The first weeks of January 2025

Winter vacation is over and our daily routines have started again...  Not that we had any real change during winter vacation other than to sleep in until 7:00.  We are back waking before the sun is even lightening the skies...  

As with Japanese tradition, Tetsu and I ate a lot of pounded rice cakes, mostly with sweet bean paste, sweet soy powder, and with seaweed and butter.  Nothing in the way of vegetables so I did make a big pot of pork and vegetable soup that we ate for the next three days.  

We realized that just sitting in front of the TV and eating all day wasn't very good for us so we took John out with us and walked to the elementary school picking up trash along the way.  Exercise for us and a good deed done to start the New Year!  

We also got in some pool time and I have decided to put my sports watch to work and see if I can track laps.  Takumi and Julieta gave me this watch a couple of years ago and though I track it for walking I balked at the idea of putting a watch in water (I know... silly.  It's a SPORTS WATCH!) and also could predict that the pool wasn't going to like it either as it has a no jewelry policy.  It (and many places in Japan) also has a no tattoo policy but guests with tattoos, mostly foreigners, get around that by wearing long sleeves or covering the tattoos with large adhesive...  So...  I have been wearing my watch in the pool with a large wrist band covering it, sort of edging around the no jewelry policy...  If they can't see the tattoos it's okay, so if they can't see my watch, maybe it's okay.  No one has said anything to me yet though someone jokingly asked me if I'd gotten a tattoo...

This is not an exciting picture but I have decided to take photos out our bedroom window on the first of  every month to record how the construction of the factory that will be built behind us progresses. 

January 1st, nothing started yet, though since then workers have be doing some deep soil testing.  Stay with me to watch how the landscape changes.

Here is a zoom shot on a prettier day.  We are hoping that though there will be a road passing right behind us, the actual factory will not disrupt our view of Mt. Nantai.  That may be wishful thinking but as far as we understand the construction plans that have been sent to all of us in the neighborhood, the factory should be farther to the south of us... (this photo is towards the north).

Trying to capture the scenery in my bullet journal.

Goodness, I can't think of much else I did during the holidays except take online art classes, so I have an awful lot of sketches and paintings of things that have nothing to do with my daily life.  They are great for learning but not so great for showing...

I have started a new quilt with Stitched In Color.  It is a Scrap Cabin quilt and my goal is to use up the bin of fabric strings I have.  I'm already questioning if I want to make this bigger than the pattern which is for a square quilt.  I sort of like rectangle quilts but that will make for nearly twice the work and I'm not sure I'm up for that...  

M-san however, spent most of her winter days appliqueing and then hand quilting this Hawaiian Quilt piece.  Look at how much detail she put into the quilting!!!!  She seems to find the quilting very relaxing and she certainly does a fantastic job with it!

John has for some reason taken a shine to Tetsu, AFTER ALL THESE YEARS! and will scratch at Tetsu's leg if he wants attention and is very happy to sit on Tetsu's lap.  We have no idea what prompted the change in John's attitude, maybe old age?  but he is very cute and we don't worry QUITE so much about getting bit anymore.

And this is how the above photo turns into a sketch.

And I guess that's about it for the Watanabe family in Japan.  Stay warm and safe!