Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to my blogger friends

here and there throughout the world

Thank you for coming to my blog
and sharing ideas and concerns of life with me.

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These small holy family dolls are one my treasures. I got them when I was 9 or 10 year-old (oh how many years ago!) at a Christmas bazaar at church. Yes, I still keep them! I remember the day before the bazaar I peeked into the room with my friends where parents were busy setting up all the handmade items on the tables for the bazaar. Then I found this holy family dolls and I was just carried away with them. I asked my mother for an allowance for in advance and the next morning I just ran to the church on time for the bazaar and got dolls in the triangle box. Gee, that's one of my happy memories of my childhood.

Have some "senbei"!

These are the most popular Japanese confectionery. They are "senbei", which made from glutinous rice and wheat flour. The dough is stretched thinly into circles or squares of about a coater-size in general, but in fact in varieties of shapes and sizes. Then, they are put into molds and baked.

They are flavored with soy sauce, salt or sugar and some are applied or mixed with sesame, beans or soybean paste. Some are wrapped in seaweed as well.

I love the one seared maple leaves and ginkgo leave in the picture. These are made from wheat flour mixed with sugar and eggs. Slightly sweet. Mmmmm I love them. This old senbei confectionery shop downtown Nagoya changes their seared stamps on "senbei " in every four season. Isn't it fun?

"Senbei" are snacks that go really well with green tea. It cerntaily provides a nice tea time in a family.

Christmas table setting in an old Japanese house

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On the way back home after I drove my husband to his office in the morning, an idea of having a fun just came up in my mind. I've known there are some little but nice museums which are used to be ones private residence near his office. The one I visited is the museum that was once a residence of a Japanese ceramics exporter who made his fortune in the middle of the 19th century.
Japanese- and Western-style buildings are preserved on a large block of land, plus two storehouses—one in the west and the other in the east—a tea room, and a garden. The other day I visited here, they displayed the Christmas dinner table settings in the Japanese -style rooms. It was a good combination of the western and the eastern different culture.

See I told you

(click to view more pictures)

Since our house locates downtown in Nagoya, the fifth largest city in Japan, there are lots of fun and excitements of a urban life within a few minutes' walking, biking, driving, taking a subway, city bus-----whatever. This evening I had a time to stop by at this shopping mall and I took some pictures.

Well, one thing you've got to be careful about windowshopping is that you have to keep your purse tight. Otherwise, you are tempted to whisper to yourself,
"Just one thing won't hurt me."
So here I am. I got a piece of Roquefort blue cheese from Dean and Deluca and chocolate from Pierre Marcolini.
"See I told you."

Beautiful Autumn colors

When the fall deepens, many leaves start changing its colors from green to yellow and red even on the trees along the streets of the center of the city.
Even at our garden we can enjoy viewing autumn leaves. It's really fortunate that we have many trees in our garden though our house locates in the middle of the city.
While the temperature repeats getting up and down several times at this time of the season, the leaves start changing colors and this temperature difference makes colors more brilliant red.

It's just breathtaking to look at the red leaves on the maple trees and I love ducking under them and looking up the leaves. When they starts falling on the ground , the winter is getting close to us.

It's hard to throw them into a trash box

(click each image for a full size)

I love everything beautiful , lovely and cute. They are sometimes postcards, greeting cards, wrapping papers, ribbons, boxes that I've just received in my daily life.

And the moment I find them "pretty!", it's hard to throw them into a trash box-----I just keep them.

So here are some of the examples which I keep as my little satisfactions.

These are direct mails from L'OCCITANE Japan.

Since each direct mail is so well-designed and I just love every illustration and drawing and its layouts. I wonder how many artists work for this and how much L'OCCITANE spends for advertising in the world market.

Anyway, don't laugh at me.

It's a small excitement when I find a L'OCCITANE DM in my house mailbox.

What kind of surprising are they going to give me this time?

They are so cute-------"kawaii" in Japanese.

The full moon

When you look up the moon, what do you see on the surface ?

Almost all the Japanese of all ages never fail to answer, "The rabbit pounding the sticky rice".

What do we see seems to be different from place to place, or in other words, in accordance with cultural backgrounds.

I read that in southern Europe, people see a big crab, in eastern Europe they see a woman, in Indonesia a woman who is knitting ,in German a man carrying firewood and many other objects in different areas and countries. What I read in the book is true, I wonder?

Anyway, how interesting because it tells that people in the world from the ancient ara to the modern ages have been keeping their special sentiments towards the moon for centuries and have been enjoying viewing the moon.

So in Japan too, we have the Moon Viewing Festival in Autumn.

At very olden days, people of the aristocratic class used to enjoy exchanging poems in the moonlight under the full moon which reflected the garden pond. Gradually the way of enjoying the full moon festival was modified among the ordinary people by offering some seasonal foods decorated in each house to pray for a bountiful harvests.

We still keep this custom and enjoy the autumn full moon in various ways. Families enjoy the special offerings and foods at home, some people enjoy the full moon at the observation floor of the high buildings , some attend the outdoor concerts under the full moon-----etc.

By the way, the moonlight is bright enough to throw shadows all over on the ground.

Autumn blessings from our garden

We have one persimmon tree in our garden. We don't really take a good care of it. All we care about this tree is to put some fertilizer into some holes dug at the bottom of the tree near some of its roots. That all we do once in winter.

I looked up this persimmon tree this morning and found most of persimmon fruits are pretty much riped. The shinning color of orange and red of unpeeled fruits looks so delicious.

Why don't I keep them before all the birds come and eat them up.

Using an adjustable long scissors for cutting branches, I gathered about twenty fruits. That was more than I expected.

Of course, I left some persimmon for some birds.

I peeled it and cut it into some pieces and brought them to my mother-in-law.

This is one of her favorites.

Do you like persimmons?

On a piece of paper

The other day, my daughter came home from school in Kyoto to spend the weekend with us.

She went to see her grandmother at hospital with me.
On her bed table, there's always a memo pad for her in any case she wants to write down something. My mother-in-law is, so to speak, a dedicated person and she's been keeping her diary everyday for years and is a big writer. I wanted her to keep it while in hospital so I brought her diary book and some postcards in her room but it seems that she is not in a mood to do so for now. So anyway, this is why a memo pad is around her.

And on this piece of paper, my daughter drew her grandmother simply out of her fun while she fell asleep. Since I've known that my daughter was not so keen on drawing when she was a small girl, I myself a bit surprised to see it. She did a good work. The next day I visited her in her room, I found my daughter's drawing is posted on the wall. Some nurses loved this drawing on her table and they posted it up on the wall. How nice! More than anything else, it is such a nice little excitement for her grandmother in a hospital room.

Socks for your gadgets

I've just known that Apple released iPod socks.

They have different plain colors for each iPod models.

Here are another socks called "funky fone sox" from the Britain.
I've found it at one of the airport shops before and I loved it at first glance.
It is originally made for cell phones but it fits for every little gadgets.
And as I presumed, it was perfect for my iPod nano.


Since my mother-in-law is in a hospital, I spend more time at home.
I enjoy finishing some house chores listening to my favorite music and songs
and sometimes English language programs with my iPod in my jeans pocket.