Growing up is hard. Little sis is a thumb sucker…big time. The dentist has suggested that unless we want to spend our meager retirement on braces and headgear that we try to get her to cut back a bit. She’s OK at home and school and in the car, but we’re starting by trying to get her to stop in public places…store, library, etc. Basically just get her to remember it’s in her mouth.

We’ve used this technique before a few times with big-sis. Basically every-time they are successful they get to color one picture. Once they are all done they get a preselected prize. For us it has worked best when the prize is purchased about halfway through and left to sit on top of the fridge.

In the past we did trees, or fish, but she requested candy. Funny to think that candy might be good for her teeth.

Summer vacation is over. Tomorrow back to work. The girls officially have one more week until they start back at school.

I have spent today piddling around the house. The dog is from some new clipart I am working on. I found a whole pile of old ephemera from the 1920’s and 30’s.

I love children’s books from this era.

OK…this how to is too snappy. I have been wrestling with this since I made the girl’s pants patterns this spring.

From Burda-Style This tutorial walks you step by step how to make your own pattern PDF’s. Love this!!

I am back from Japan. It has been a great trip, but I am really ready to be home. This is the longest I have been away from the girls ever.

Japan is the motherland of crafting. There is such attention to detail in everything.

We spent the last two days in Kyoto. Our sister-in-law Masae arranged a traditional Japanese hotel. We ate dinner in the room on the floor-Japanese style.

Kyoto was very interesting. Many more foreigners there. I think since so much of the old areas are preserved, and with all the books and movies about Geishas in the past few years it is more of a tourist hot spot.

We got to see the Kyoto O-bon festival (see the Wikipedia article …they have a better picture). The symbol here is for big. They light these in torches on the surrounding mountain sides. This is to say goodbye to all the spirits of the ancestors that visit this week.

Masae arranged for a taxi-tour guide on Friday. He spoke great English and was quite a hoot. He asked where we wanted to go-we gave the polite Japanese answer-”wherever you think is best”. This is a big tip if you travel there-you have no opinion and learn to go with the flow. Also, be prepared for raw squid for breakfast. Not a fiber oriented cuisine.

So he drove us quickly by the Gion (Geisha area) and seemed to hint that this was a tourist spot. We spent the rest of the day visiting temples.

(Mee looking tired holding a fish-head)

I tried lots of new stuff. I used a traditional Japanese toilet…I know TMI. I ate things with eyeballs still in them. I got to see a Keirin bike race. I went to the fabric district. I got whispered about in foreign tongues.

Keirin Race-notice the color coordination of the uniforms!

Oh, here’s some of the traditional fabric:

There is an entire area of fabric shops. Most were closed due to O-bon, but each had a specialty. Imagine if you will, one store for knit fabrics, one for quilting, one for suits, one of quilted fabric for children’s jackets. IT went on and on-just as well they were mostly closed…it would have been hard to get me out of there.

I’ll post some more pictures in the next few days. I got several Japanese sewing books and some yarn that is already half a sweater. That’s the other great thing about international travel…lots of knitting time.

Here are some of the photos from the temples we’ve seen.

The Meji Shrine is a Shinto shrine:

It is in a park setting surrounded by trees. It is hard to believe it is in the middle of Tokyo.

And the Asakusa temple compound is Buddist:

This shrine compound is very large. It has a five story pagoda.

The amazing thing is that this is right in the middle of the Asukasa neighborhood. This is one of the few old parts of the city that are preserved. The market runs right up to the gates of the temple compound.

The story is that two fishermen dragged a statue of the godess of compassion out of the river sometime in the 600’s AD. The temple was built around it. Noone is allowed to see the statue, so the story goes that you do not know if it is really there, you just have to trust that it is. Interesting to think about practicing faith in such a way that you have to learn to trust in compassion.

The interior of the temple.

We are here!! My sister and I arrived Saturday afternoon (about 3 in the morning East Coast time). Tokyo is amazing. Where to begin.

 First, the city is amazing. It is so clean, and people are so nice. We are quite lucky since our brother Bo both speaks and reads Japanese. This could be a bit overwhelming without a tour guide.

Sunday we went to Shibuya with Bo and Masae (his wife). This is a shopping district a bit north of where they live. It is right next to the Harajuku area…we saw several of the kids all dressed up. This has actually been one fo our first observations. People are much nicer dressed than most folks in the US. Much more fashoin concious. At teh same time that seem much more accepting of people doing their own thing. A lot of the women use umbrellas to protect from the sun.

 Then there are the department stores. They make Saks feel like the local K-Mart. Clean. And they sell everything. Each has one floor that is dedicated to food. Sort of like a food court, but much higher quality. Fresh fruit and meat. French pastries. I need to get a photo before we come back, it is incredible.

We went to one yesterday called Printemps. (Go ahead and look, I’ll wait. I know the Japanese is hard to read, just click) At least 7 floors of goods. Mostly woemen’s clothes and house hold items. Sally got some snappy shoes, and I bought some gifts for work folks.

 The interesting thing is that even in the department stores they have a lot of areas that sell crafting type items. This is the button section in Printemps, in case you want to embellish what you buy. They had different areas that sold lace trim and other things like that.

Then there is Hand Messe. Forget going to the Pyramids at Giza, this is makes the trip of a lifetime. It has 24 levels. Each specializes in one type of this. Like handcrafts, or stationary, or lumber, or Halloween costumes. 24 FLOORS. It bills itself as the “Vreative life store”. That is is. It even has an area that sells labratory equipment.

I bought enough Noro Kureon to make a sweater. and some time clover needles.

More tomorrow on the temples we saw yesterday.

Yup, I got into grad school. I am officially a Graduate Student of Engineering in Computer Science at VCU.

I am hoping I get my information packet before Wed…that’s when I leave to go see my sis in LA on our way to Tokyo.

 Oh, did I forget to mention I’m going to Tokyo. I feel like I should have the whole thing all mapped out, but I am trying not to be the bossy big sister on this trip.

My sister and I fly out from LA on Friday for Tokyo. We’re staying with our brother, who has taken the week off for us.

 Oh, and all that stuff about learning Japanese? Yeah, I finally realized about a month ago that I might learn a ton, but I would never understand what anyone said back to me. The girls have gotten a lot from listening to the CD’s, Little sis has worked “moto takai” into routine conversation.

Oh, I have a few knitting projects to mention tomorrow. I have like 44 hours of plane time coming up…socks? sweater? Wheat to knit??

OK, I do love my new laptop. I really do. The old one died after ten years of faithful service. We had to replace it for summer school, and possibly grad school (fingers crossed).

But let me tell you the transition to Vista has not been easy. And for the record I teach computer science, this really should not be so difficult. In all honestly I probably haven’t played with it enough. But I am a busy girl, and I have important knitting to do. I want the darned thing to just work.

It has a whole host of things that bug me, but the main thing has been learning how to turn off the laptop. I learned the hard way that using the icon that looks like the shutdown button does not shut it down, but instead sends it into hibernation.  I do not need it to pass the winter in a torpid state. I do need it to turn off so it still has power at the end of a 12 hour drive to say, Florida.
So rather than stay annoyed I did a Google search yesterday and found Ed Bott’s Microsoft Report. Ed is my new hero. Right after the Yarn Harlot. There, in an organized list, was everything I need to know to control this thing. Even things I didn’t know I wanted to do.

I am wondering if Ed does tubular cast offs…that’s the next thing I need to fix.