We're back!!

Last Tuesday, Jade and I visited the hospital in Yokohama to stay for 6 days. The next day she had some operations to cure her ears.

Jade has been suffering from secretory otitis media for both ears ever since she was a baby. The home doc suggested to have 2 kinds of operation to cure. One big operation was to cut her adenoid. And the other one is to drill her eardrum to insert a silicon tube for her both ears.

The above photo was taken just before she entered the operation room. So sweet smile!

Everything went fine and she came home Sunday afternoon with us. I stayed with her every single day and I spent the nights together with her on her bed! Gee, so happy we're back home.

snow in Kamakura

The snow still stays every-
where.
This is my first experience since I moved to Japan!! Incredible! When I was in Washington, USA or Bucharest, Romania, this was nothing new, though.

Our friend in the garden looks a bit unhappy, eh?
Is it too cold him, I guess.
Poor little frog...


I'll be away from home from Jan. 24 to Jan. 30 due to my daughter's operations to cure her ears, and will be back on Jan. 30!

You guys take care and stay warm!!

Saturday at home

Look at the photo! I took it from my Atelier this morning at 8.00 AM. It's SNOWING here in Kamakura. Unbelievable!! The area I live is called "Shonan", and it's said to be a warm place. But today, it's been snowing all day. Wow...

Japanese Pickles

Today, I'll tell you about how to make simple Japanese pickles, "Tsuke-mono". We've been eating "tsuke-mono" over generations, and each family has own recipes. It always come together with Japanese white sticky rice and "miso-shiru" (miso soup).

This "daikon" (Japanese radish) is only grown in the area where I live called "Miura Hanto "(Miura Peninsula). The outside color is pink, but the inside is white. Looks so cute! I'd never seen this until I moved to Kamakura. The farmers don't sell this "daikon" a lot, they only sell around their territory, it seems.

The recipe is from one farmer woman I met at the vendor. So simple. Wash the red "daikon" and cut them into one-bite size. This "daikon" is so soft, that's why you don't need to peel off the skin. Put them into a big storage jar, and add rice vinegar and equal amount of white sugar into the jar until soaked. Leave it for a couple days. Voila! Here you can have the "tsukemono".

I know it sounds a bit funny for you to add some sugar, but it's quite common way to cook something in Japanese traditional dishes.

my favorite flowers

I visited my favorite flower shop the other day to take some beautiful photos.
Enjoy!

I've found small "spring"

Yesterday, I went to a pick-nick to Kamakura Central Park with my family. It's been very cold in Japan these past weeks. Some are dying due to unexpected accident from the heavy snow in the North. It's such a pity.

I myself hate freezing cold winter! I love summer a lot!! So I'm waiting the up-coming spring so badly...
I happened to have found some sign of "spring" in the park!! They look so lovely to me! Oh, spring, please come at once!!

I got a new camera!

Yeah, I got a new camera!!
It's EOS Kiss Digital N from Canon.
It was quite costy, but no regret at all!!
This will be my buddy from now on!

These are first shots I took with my new camera. I took them in black and white as I thought that would be interesting.

Guess what I found at my mom's barn after 14 yrs!!

I happened to find an ancient boxes over last weekends when we all visited my mom's house. It was my unfinished patchwork projects!! Gee, this is really old!! The feet you see is Jade's, for your info. Ha ha ha!
I started patchwork when I was 16 or 17 yrs. Back then I was a high school kid in Lake Mary, a town near Orlando, Florida. I haven't seen them ever since I put them into boxes when I left there after high school graduation.
Wow!! I have to be thankful to my mom who kept the junk for such a long time, I mean 14 yrs!!
Now I'll need to finish my work, right? Any idea for border design/color? You know, I've never finished any project in patchwork/quilting so far!!!

latest bag on etsy

I updated the latest bag on my etsy shop <http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=209>. Applied red heavy-duty cotton canvas and apple print cotton to make this sweet tote bag. There're 2 outside pockets to store your cell phone, train/bis card, pen, keys and so on.

Interested? Here's the link to the page, http://www.etsy.com/view_item.php?listing_id=57216

Actually, there's matching bag for this.
But I haven't put on etsy yet.
What do you think?
I really like the shape. This can be used for kid's shoe bag. It's quite popular here in Japan and all kids have this kind of bag at their kindergarten. The reason is we change the shoes at the entrance of the building in Japan. We hate to walk around the building with shoes from outside. So all kids leave inner-shoes at the hall at school. Sometimes they take the shoes home to wash and that's how we need to have this kind of "shoe-bag"!!

A Happy New Year To You All!
Akemashite Omedeto Gozaimasu!!

Hope you all had a great winter holidays! Now I'm happy to be back again.

This photo shows "kagami-mochi" my daughter created at her day-care just before the New Year's Eve. "Kagami-mochi" is something we Japanese displays in the room during New Year's Days. Mochi is "cake made of boiled rice" according to my dictionary. Kinda hard to explain... Anyway, this represents Japanese Oshogatu (New Year's days).

Since this one is made by a three-year-old, it's a bit ugly shaped. Ha ha ha!! But she did a great job as a 3 yrs old!!


The real one looks like this. We buy from a store which is already decorated like this way. We have a history of doing this for over a thousand years. Interesting?