Smash*Book「Pretty Pink」Update #3

 This double page is very special to me: it’s about my baby daughter!

I picked this double page to be all about my daughter, because it has the calendar on the bottom of the right page saying “A DAY TO REMEMBER”, so I circled her birthday with a heart.
In addition to that I used adhesive letters to add the birth-month (spelled in the german version with an “i” in the end) and her name, as well as “My Girl” and the meaning of her Japanese name (kanji 七海), “7 seas”

I took polaroids of her, as well as me with her & my husband with her to fill out the page on the left with that. I really like the little frames for the polaroids that I got from a friend. On the page to the right I only added a palm print of hers and will use the empty space to fill it with all the funny, witty, interesting things she’ll say once she can talk (more).

In the middle I attached a little wooden ’ema’ keychain I bought at a Japanese shrine that sort of specialises on wishes & prayers for a good upbringing and education of children.
Something I added in the middle to the “rings” of my smash book are little ‘song cards’ as I like to call them. Basically I got a little crafty and made cards that on the front are decorated according to the theme of the lullaby/children’s song, and have the song lyrics written on the back. They are all  in Japanese lullabies (except for the one on the bottom left which is just the Japanese version of “twinkle twinkle little star”).

I can’t wait to fill the page on the right with quotes of all the things she says that I want to remember!

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See all my Smash*Book updates HERE

「Geisha Girls Cross Stitch」 Chisato

I finished the third one in my geisha doll cross stitch series.
I named her ‘Chisato’

Chisato  – often written with the Kanji for 千 (chi) thousand & 里 (sato) village –
means ‘thousand villages‘.

Other Geisha Girls I stitched:
Misaki
Miyuki

「Geisha Girls Cross Stitch」 Miyuki

Here’s the second one of the Geisha Girls Cross Stitch series I’m doing…

I named her ‘Miyuki’

Miyuki – often written with the Kanji for 美 (mi) beauty & 雪 (yuki) snow – means ‘beautiful snow‘.

Other Geisha Girls I stitched:
Misaki

「Geisha Girls Cross Stitch」 Misaki

This is the first post of the geisha girls cross stitch series I’m working on whenever I feel like it. They are all inspired and/or done according to the pattern from iamnotadoll on etsy 🙂 I just gave them different names that I personally like or connect with each little geisha doll.

The first one is 「Misaki」

Misaki – often written with the Kanji for 美 (mi)  beauty &  咲 (saki)  bloom  – means ‘beautiful blossom‘. With her green kimono and the purple/pink hair that name fits perfectly in my opinion 🙂

Advent Calendar「Teehaus」Tea #11 ● ‘Japan Kirschblüte (Cherry blossoms)’

Türchen #11 unseres Advents-Teehauses beinhaltete einen Grüntee: ‘Japan Kirsche’…
Door #11 of our tea house Advent calendar contained another green tea: “Japanese Cherry”

Japan liegt mir sehr am Herzen, da ich schon so oft dort war und wundervolle Momente verbrachte habe, welche zu wertvollen Erinnerungen wurden. Der Grüntee (sencha) schmeckt durch die Paklumblüten sowie dem Kirscharoma sehr zart fruchtig, und lässt sich gut den ganzen Tag über trinken 🙂
Japan is quite dear to me as I’ve spent so many times there having wonderful moments become treasured memories. This green tea (sencha) tastes nice and fruity due to the cherry-aroma & the Paklum petals. It’s easily drinkable during the whole day.

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Vorherige Türchen / Previous days
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「Teehaus」Advent Calendar #3 ● Madame Butterfly

Heute haben wir Türchen #3 von unserem Advents-Teehaus geöffnet. Darin versteckt war wieder ein Grüntee mit dem schönen Namen “Madame Butterfly” ƸӜƷ
Today we opened door #3 on our Advent Calendar「tea house」Hidden inside was another green tea with the lovely name of  ”Madame Butterfly“. ƸӜƷ

Wie ich im gestern schon erwähnte bin ich ein großer Fan von Grünem Tee, weshalb ich mich auch heute freute diesen auszuprobieren. “Madame Butterfly” ist ja eine Erzählung des amerikanischen Schriftstellers John Luther Long über ein japanisches Teehaus-Mädchen. Grüner Tee ist zudem in Japan äußerst beliebt und hat dort auch den ganz eigenen ‘Matcha’-Geschmack. Deshalb passt der Name super zu diesem Grüntee, denn er erinnert mich ein wenig an den, den ich in Japan gerne trinke 🙂 Die Sonnenblumen- und Rosenbluten schmeckt man wirklich gut durch, und er duftet ganz sanft nach Pfirsich 🙂 Schmeckt mir noch besser als der “China Jasmin” Grüntee von gestern!
Like I said yesterday, I’m a big fan of green tea, which is why I was really looking forward to trying this one today. “Madame Butterfly” is a short story by American writer John Luther Long about a teehouse-girl in Japan. Green tea is very popular in Japan and the Japanese ‘Matcha’ has a very distinct, unique taste. The taste reminds me of the Japanese tea I like to drink, so the name suits it very well 🙂 The sunflower and rose petals really define the flavour here and it has a very round peachy fragrance to it. I’m liking this one more than the “China Jasmin” green tea from yesterday.

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Vorherige Türchen / Previous days
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Bookish『blogtober 2014』

Day 25 of blogtober2014 has me talking about books ❤

Your favourite book
Well, I really can not just name ONE favourite book. After all there are different genres, different languages, different moods I’m in to feel connected to a story etc. So I decided to make a little list of favourite books, yea?!

• Children’s Books: Snow White & the seven dwarfs – my favourite fairy tale of all times since early childhood days
• Young Adult: Das Lied der Träumerin by Tanya Stewner who usually writes children’s books, but has made a really good debut into the young adult genre with this book (unfortunately not translated into English yet).  It has music, love triangles, secrets, dark desires and a whole lot of “finding oneself” among the protagonists.
• Dytopia: The Children of Men by P.D. James – Chilling, post-apocalyptic story that sucked me in from start to finish. So did the movie they made based on this book. I recommend both!
• Women’s Fiction: Auf der anderen Seite ist das Gras viel Grüner by Kerstin Gier – If you could turn back time 5 years, would make the same decisions in your life, fall in love with the same person ??
• Contemporary: Me Before You by Jojo Moyes – A story with characters so strong and vivid, they will stay with you for a long time after you finished reading. At least that’s how it was for me.
• Fantasy: The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers – A must-read for everyone who loves books, reading and the suspense & excitement of immersing oneself in a fantastic story.
• (Japanese) Classic: Botchan by Natsume Sôseki – a humorous Japanese classic by my favourite Japanese author, and just because the male protagonists reminds me a lot of myself 🙂

 

My dream vacation always will be…『blogtober 2014』

Day 21 of blogtober2014 takes me back to Japan – my “home away from home” kind of place.

Your Dream Vacation
I already wrote a blog post on our trip to Iceland, which was a bit like a dream, a totally different world ^^ In that blog entry I also mentioned anothere country which I want to talk about now as it is & always will be my “dream vacation place” to go 🙂

JAPAN – 日本 – TÔKYÔ – 東京
Ever since my first stay there in May 2008 (when I went to language school in Tôkyô) I fell in love with the city & country more and more. Tôkyô is a city that is making me feel just so…alive. I could probably write a novel-length entry about why I like it so much & keep going back every year, but maybe I will leave that for future blog entries, you know…talking about different aspects individually.

view from Sky Tree over Tôkyô – with the Sky Tree casting its shadow

I filmed some footage on our last trip to (Tokyo) Japan in September 2013 and put it together with photos in a sort of vacation video. The annotations are in German but I think you can still enjoy watching if you can’t read German as pictures and video clips don’t need much explanation 🙂

Every time I go to Japan a little piece of my heart stays there, and I feel homesick for it when coming back to Germany.

 

I specialise in…日本(語)『blogtober 2014』

On day 17 of blogtober2014 we take a look at my skills 🙂

I’m  an expert  a specialist at….
Firstly, I don’t like calling myself an ‘expert’ at anything…wouldn’t it mean I know EVERYTHING in a certain subject. I’d rather like to say I specialise(d) in something, and have room to grow and learn more and more over time.

The subject I’m really skilled at (and would call myself a specialist at) is: Japan/Japanese – and to be a bit more exact – Modern Japanese society & literature. It’s been 8 years since I started learning Japanese in self-study and later on at university as part of my International BA degree in East Asian Studies focusing on Japan. So for 8 years I’m busying myself with all things Japan, trying to get better and better with the language and broaden my knowledge about society and literature in detail.

To me, the interpretation of ‘individualism’ in (historical and modern) Japanese society as well as in literature is one of the subjects I’m most interested in. Natsume Sôseki a famous writer of the modern era was an advocate trying to get society to develop a sense for their own ego, their own individualism without crossing the line of egoism. There is so much value in his speech “My Individualism” (can be read in: My Individualism and The Philosophical Foundation of Literature). It is amazing how well you can transfer his thoughts from all those decades ago into Japanese society of today.

 

 

 

Fall Fashion – the simple, comfy kind『blogtober 2014』

Day 16 of blogtober2014 is dedicated to the fashion of this season.

Fall Fashion
I have to admit that I’m not a real fashion-addict, who enjoys posting “Outfit of the day” updates. I don’t go shopping every week, not even every month, but I wear the clothes I buy for years mostly (of course adding something new when I feel like it). It’s not even so much a money issue as it is the fact that I just really like the clothes I buy and then want to wear the pieces for a long time.
This is what I like to wear in autumn. It’s a 3-4 year old photo taken of me in Yamashita Park (Yokohama, Japan). BUT I still wear those same clothes on an autumn day this year. Just a comfy pair of jeans, my well loved dark petrol knitted long-shirt, a jacket and a dark blue scarf. It’s really simple and not “high-fashion” at all, but I rather enjoy the colourful autumn scenery instead of pondering too much over what to wear these days 😉

To add some color, I love to wear handwarmers as autumn  days can get quite chilly sometimes.

I crochet these myself, you can find other creations looking through my handmade category 😉

Of course cardigans are also a big thing during fall season. I have several to just put over a thinner shirt to get that extra bit of cozy comfort. And since I’m a mum, I also crochet a ‘fall fashion cadigan’ for my daughter

You can click here and see my blog post about this cardigan ^^with close up pictures of the details 🙂