Down in the dumps

I am not in a great mood today because there is someone outside my window cutting down trees in front of my house and we just got word that the rest of the forest behind us will be cut down during the next two months...  This year had been a hard one for trees.  The mountain between our town and the next is losing acres and acres of trees and the lot next to the elementary school had its trees cut down in December.  Why are the tree cutters so busy during this pandemic?  For 30 years the forests near us have been left alone but these past two years there has been so much activity!  

30 years ago when house hunting, we found this house on the edge of a back neighborhood surrounded by trees and behind the rice fields.  Our first visitors would all comment that our everyday home looked like it was someone's home-away-from -home in a vacation spot. (Small, out of the way and surrounded by trees.)  True a lot of people probably didn't like our house because we didn't get much sunlight and there were bugs and frogs and snakes everywhere, but the trees have always made the scenery around us feel so cozy.

The inside of our house too, has a couple of rooms with wooden walls adding maybe to the cabiny feel to the place (I like to think).  One thing that we had wanted to install but never did, was a wood burning stove.  As Japanese houses don't have fireplaces, the next best thing would have been a wood burning stove but they do take up a lot of space, are in the way outside of winter months, and the cost of firewood is actually quite high so it is a luxury to upkeep.  In recent years we have tossed the idea around again but cost still keeps us from the plunge.  

And would you believe that there is a small shop in our neighborhood that DOES have a wood burning stove and the neighbors complain that the ashes get on clothes and bedding that are airing outdoors and the some people even complain about the burning aroma.   Different tastes for different folks but here in the countryside you'd would think that country living would be more accepted!

We do live in a residential area, though we are the very last house before the fields...  We don't have too much communication with our neighbors as unlike farmers, everyone has moved to this area instead of having roots here, and there isn't quite the sense of community that the farming families have.  Despite that, Japan is governed by community cooperation and so the neighborhood is divided into Homeowners'  Block groups and people are forced to make decisions together about trash centers, street cleaning days, sports events, children walking to school together etc.  The mandatory "have to make decisions together" causes SO many problems because opinions clash and yet things must get done...  

For the past two years, Tetsu has been the head of our neighborhood's Homeowners' Association and I am sorry to say that he has clashed with SOOOO many people in these two years.  We are beginning to feel like outcasts in our own neighborhood because so many people have disagreed with him (or is it vice versa?)  I think the saying "You can't please everyone." would apply here...  One of the trash centers needs to be moved?  Well, you are always going to have someone who is inconvenienced and wants the center placed closer to them...  or farther from them...  Someone gets upset!  

Including Tetsu.  Including me.  There is always someone calling to say the head of the association should do this faster or that in more detail or get the ball rolling about something that is not any of their business and then Tetsu loses his temper, (and I did once too if you remember....)   My Bible verse today was to be a light shining in a dark place but we've sure failed in that area with our neighborhood.

What has all this to do with the loss of the forest?  I'm beginning to wonder if we should consider living somewhere else.  We've lost the nature around us...  we've had a parting of ways with many of our neighbors...  But we love our house itself...  and where would we go anyways?  It's not like we are going to go and move somewhere near our children.  That has never been an option with Tetsu's lack of English never-mind not having US medical insurance.  

We have tossed around the idea of moving back north to where Tetsu grew up...  In the Tibet of Japan where I met him, but the COLD!!  I just don't see that in the last years of our lives we should moving towards MORE inconvenience rather than less!  

We know we don't want to move into an apartment...  We know we won't move to the States...  We know we like nature...  We know that we'll only be driving for another 5 to 10 years...  We know that when Covid is under control we want to be somewhere so that is at least not MORE inconvenient to fly to America.  (That would be another negative for moving north...  An extra flight?  I don't think so.)  

A last thing to note is that in Japan, used-home value is zero.  You can spend all you want improving your home but it will never boost the house's value.  Our house is perfectly lovely... to us... but someday when it has to be sold, by us, by our children, the house will be torn down and someone else will build something new here.  Land value has decreased too in 30 years so it is not like we can sell our house and with the income apply it to somewhere else.  When we bought our house we knew and expected that this would be our last house...  

So, I'm in the dumps because I can't see a way out of an annoying situation.  Well, in 30 years I suppose changes are inevitable and I should be happy I've had 30 years of living in an area I loved...  

Sorry to be so blue...

 

Random pictures

This week the monthly Nikko newsletter arrived at my door and with it, a page featuring me as "This Month's Shining Citizen".

Back in December, when there was a TV program featuring foreigners in the city aired a three minute cut of me at the crosswalk, someone at the Nikko City Hall happened to be watching the program and recognized me as one of their crosswalk guards.  And since I'd been on national TV (three minutes, no name mentioned nor my face shown) the City Hall contacted me and asked if they could write an article about me in their newsletter.  Thus, here I am for all of Nikko to see.  This time there is a whole story about why I live in Nikko, how I met Tetsu etc. and there is even a very small photo of me in the corner.  Since the article came out I am getting phone calls and text messages from Nikko friends and acquaintances who have stumbled on the article...  Sort of embarrassing but I'm pasting a picture of the article here for posterity...  Don't I look well bundled up?

Let's see...  I got a funny photo from Leiya the other day and asked if I could post it on my blog...  I had to ask...   

First... here is one of the very nice photos that Leiya got dressed up for, make-up etc.  She can be so pretty!   Tony looks like the respectable doctor that he is.

And here is the funny photo of them!  Which one do you think is truer to real life?  I so laughed when I saw this!  Let's see...  Leiya in pajama pants and fuzzy socks.  She's got a wrap baby carrier around her that keeps Luka close to her as she goes about doing household tasks...  I don't know what Tony is wearing except for the baby, but it is dead of winter and there he is no sleeves!   Leiya's comment about this photo was that they looked like crazy parents decked out in gear.  I think they look like crazy parents right out of Return of the Jedi or one of those Star War movies...  Anyway, too bad it isn't Halloween! 

 

The end of January

The month of January went by quickly though I'm not sure why as we really didn't do anything at all.  Maybe all the photos and videos of Luka made us expectant over and over for the upcoming day?

The Covid numbers are decreasing slightly in my prefecture and the officials are even considering loosening any of the already loose restrictions put on the public.  Even so, I got word from the preschool that they would like me to refrain from coming in February and the elementary school sent me a letter saying they regretted to say that they weren't going to have guests at the graduation ceremony in March nor at their entrance ceremony in April.  I have to make the decision as to when to start up my two English classes with ladies that I have at home but I think we'll play it safe and consider February a continuation of winter break.

So, actually the only person I've seen this month is M-san who is rather a homebody herself and she seems to see only me.  We got together again on Friday to continue the paper-pieced Atomic Stars quilts that we are working on.  She got a second one done before we took a chocolate break, and then she actually wanted to do a THIRD one as she still wasn't sure of the process.  At the end of the afternoon she had three very nice blocks made but she said she still didn't feel confident in doing them alone.  THAT IS NOT A SURPRISE!  How many of these paper pieced blocks do you think a person has to make before they feel like they've got the method under their belt?!  M-san said her grandmother thought her block last week was "nice" but I told her that non-quilters would not understand the brain power needed to do paper-piecing and it would be QUILTERS that would tell her what a great job she is doing!  Don't give up!

Because we are sewing the Atomic Stars at my house, M-san has been doing handwork at home and she brought her finished star quilt.  She says she really enjoys the hand-quilting part of patchwork so I'll have to figure out something again for her to do as homework...

Here are my Atomic Stars.  I'm at the halfway point!

For all my enjoyment of sewing last week, I've been grumpy because the forest in front of my house is getting chopped down...  Remember a year and a half ago I was so upset about the forest behind me?  Well, the one in front of me is doomed too now.  I'm trying to be philosophical about it this time because 1) the view behind our house AFTER the loss of the forest is one that brightens my every morning!  So good things do come out of what I consider disasters...  And 2) with the pandemic and so many loss of lives, how can I grieve over trees right now?  This thought was brought back to me at the end of last year when they started chopping the trees and I was fuming again and right about that time Takumi became sick...  Marlene once asked how I feeling about the tree chopping and I said,

"Trees are the least of my problems right now!  I'm feeling overwhelmed about Takumi's situation!"

Takumi, by the way, is feeling better, seeing a doctor regularly and he and Julieta have even bought a new house and moved!  I don't have details about that yet but it sounds like his health is moving in the right direction.  Thank you again for your prayers.

Back to the forest in front of my house....  So the trees are going away daily and every so often there is a loud thud as a tree falls and John starts barking and running around the house and Tetsu usually checks out the window.  This weekend he was watching the felling process and suddenly said,

"Oh no!  That was bound to happen!"

The tree that the amateur woodchoppers were working on fell in the wrong direction and hit the small factory our neighbor has...  The fence is easily repaired but that roof is going to need the insurance company.  This picture was taken from my sewing room upstairs...  As the rest of the trees go I think we'll move our cars away from the road and maybe stay in rooms on the other side of the house as the woodcutters work...  

A crying baby

There's not too much going on around here.  We've had two light snows this past week but they melt off within a day.  

Tetsu spent one afternoon shoveling from our neighborhood all the way to the school hoping to make it easier to for the children to get to school the next day.   It took him 4 hours so the snowfall wasn't all THAT light (though actually it was the distance that made for a lot of work.  It usually takes me 15 minutes to walk to the school.)

This morning's snow has already melted away and it is still before noon.

The school playground.

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Leiya and Tetsu have been Facetiming back and forth trying to figure out some Japanese characters for Luka's name.  In Japan, this is a very important point as all those characters have meaning.  There is also some way to tell fortunes by how many strokes a character has and parents will choose combinations of strokes for good luck, but that is a banned topic in our house as we don't believe in fortune telling!  ANYWAY...  There are so many different combinations of characters and meanings and parents and grandparents put a lot of their hopes and dreams for the new baby into this selection...  In Leiya's case, her EXTREMELY complicated Japanese/Chinese characters are 麗耶 which means Beautiful and Of Jesus.  Lovely meaning, impossible for this foreigner to write!

Because Luka's birth is to be registered with the Japanese embassy in the near future, Leiya wanted to decide on the characters that will be official for his name and thus she and Tetsu are discussing it and she interprets all this information for Tony so that he can get in on choosing the characters too.  As far as I know it hasn't been decided yet, but when it is, Tetsu will probably write the name formally with brush pen (he's already bought a formal name plate) and send it to Leiya.

Leiya is loving being a mother and she daily sends us photos and videos and of course we enjoy looking at them all over and over again!  Leiya had a photographer come and catch some pictures of the new family and though some are sweet and loving shots, Tetsu and I get a laugh out of the ones of Luka screaming!  It sounds like breastfeeding is going better but there is not much sleep going on in their house as Luka uses his lungs if he's put down for long!  

"Here's to you, Tanisan!"

I'm not sure if Leiya was telling me that the cute baby wear was a reminder for me or if she was saying anytime I wanted to take care of a crying baby for her she'd be ready. 

 

Back to the Farm Finished!!!

I am proud to announce that I HAVE FINISHED THE RYAN MCKENNA BACK TO THE FARM QUILT!!!!!!!

I really wondered if I would get this to completion.  Not because it was particularly hard to do but because it took so much patience and tenacity!  My greatest fear was that I would lose one of the block patterns, or more likely lose MOTIVATION, or for some god-awful reason I'd leave this world with this quilt half done for someone else to figure out and then they'd give up, not see the potential, and donate it to a second hand store!  

The whole BOM was sent to me by a wonderful blog friend who was cleaning out her sewing room (I guess!) and it has been in my closet for a few years.  I took the whole set to Mrs. Furui's thinking the members in our group could claim one block each and everyone would have a project to take home, but then the whole set came back to me when the pandemic started as the patchwork group was no longer meeting.  I have a memo that I bit the bullet and started the first block in April, 2020...  And since then my monthly goal has been to do a Block of the Month as the quilt was designed for.

April - Block one -- Autumn Stroll

May - Block two -- Swing Low

These two blocks are the only two that connected at a later date making one large picture.

June - Block three --  Pigs in a Blanket

July - Block four --  Rub-a-Dub-Dub

August - Block five -- Piggy-back Ride

September - Block six -- Behind the Scenes

November - Block seven -- The Hills are Alive

December - Block eight --  Home to Roost

January - Block nine -- Munch-a-Bunch

Once I was on a roll I just had to start quilting, and thinking about freehand quilting all those tiny spaces in such a big quilt made me dizzy!  I ignored the pattern instructions and started quilting each block separately (giving me a way to use up small pieces of backing too!) and when left with the eight pieces (block one and two HAD to be joined) I sewed the front side with a neutral batik and the back side with left over strips of backing.  A LONG PROCESS!  The back is "interesting"...

I spent one sleepless night trying to figure out how to add the border (with separate backing, and batting) but once that hurdle was met I ended with binding and no quilting at all in the border.  There seemed to be so much busyness everywhere else!! 

And I even got a bit fancy and traced off the scarecrow in block one and made him into a label!

This quilt is so beautiful because of the very special fabrics that McKenna uses.  Look at the Home to Roost block again and notice the fencing fabric in the coop!  And the border is of a beautiful green field of clover!

Once done though I realized that there isn't really a wall in my house that is large enough for this quilt.  It belongs in a much bigger room.  We ended up moving a bit of furniture and put it in our entry where I can glance at it when I go in and out of the house...

   It was a big job but so worth the effort!  

  

Seeing the earth and stars

Whew!  My young friend, M-san, made her first paper-piecing Atomic Star!  I fed her chocolate and sweet cafe latte after she had finished.

Before we began I had sent M-san a You-Tube video showing how to make the stars and I wasn't sure if it would just scare her off or inspire her but she watched it and was surprised that we would be sewing on top of the paper.  I stood over her and directed as she went through the steps.  

"Place a card next to the line and fold the paper back."

"Roller cut 1/4 inch from the paper to make a visible edge."

"Slip the next piece of fabric and line up the edge."

"Check the mirror image of the under fabric."

"Pick it up and carry it to the machine."

"Place the needle first at the entry point, lower the machine foot and sew."

"Fold the fabric flat from the seam."

"Place a card next to the NEXT line and fold the paper back..."

"Repeat."

We messed up once and had to redo one small piece.  Paper piecing allows ONE mistaken seam before the paper is too perforated to continue...  Think the steps through!

And M-san had her completed Atomic Star!  The first of many more (hopefully...)  or she may have decided never to do it again!  She kept saying, 

"I don't think I know what I'm doing.... I'm just doing."

It takes practice and even some attempts that have to get thrown out.  One star a week for her may keep her motivated...  too many and the brain begins to hurt!

As an...  "AHEM", experienced paper piecer, (though I still mess up once each star) I have given myself the goal to make one star a DAY!  I need 30 in all and I do have other projects on the table so one star is about right for my brain too.  Here on my design wall are the 7 black stars that I have made, M-san's blue one, my practice white one and an idea of how the other solid diamonds are going to surround the quilt at a later date.  

Thursday I got a post card in the mail and I was delighted to find that the Tokyo International Quilt Festival Partnership Quilt project committee had sent out post cards printed of the quilt where our blocks had ended up.  It was nice of them to make this extra effort and keep track of who's block was in which quilt and then address all the postcards to be sent.  (When we sent out the blocks last summer we included a self addressed post card so that the committee could let us know which quilt our block was in...  but that self-addressed post card had already been sent back to me at the end of last year.  The quite extensive job of sending the post cards this time is proof of the committee's conscientiousness.) My block is on the right hand side...  in the lower center...  and clearly says LOVE THE EARTH which was the theme this year.  Can you find it?  

As I expected, there were so many circles represented in the blocks...  Carin sent me a picture of her post card and hers was in a quilt with mostly circles too.  It was really hard to express "earth" in the very small square and I think a lot of us quilters fell back to the circle motif...  

What will next year's theme be?  As far as I know, though the 2021 quilt show had to be cancelled, the 2022 show is still on the docket.

For the nation

Even though I've lived in Japan for over 40 years, I have only American citizenship and I will always consider myself American.  Because Tetsu doesn't speak English and doesn't even adjust well to vacations in the States, I will probably never live there again.  However, with both our children and their families living permanently in the States, my heart and thoughts turn daily to what is going on in the States... With Covid and even political concerns.  

Today is already January 20th in Japan and my focus is praying for the United States on the new president's inauguration day and term.  He, and all his advisors need wisdom, courage, perseverance, health, understanding and good hearts.  And God's help.

Praying today.