pinku

Nervous knitting

Nora's shrug-like pattern is making me nervous.

I think I'm up to my 5th pentagon and the lack of schematics with the pattern means that I can't really check whether I'm on the right track. Sure mine match up to the measurements of the side of pentagon as shown in the pattern, but I still feel very nervous. I had to substitute yarn which I'm sure a lot of people are doing and I think I chose one that is a little too flimsy. It's a wool/silk blend (70%/30%) that I like, but I should have gone with the wool/alpaca blend instead. I went against all my instincts and just kept on knitting. I do have reservations about the fit of the sweater (especially the under arm area - it even looks squishy on the model) and nothing makes me more nervous than spending all this time knitting little pentagons that you join together rather than something in one-piece that you can try on as you go. I'm thinking aloud.

Also after finishing the first two pentagons and proudly holding them up and showing Darin - he immediately made me hold it against my chest area because..... well they do look like chest pasties. It's been a fun knit so far though (well, except for all the accompanying nervousness) - oh make sure you like casting on LOTS of stitches before you start this project - you need to cast on over 130 sts with every pentagon (so that's like 11 times). Bad Mom, Good Mom knit her pentagons in the round and they look great!!

BTW, the new Rebecca magazine (No. 33 - spring and summer 2007) is out, but nothing really grabs me - at all. Good I can save my money.

I liked the brown preview section the best - i.e. the tank and the bell-sleeve crochet(?) top. Maybe I'll wear brown and orange/yellow to work tomorrow.

Do you like chunky?

The other thing I wanted to talk about the other day is chunky knits. What do you think about them? Are they just for the skinny models?

I just pre-ordered Wenlan Chia's upcoming book, Twinkle's Big City Knits. There are a few sneak peek photos here.

including this one

I'm also considering cancelling my order. I'm sure the photos and the designs will be super cute (this point may win me over in the end), but how would they look on me? I'm not a petite person as I (unfortunately or fortunately) did not inherit my father's Asian body shape. I love the Kim Hargreaves cardigan I made out of Big Wool, but it teeters on the edge with regards to chunkiness for me. I don't need any extra bulk (even though it is very warm and toasty). I love the idea of quick knits - fun times for sure, but I just don't know about chunky knits. I think the book would be super popular here in Japan where baggy is IN (which is good for me too because their baggy is my fitted).

Speaking of fitted, one up and coming knitting book that I won't be cancelling is Fitted Knits by Stephanie Japel. I have high hopes for this book and am sure I will be satisfied. I think Steph's designs flatter all types of body shapes and I like the idea of fitted knits.

On a completely unrelated note I found out yesterday that employees from my company get a 20% discount at all Dean and Deluca stores throughout Japan - I think there are only five though. Luckily one is right near my work. The discount still doesn't make lunch there cheap - it just makes it affordable. I was also very strong today and resisted the doughnuts from Doughnut Plant. A great thing about D&D in Japan is that they offer half sizes of all their sandwiches, bagels and quiches, so today I had half a piece of Quiche Lorraine and half of a lox bagel. Yum!!!

Hope everyone has a great weekend! See you next week!

Virtual Garage sale?

I think I'm gonna have a virtual garage sale.

I thought of this brilliant idea while swimming today. Doing laps is very therapeutic, not only for my physical self but it also gives me an opportunity to work through issues, and brainstorm new ideas. I have so much stuff that I loved at some point but don't use anymore and other stuff that I just probably should never have bought. Ah yes, we've all been there. I would just have a normal garage sale, but we don't have a garage and it's just not done in Japan. I'll put anything leftover on ebay. Just need to purge and get some money back instead of spending it - cough, cough!

I've got unworn shoes from here, Japanese craft books (mostly older ones that can't be bought on amazon anymore), and a bunch of other stuff. Should be fun.

Talking of spending - sweet Taeko informed me at our SNB on Tuesday night that you can now buy ADDIS in Japan - OMG! Not only that, she told me they are around 600 yen - LESS than half the price I paid in the US ($14.95 - ouch). I purchased (cough) 14 (cough) pairs yesterday, Please don't do the math. But as Rae and I talked about the other day - this kind of purchase is a total investment!! All of the larger sizes and popular cable lengths are sold out, but I only really wanted needles that are a size 5 and smaller as I use my Denise needles for larger projects anyway. I also bought a whole set of small circs with a whopping 60-inch cable. I figure I'll teach myself the magic loop technique. They are even selling addi circs with a THREE METRE cable - um, crazy.

You can buy the addis online in Japan at ASATSURU - they even have an English page - cute!

Oh, btw have any of you used a knitting thimble? They are sold out of the INOX ones but they look kind of handy.

Still on the topic of shopping, Fred Flare has done it again - they are selling one of a kind Amy Sedaris fake cakes. I really want one, but I'm going to try and resist (considering the purchase of 14 pairs of needles and did I mention the yarn I also bought yesterday.....). Anyway, you should totally get one thought (pink!, get the pink) and I'll be so jealous - they are also personally signed by Amy. I also love the Amy Sedaris pastry pouch - cute!

Man are we still on the topic of shopping. I just can't resist. It's kind of like my addiction to amazing tv like 'I Love New York'. It's produced by Ken Mok of ANTM fame - oh and did you know that's my last name too. I so wish we were related. As I told Claire I was a bit disappointed with the first episode, but man did it pick up this week with the mangeant (i.e. male beauty pageant).

I have plenty more things I want to chat about today, but um, I think I've written enough.

Aha!

I've worked out why winter and I don't mix. Having never grown up with winter, I now know that I'm not very good at coordinating winter fashion because I'm so worried about being warm. Any tips are welcome?

There are also just too many accessories (to lose that is) and extra wearable items. It's all so bulky and heavy.

Last week I lost my most ever favourite cashmere shawl that I take with me on every plane trip. It was a casualty of its own existence. It exists because of the cold and was lost because of the cold. Go outside with said shawl and my neck is oh so toasty, decide to go inside cute store, store heating too hot, take off said scarf, stuff it in too small bag, try on something, leave shop flustered because can't choose what to buy, still hot from store, get on train, get off train, start to walk home and realize it's a little chilly, reach for said scarf, scarf is no longer. feel sad.

This scenario has also happened with other winter accessories namely hats and gloves and ear muffs (which I forgot this morning because I didn't put them back in my bag after getting home last night). There is just too much room to forget stuff in the winter time.

Things I do like about winter are:

• colourful tights and leggings - shop of choice Tutuanna (yes, enjoy the socks style. Lovely day. Lovely socks.)
• cuddling for two reasons - fun and necessity
• rotenburo
• cockroaches go into hiding
• cuddling with our pigs

Other things I'm loving right now:

• Tsutaya Discas - Japan's version of Netflix. A few months ago when our tv died, we got rid of our satellite tv and just watched stuff on my computer. Now that we have a new tv (thanks suzy), we decided to try out Tsutaya Discas - we can rent 8 movies a month for 1974 yen. It's been fun so far. There are other options though. I might try out Posren, which is a similar service, but you can rent as many titles as you want each month for 2079 yen - they are also said to have the largest range of dvds in the business. You can try out Tsutaya Discas for a month for free and Posren for two weeks (but you can't rent new releases during either of the trials).
• Mag-Mart - this is an online magazine store in Japan that carries lots of foreign magazines at more reasonable prices than most bookstores (except maybe Tower Records). Their general range is OK (only two Australian mags and not the New Weekly which is what I would most want), but the BEST thing is that they carry some knitting mags not available at any bookstores in Japan: Interweave Knits (1365 yen), Rebecca (1900 yen) and Phildar in addition to Vogue Knitting (1281 yen) and Knit 1 (1120 yen). SWEEET! Shipping is 210 yen regardless of how many magazines you order. They just sent out my copy of the new Vogue Knitting. I am SO going to try my hand at modular knitting and knit the sweater on the front (shown below). Am thinking I'll have to add some length as I'm not sure how it'll work with a larger chest area than the model on the front. Oh and Daz, they don't have Thrasher or Slap, I already checked.
• The revamped menu at Village Vanguard Diner in Kichijoji.
• The organic food buffet at Warabe in Kichijoji.
• Jindaiji (as always) - a little piece of Kyoto right here in Tokyo.
• Hong Kong Yatai Shijo restaurant in Jindaiji - cheap, great atmosphere, open 24 hours, great food

Szechuan green bean dish - 500 yen

the interior

Sweet and sour pork

Nora Gaughan sweater I'm going to try my hand at.

Birthday Duck

Thanks for all the birthday wishes. Lucky for me it was a long weekend (this Monday was also a holiday) so I was able to celebrate for three days and even managed to have a semi-productive day on Monday (I cleaned up my clothes pile!). I've been pushing my birthday FORTNIGHT (why celebrate for one day when you can celebrate for two whole weeks) on Darin for a while. Unfortunately that all comes to an end tomorrow.

On the day of my birthday it was cold and it rained and it rained and it rained. I had plenty of plans but they all got thrown to the wayside and we ended up staying at home all day until 6:30. I was treated to coffee and cake in bed and I got the cutest present ever (I've named her teenie) from the best husband ever.Then Martine made my day by bringing over croissants, an awesome birthday present AND a birthday cake!! We sat around and ate and ate and we also watched Pretty Woman - the Director's cut (personally I couldn't tell the difference). So as you can see I had a great day regardless of the cold mean weather (especially when I usually celebrate my birthday in the middle of summer).

my cake (thanks again, Martine!)

The food didn't stop there. We headed to a great new Chinese restaurant we discovered recently - Chinese Cafe 8 with some friends. We went to the main branch in Roppongi but there is another one is Ebisu and one is opening soon in Akasaka. I consider myself a pretty good judge of Chinese food considering my parents have a Chinese restaurant. This place is great: it's open 24 hours, the food is cheap but delicious and their peking duck is devine (3860 yen for a whole bird).

When you order a whole duck, they bring it out to show you before cutting it up. My photo of the whole duck sucked but here is one of the cut up duck.

The decorations in the restaurant are somewhat intriguing. Yes it is what you think it is.

The company was also fantastic! Daz the mountain man - seriously he's made out of mountains.

C&J.

Ty, Sachi and Andrew

But it didn't end there. We ended up checking out another two izakayas before making it home in the wee hours of the morning. It's good to know that I can still party with the best of them :)

I want to write about three new restaurants we have discovered/rediscovered recently but I'll leave that until tomorrow. See you then!!

The year of 007!

Happy New Year!

Last year we had a tropical new years on the Great Barrier Reef but this year we went to the snow. If it's gonna be cold, it might as well be snowy and pretty. That's my logic anyway. We went to Nozawa Onsen in Nagano with our friends Tyler and Sachika. We knew you could ski there but didn't realize that it's predominantly a village for skiiers, so for the first day and a half we walked around envious of all the skiiers and pondered on how the beer and katsu curry must taste so much better after a physical day of skiing. So finally on New Year's Day we took the plunge and skiied all day. Darin snowboarded for the first time and being a skateboarder, he did really well.

I really recommend a trip to Nozawa. The tiny little village has plenty of cheap accomodation and good food. It also has 13 free hot spring baths - we managed to go to four different ones. It snowed the first day we were there.

so we soaked our feet in one of the ashi-yu (hot springs for feet)

the town has a travelator that takes you directly from the town to the ski fields - very convenient!

Hikage ski slope at Nozawa

we saw crazy tyres

saw some cute dogs

we went to almost the top of the mountain - it was truly a winter wonderland

tyler and daz after a hard day on the slopes

then there were snowball fights

my new hat kept me warm - I used a Japanese knitting pattern from this book. (This hat was knit entirely on the flight from Detroit to Tokyo - Darin had to massage my hands afterwards they were so sore).

And we soaked in the best outdoor hot springs that we've all ever been to - Maguse Onsen. Tyler took a lot of great photos from the men's bath (including one of him and darin naked - don't worry it's very classy, no bits can be seen!!) and supposedly lots of other men were too, but things were much more guarded at the women's onsen and I just took a few quick photos. The scenery was amazing and sitting outside in the snow in freezing temps naked but not cold at all is a whole other experience. Highly recommended.

we also ate lots of great local food - handmade soba, tons of nozawana (nozawa style-pickled vegetables) and these baby nagaimos - they are just like mini boiled potatoes - deelicious!

You can view all of our vacation photos here!!!

I hope everyone had a great new years. I didn't really make any resolutions. I hope to join runagogo and lose some of this holiday joy around my belly. Oh and today is my last day as a 31-year old and I take the plunge into the 32s tomorrow. It's going to be a great one!!