Tokyo Handmade Festival

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of meeting Julie F (My Quilt Diary) at the Tokyo Dome, to see a small quilt show together.  We hadn't seen each other in person since the Quilt Festival in January 2020.  

This "Tokyo Handmade Festival" was like a little taste of the old Quilt Festivals. 

The only hassle was navigating quite a long, inefficient, almost maddening process of walking past the whole length of the line to get my ticket, then even further for us to fill out forms with our name and phone number, then a walk all the way back along the line, to the end of the line.... then... wait in line, etc. etc. - all of that took a long time, maybe 45 minutes or even an hour?  

The show itself was very small but lovely, and not too crowded. 

Atsumi embroidery: 

I adore this whimsical alphabet: 

Kathy Nakajima's Hawaiian quilts: 

A fun and rather fittingly busy and garish Halloween exhibit: 

Some interesting BORO pieces: 

And beautiful work from the Tokyo-based artist Lindzeanne: 

Last but not least, the NHK Partnership quilts, all along the perimeter.  It took some sleuthing but we found our individual blocks, in the same quilt actually: 

My block is the bottom left one below in orange, yellow, green: 

And Julie's beautiful cardinal is here: 

There were many quilts on display - we looked for Queenie's block and couldn't find it.  Edited to add:  well lo and behold it was right there in the same quilt!  Second to the right from Julie's cardinal.  A lovely earth surrounded by embroidery.  

Next, we split up for 30 minutes to explore the vendor area, and I stayed mostly on the perimeter, avoiding the center areas that really were too crowded.  

I focused on three or four vendors, and purchased several beautiful pieces of vintage indigo (and some soft brown and red) as well some newly woven kasuri (not pictured) to use in more indigo sofa throws. 

Ahhhhh this makes me happy: 

Lastly Julie and I got some bubble tea and sat outside catching up for awhile before saying farewell and walking in opposite  directions to our respective train stations!  Thanks for the nice outing Julie!  I hope we can gather together with Queenie and Tanya too at some point in the not so distant future! 

xo

Cynthia 

Flower Power 6, and outings

Another little collage: 

I started with this little piece of vintage indigo.  It's impossible to see on the photo, but it has stitching on it.  I have no idea - maybe this was part of a mend to a futon cover.  In any case, it is beautiful old indigo and kasuri and it just looked like a good little flower vase to me.  I ended up turning it on end and then back again. 

Just playing around with shapes and layout: 

A little flannel board is nice.  The blue check is from one of Tommy's old shirts:  

Please visit Wendy's blog The Constant Quilter to see more minis!  Thank you Wendy! 

In other news, I've finished one week out of quarantine and I made it count!  I had something to do each day, whether it was a trip to the post office, or an outing.  

I went solo to an amazing exhibit of Hokusai sketches just ten minutes from our apartment, at Midtown: 

Even the carpeting was covered in his drawings: 

And I was invited to an English Flower Garden in Yokohama.  It was really small and just lovely.  We could stroll the whole thing in 30 minutes.  Got eaten by mosquitos and it felt like 100 degrees out, so, any longer would have been too long anyway!   There were five people, total, in the garden, from what I could tell.  

These glass "furin" (Japanese wind chimes) were just magical.  They sounded so pretty in the breeze, off and on: 

The gentle swaying of a Weeping Willow: 

I loved the various benches (I'm sure pre-Covid, they would have been occupied):  

Even vaccinated, I'm still being careful (no large group events and I'm not keen on a lot of indoor time outside the apartment) but it was very nice to have an outing with (vaccinated) friends and see something quiet and beautiful.  The world just seems to be blowing up on so many fronts.  It's hard to not be consumed with anxiety about it all.  

On a lighter note, earlier in the week I enjoyed some  kakigori  with another friend.  Kakigori is an old-timey dessert of shaved ice.  Lots of delicious options on a "feels like 100 degrees" day.  Mango and milk for me. 

 

Notice the Dixie-sized cup of water, next to the giant mountain of shaved ice, lol.  

The ice collapses down as you eat it, into a slushy sweet mess.  Yum.  

xo

Cynthia