Days at home

Things are quiet in the countryside of Japan.  Tetsu is enjoying being outside everyday and he is methodically weed whacking the empty lots around us.  He is also getting ready to plant some vegetables so we will have a bounty to look forward to this summer again.

For myself, I finished a quilt!  Alas, I haven't figured out how to photograph it so that will be my next task.   Here is a sneak peak.

In the meantime I have made a start on the Songbird's Garden quilt and I spent two days cutting all the fabric and now I'm working on the applique.  

"Oh, the applique won't be a big job..."

Ha!  I realize that I have over 80 leaves to prepare for the whole quilt and as I like to shape them against freezer paper templates with starch, I've been standing over the ironing board with starch, paintbrush, stylus and iron in hand and am slowly getting the leaves ready to applique.  The applique is done in the evenings.  I have finished the center block and am hard at work on the four borders...

My work schedule has started on its normal schedule again.  A couple of ladies English classes, really just friends getting together to drink coffee and eats sweets and chat in English.  We will continue to wear masks when we are together but as all of us have been vaccinated three times now, we feel comfortable meeting even though Covid numbers haven't drastically decreased.  I think Japanese have decided to try and live with Covid instead of trying to isolate until it is eradicated.  These past two years have been hard on everyone.

I am also back at the crosswalk in front of the school and yesterday I had a helper!  Our prefecture has an ice hocky team called the Icebucks and the team's mascot joined me at the crosswalk.  This was fun for everyone, children and drivers alike and Shikatti, the mascot, helped stop cars and bowed and waved to everyone who went by.

Mother's Day was celebrated at our house with a text message from Leiya and two boxes of sweets from Takumi and Julieta.  

This pretty little box with preserved flowers was filled with cookies and I've decided it makes a very nice sewing tray to keep by my chair while I applique! 

Old and new quilts

I'm afraid I'm not going to have much to post about now that our lives have gone back to quiet country living...  I've started a new quilt though and it will keep me busy even if it is not too blog worthy for awhile.

Leiya had seen a picture of this quilt and had sent it to me saying that she really liked the colors and that the quilt matched her carpet...  I thought that was a good enough reason to order the quilt kit and months ago I had the kit sent to her house and now I've brought it home to work on.  It will be a good long term quilt again!

Leiya and Tetsu and I had an interesting discussion while we were together, about what to do with all my quilts.  I've been a quilter for 40 years and I have a lot of quilts!  On this trip to the States alone, I think I took eight quilts to be delivered to various people.  The conversation sort of revolved around my quilts but I think the bigger picture is what are my kids going to do with our house and stuff in Japan when the time comes...  The quilts are just the easiest way to start the conversation.

This topic is much more interesting to Tetsu than to Leiya and me, and he began it by pointing out that I have hundereds of quilts in boxes, on shelves, in closets, on quilt racks and of course on my walls.  I'm rather embarrassed by what a pack rat I seem to be but unless I've been working on a quilt specifically for someone, the quilt sometimes claims my heart, and sometimes it just feels "rude" to give someone a quilt that I've just got laying around the house and that I didn't have in mind for them when I was making it...  Some of my quilts are just so old now, they have stains or the fabric has worn away in places, or they are faded or the style and the fabrics are so old fashioned that I can't imagine anyone wanting them... but they are a part of the history of my quilting days...  So they rest in boxes.

Leiya made the unsentimental remark that she certainly had enough of my quilts in her house already and though they were lovely, she didn't really need any more.  Unless I had some quilt that I absolutely wanted to stay in the family for posterity or was going to make for family members.  She suggested putting quilts up on ebay or mericari or some other online shopping site.  Actually, Tetsu didn't take to that suggestion well...

"You don't know how much time and effort your mother puts into her quilts!  They are very special!"  

"I DO realize how precious they are, but there is a limit as to how many Takumi and I can take, and I can't honestly say I'll treasure ALL of them as much as you do.  You could just put aside some that you really like and label others as "do as you like"."

This reminds me of my mother who went through her photo albums and papers and sorted them into boxes which she mostly labeled "Stuff to throw away after I'm gone.  No need to open the boxes."  There are some things I guess we just can't bear to part with ourselves.

Leiya asked me what I wanted done with my quilts (she could see that Tetsu was getting touchy) and I said I have envisioned that at my funeral, the quilts would be laid out on tables and all guests would be welcome to take home anything they wanted, first come, first served.  After that anything left over can be tossed.  I can see that, if a farewell reception is in the near future, but not really if I'm going to be around another 20 years and most of the people who admire my quilts now will already be gone or certainly not need anything more in their homes...   Am I becoming morose now?

So my question is...  what do we quilters do with all our old quilts?  I can try to make certain I make new quilts for specific people but the ones languishing in my home...?  They haven't even been relegated as dog and cat bed appropriate yet.

As an aside, I also wonder what going to happen to all this fabric and the quilting supplies but hopefully that stash will be of use to a younger quilter someday...

Wrapping up our trip to the States

I think I'm about done with all the stories and pictures of our trip to the States.  Just a few things to add.

There are always many differences between our lives in Japan and the lives we see our friends and family living in the States.  Part of it is cultural, part of it is we are just old timers, and this time we we saw differences in how governments respond to situations, specifically the response to Covid.

First our families.

It seemed like every time we turned around, at Leiya's house, at Takumi's, someone was saying "Hey Google!  ...  What time is it?" or "Hey Google!  How do you spell...?"  Tetsu and I are not up to this level of technology in our home and it was a surprise to have people just call out a question in the middle of a conversation.  We noticed this too while walking down streets.  People would just be chatting into the air and though we were aware that they probably had a bluetooth device in their ear and were telephoning someone, still, in the past we might have wondered about how connected to the real world the person was...

Speaking of voices out of nowhere, Takumi's house also had a voice security system and it would call out randomly that someone had opened the back door or the garage door or the front door when a door (and I suppose a window) was opened.  At least we knew where everyone was, though the dogs had a pet door to themselves that didn't get announced.

Takumi's house was also equipped with a motorized vacuum cleaner (which is becoming more popular even in Japan) and this was the first time for Tetsu and me to see it at work up close.  The first day I followed it around the house amazed that it could get out of corners and manuever under tables and avoid dogs.  It seemed to take longer to do the job than I would if I'd just pushed a vacuum cleaner along myself though...

One bit of technology that we are now thrilled with is a powered toothbrush.  Japan has them too but I've pooh-poohed them for the longest time.  While in California however, I'd hear this buzz in the evenings coming from the bathroom and I finally asked what the noise was.  Takumi and Julieta claimed that the powered toothbrush was amazing and the day before we left California, Takumi bought us a set that connects to our iPhones!  Wow!  I never would have thought but Tetsu and I are both enthralled with the fresh squeaky feel our teeth have now!  Thank you Takumi!!

A funny story, maybe illustrating a cultural difference, happened when we stayed at the lovely AirBnB in the mountains.  We couldn't work out how to use the fan/light above the beds and Leiya called the AirBnB manager and he offered to come over immediately.  A very friendly, chatty man arrived to look at the fan and he climbed up onto the double bed to look at the ceiling fixture.  But he left his shoes on!  Tetsu was horrified because in Japan we don't even allow shoes in the house let alone on a bed, let alone on a guest's bed!  Leiya and my eyes met too as we stifled a laugh...  The nice man figured out how to get the fan to work and as he left he gave us a double thumbs up and said "Now make sure you give our AirBnB a five star rating for great service!" which made us all laugh hilariously after he closed the front door.  Well, besides the shoes on the bed, we did rate the AirBnB pretty high!

The response to Covid these days is still very different between Japan and the States.  While we were in California, the mask mandate was removed on airlines and even before that we were surprised at how no one wore masks at all except in medical buildings.  In Japan masks are still mandatory in all buildings and we wear masks when visiting private homes and even when outside walking.  At my niece's wedding, guests were specifically asked to NOT wear masks as she wanted everyone's happy faces to be visible in her wedding pictures.  

The biggest difference in the response to Covid was the requirements for entry into the countries at the airports.  After getting our PCR tests done before leaving Japan, we were amazed to be waved through the Los Angeles International Airport with no one giving a glance at our documents.  Then, coming back to Japan, we were very nervous about meeting the Japanese government's requirements for Covid testing as they required certain tests and doctors' signatures.  The PCR test at the California pharmacy was very haphazard (handed our kits and told to go at it) and the original results did not meet the Japanese requirements so I had to contact the medical laboratory and ask for more specific test result data.

When we finally got back to Narita Airport in Japan, despite our documentation, Tetsu and I and EVERYONE ELSE on the flight were directed through a maze of corridors and rooms to an official Japanese Covid testing site and it took three hours to get through that puzzle of red tape and hundreds of medical staff!!!  Truly!  I think I counted 20 stations to get through of people checking our documents, asking questions, making sure we sat in designated waiting areas, directing us to tables, booths, lines, chairs, getting monitoring apps installed in our phones, waiting for Covid testing results, getting documents stamped etc.  It was a horrendous experience and even though I had heard that it was difficult to get through the Japanese airport, we were irritated and exhausted when we finally left the airport!  That experience alone (never knowing if your documents and results were going to be rejected or not!) has put me off traveling internationally again until this whole pandemic is past history.  And that's not even having to deal with the mandatory quarrantine that was still being issued a few months ago in Japan!  At least we didn't have to go through that!

We arrived back in Japan, tired but happy and finally at home.

The last few days in California

We spent the last three days of our trip to the States with Takumi and Julieta.  Some of our plans didn't work out but we enjoyed seeing how Takumi and Julieta live in their new home and meeting their doggies.

Tetsu and I had tentatively planned to rent a car and travel to the San Diego to visit a friend of my mother's who is in her 90's and has been like an aunt to me.  Ann also speaks Japanese and Tetsu felt very welcomed to her and her husband's home the many years that we have visited in the past.  Though Leiya had managed to make contact with Ann in March, unfortunately she never answered her phone when I called, nor did she respond to e-mails which included my telephone number.  Well, Ann is in her 90's and maybe not that connected with the digital world.  We sadly missed seeing Ann this trip.  

I had also thought we might swing by and visit one of my high school friends whom I stay with each summer when visiting California.  Again, our timing didn't work out because she was in Minnesota for a family funeral...  In the end, we didn't really have a reason to rent a car so Tetsu and I stayed at Takumi's while Julieta went to work each morning and Takumi hunkered down in his room to work remotely.  I read my Kindle and Tetsu took pictures around the house and organized his photos on his computer.  We played around in the evenings when both Julieta and Takumi were finished with work for the day.

We went out for a Mexican breakfast one morning!

We stopped in to visit Julieta's grandmother and aunt's family and they invited us back for dinner that night.  Real Mexican food!

Tetsu loved the uncle's garden and how he'd decorated it all.

Because of our big breakfast that morning, we went back up to Idyllwild just to walk the dogs and get some exercise ourselves.  

I love that Takumi and Julieta can just zoom up the mountain for an hour to walk around and enjoy nature.

Julieta's very warm family.  Oh, the food was delicious and we brought home lots for the next day's lunch!

One day Julieta took Tetsu and me to get our PCR tests to return to Japan...  The process was easy, the receiving of notification that Japan would accept was a major hassle!  We made a trip to See's Candies and Hobby Lobby.

The front entrance to Takumi and Julieta's house.  That's a quilt I made Takumi long before he met Julieta.

Another one that I expermented with and tried to be "arty".  There are quite a few of my quilts on their walls and I am flattered that Julieta will display them as I'm not really sure if she is a "quilty" person.  I left more with her telling her to give them away if she wants.

There are Hazy and Pollo running around the very nice backyard and there are the Idyllwild mountains right behind their house.

Hazy checks out everything and Pollo is her little shadow.

Those bottom teeth of Pollo's really give him personality!

Tetsu relaxing with the doggies.

Takumi's office with four computers going at once.

One of our final meals at home.

But we actually did see Leiya and Tony and Luka for 20 minutes on this final day when they stopped in on their way to the airport to drop off some In-n-Out hamburgers and pick up the stroller they'd left in Takumi's garage.  A final photo of Luka and "Ji-ji"!  (Grandpa in Japanese baby language!)

Wineries!

On Saturday, the day after my niece's wedding, Takumi and Julieta had the day off and we arranged to meet them at one of their favorite wineries in Temecula.  Tetsu wasn't too excited about this plan because he (we) is not a drinker and he wasn't particularly interested in sipping wine.  Nevertheless, Takumi said that in their part of California, one of the main attractions of the area was the opportunity to visit wineries and so that was where we were headed!

I am so glad we did!!!

Oh my!  The scenery was just beautiful!

We ordered a bottle of wine...

 and some munchies and Takumi and Julieta told us about why they liked this winery.  

It seems that they've visited quite a few and this one they especially liked for the scenery.  

We wandered around the vineyard.

And just enjoyed the warm sun.

Luka played around on a photogenic tractor.

We took pictures for this year's Christmas card!

And then we moved on to the next winery!

Julieta said that of the many wineries they'd visited, this one had the best chaucherie board (which was a word I didn't even know.)

I think Luka didn't like an olive on the chaucherie board.

We ordered so much food to go along with another bottle of wine!

And the scenery was again beautiful!  I could get used to this lifestyle!

After lunch we headed to ANOTHER winery!  

This time to try wine tasting!

This was an eye opening experience with the sommelier talking to us about what wines we liked (for Tetsu and me, none as we'd never had any) and the young man who was assisting us chose wines that he thought we might like.  And Tetsu found out he likes sparkling wine and sweet wine!

This winery had a great lawn area where we all relaxed for an hour or so talking to each other and anyone else who happened to sit down.  

Luka and I rolled around on the grass.

We went in and out to the wine tasting room to try a new wine.

And pretty soon it was time to say good-bye to Leiya, Tony and Luka who were headed to San Diego for a few days while Tetsu and I went back home with Takumi and Julieta.

A few tears in the parking lot (from Tetsu and Leiya and me), and we waved good-bye with lots of photos and memories!