Things I have been making these days

I have been busy these days as now I have a studio! It's only 3 minutes away from home too. It is upstairs of a new shop, Oku Den. My sewing machine, over-locker, fabric, threads, etc... have moved out of my house. It is so nice to have a big space and a big table to cut fabric , and designing and sewing what I like to make is just fantastic. I have met a wonderful person, Oku, who gives me constant encouragement. After the bags and aprons are made, they move into beautiful shop space downstairs. How fortunate am I to find this opportunity!

I love making these shoulder bags. It is so much fun to match kimono fabrics with this beautiful denim. Luckily these shoulder bags recently found their new permanent home, so I am really happy.

And with the small off-cuts, I have been making small coin/lipstick pouches.

These are all small left-over pieces of kimono fabrics. I have boxes full of them and again, it is a lot of fun finding the right combination.

I have been working diligently these days, so I gave myself a reward by accepting an invitation to a craft weekend last weekend. Sewjourn is in picturesque Lancefield, only 1 hour away from Melbourne. Meeting such beautiful fun loving women who all have passion for being creative was really inspirational. I had a chance to make clothes for myself and my daughter - here is one of them... she loves modeling for the camera!

Tibetan Apron

Recently I made a shoulder bag for my friend who wanted to use her favourite piece of fabric as a feature panel. This colouful piece of fabric comes from a Tibetan apron. It is a strong fabric and those stripy colours are really gorgeous. The apron had three strips sewn together and I was thinking about the Tibetan woman who might have weaved this piece as I un-stitched them. I wondered what kind of apron she was wearing.

I found out later that traditionally, these aprons are worn by married women. It is really interesting to see how each culture has its unique way to distinguish woman's married status!

Fond memory

Here is my kids cleansing their hands and mouth before entering into the Shrine site.

Stunning view of ski mountain. It looks almost like a painting.

My daughter loves green tea now after learning tea ceremony. Here she is wearing an old kimono that I used to wear when I was a child.

Back into life

I was back home in Japan for almost 2 months. My children never seen that much snow in their lives, and yes, they did love snow ball fighting and skiing! I loved being able to relax at my old home with my mum's home cooking. Now I am back in Australia, I am trying to create something beautiful in the kitchen as well. I have tried bread making and also have been working on how to make kids' lunch box more exciting and nutritious. Hard work! Kids are back to school and so their friendship with school friends have come back to where they were at before we left for Japan. My daughter was invited to her friend's birthday party recently, so I wanted to make something for her. Here I made using strong linen/cotton fabric with feature patchwork using my kimono cut-outs. It was such a fun to match colours thinking about this little girl's gorgeous eyes. I used a wooden button recycled from Japan.

Denim is beautiful

I often use denim to make handbags and have recently come across with this lovely denim. It has greyish navy colour with very stiff texture. It turned into two bags so far.

This is one of my friends shoulder bag with beautiful blue Japanese silk.

And this is mine. It has my mother's woollen Obi attached at the front. I quite liked the colour combination of greyish tone of denim and a red feature panel. This time, I changed the deign slightly and attached a zip so nothing will fall out! The arrow pattern or " Yagasuri" on the red Obi is a traditional Japanese design. Both bags are lined with linen inside.

Great-aunt's obi

When my mother gave me her auntie's Obi, a sash for Japanese kimono, I really didn't think it has the traditional Japanese design that most Western people would recognise, but I really liked it. I was hoping that I can make it into a bag one day. So here it is. It was originally going to be a much bigger and longer bag, but during the "manufacturing process", it has changed its design to this. And I love it now! I am glad this Obi has its second life as a bag in Australia!

A Feathery Friend

Isn't he beautiful? My children found a baby Tawny Frogmouth on the way home last Friday. He was on a tree in our street. It was a warm day and we thought he was thirsty. So we took water for him, but of course, he wouldn't drink it from us. We just watched him and felt so blessed to be able to see him so close. Soon we found out that his mother was watching us from high up in a nearby tree. We were lucky that the mother didn't try to scare us. I think it was too hot for her to fly or she thought we looked harmless! We didn't see him and his mother next day. Maybe they found a good shelter...