Japan Day Five - Fabric Town and Asakusa

We were back on the Shinkansen yesterday and off to Tokyo.  Even though the trips are a couple of hours each way from Nagoya I really love watching the Japanese scenery rush past; little towns, big cities, the sea, patchworks of rice fields flooded with water waiting for planting.  I alternate between gazing out the window and getting work done at 200km per hour and so the Tokyo Fabric Shopping Guide book is really coming along.

It was a grey rainy day yesterday but that didn't dampen (sorry!) our spirits.

Firstly we headed for Nippori Fabric Town, such a treasure trove.  Not only did I buy some pretty Japanese cottons, but also a couple more second hand kimonos, some super cute clothes for my little one and some leather working tools for The Man.  We certainly didn't make it into all 100 stores in the area, but then again, I don't think I could have carried any more purchases anyway!

Heaving left that heavy load in a locker, we hopped on another couple of trains and went to Asakusa.  The little tourist street looked so pretty with the light reflecting off the damp ground.

It was a great day for puddle-jumping frogs and those dressed like one.

My Creative Space

Once upon a time there was a girl who lived in an exotic land.  Every couple of months she would take a train that snaked past patchworks of rice fields, tea plantations, industrial estates and one gorgeous snow-capped mountain.  The train would transport her from the little town of vegetable fields and bicycles she now called home to a metropolis of buildings that touched the sky and people that moved in waves.

This not-so-young girl was a Japanese-fabric-ophile and she had arrived in the promise land.  A place that had an entire "Fabric Town" where five story buildings were filled with gorgeous print after gorgeous print.  A city with craft stores so large they needed seven whole buildings to hold them.  Somewhere that you could not only buy materials for almost every craft imaginable, but also be inspired by all around you.

That girl wanted to share her new-found knowledge with the world.  To map out the places to go and how to get there.  To help those navigate the foreign language and customs of the land.  With each trip, she would explore a new area, madly writing notes, subway exits and drawing maps.

But alas, while she had filled notebooks with her excited scribblings, before she could put them in order for others to read, life took over and the guide was carefully put away, but never forgotten.

But now, the not-as-young girl has only eight more sleeps until she visits this exotic land again.  The maps, the writings are all seeing light again and are being put into careful order.  It has been a number of years since the girl has visited the fabric promise land so with the guide in hand, she can see it with new eyes, check her maps, add new findings into the book so that she can then finally share it with the world.

There are many more magical creative spaces to explore, Kootoyoo is where you'll find the map.

I Need Cuddles

If hubby was home, that's what I'd be saying to him right now. He'd then wrap me in his big muscley arms and for a few minutes at least, make everything good again (can you tell I miss him already).

I need cuddles because I'm still adjusting to hubby being away. It's veeeery quite in the apartment. I need to get out and talk to someone.

I need cuddles because I'm now in that yucky space between being excited about starting treatment for my thyroid and the time when I start feeling better (they say it takes a couple of weeks). I'm nervous that it won't work. I'm impatient to know if it's going to work well enough that it will once again make getting pregnant an actual physical possibility.

I need cuddles because I was so excited about my "secret squirrel" business while I was in Tokyo, but now don't know if it's going to be marketable or not. To reveal (we can call it the "not secret squirrel anymore business" if you like), I started writing a "Fabric Lovers Guide to Tokyo", hoping to publish it as a small book with reviews of the best stores, maps and information about shopping there as well as general helpful information about getting around and shopping in Japan. I now see that there are a couple of blogs doing just that (links soon, when I'm not in such a need for cuddles). I'm not sure if I should scrap the work that I've done so far, continue or look at doing it in another format. Not sure if there's a market for it or not. Any advice/thoughts would be much appreciated.