody...  Nikko City didn't seem to think that was worth cutting into their budget.  The toilets also don't have automatic flush which has resulted in a small problem as some of the younger children expect the toilet to flush by itself and don't know what level to pull...  Ah the problems of getting used to ultra-modern plumbing.

I observed a music class with all the third grade students taking parts in a recorder performance.  The bulletin board in the hallway shows how they are learning to read music...  I don't think I learned to read music in elementary school music class... we just sang.  Of course, even after 10 years of playing the organ I still can't read music very well...

This must be the bulletin board in front of the 1st grade class.  They are taught to write Japanese characters using a brush and there were numerous layers under this particular character for mizu, water.

This long sink is near the entry and the students are taught to wash their hands after coming in from playing outside and also to gargle with water.  The green stuff must be soap, the blue basket sometimes holds a soap bar but it was empty yesterday.

I took a quick glance inside the nurse's office.  Thankfully my children didn't spend much time in the nurse's office when they were in this school.  The nurse or at least an office person with a license is there full time and she teaches health and sanitation, sends out newsletters about health care to the families.

"This month the flu has hit.  As of this date our school has had 12 reported cases of the flu.  Be sure everyone in the family washes their hands, gargles regularly and wears a mask."

She also schedules in-school dental and eye exams and I think vaccinations.

The school nurse has the interesting job of being almost a school counselor and though I'm not sure if there is a problem at this school, in Japan sometimes a child will boycott school altogether and become housebound.  There must be laws but they are lenient, leaving the decisions up to the parents and no one wants to force a child to come to school if he is going to be miserable (and attempt suicide).  So the nurse's office provides a safe zone for a child to reluctantly come to school and hang out all day in the nurses office, doing schoolwork there, avoiding other children and sometimes confessing fears and frustrations to the nurse in a relaxed atmosphere.  I have never heard of this practice in the American schools (my mother was an elementary teacher for 25 years) but it is not all that uncommon in Japan and sometimes there will be two or three students who just report to the nurse's office daily instead of going to their own classrooms.

And this was an empty classroom with the students' things already laid out for going home (I don't know where this class was).  Separate wooden desks and chairs.  Bags hanging by the desk for carrying indoor shoes and toothbrushes gym clothes and library books to and from school.  The pink and red and blue backpacks are traditional school bags usually black for boys and red for girls but times are changing and there are more colors available nowadays.  Yellow caps for the boys, yellow berets for the girls to wear on the way to and from school also.

So there you have the local elementary school.  It has about 175 students this year with one class for each of the six grades.