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Farmpark Koi Nobori
Today I participated in a children’s festival at the newly opened Soil to Soul Farmpark. The weather was perfect, there was a huge turnout and 23 people made koi nobori at my stall. I sold almost all the large fish and about half the small ones, which was opposite of what I guessed I’d do.…
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How an Artist Builds a Fence
Engineers, please do not read. In my imagination and vision, the patio still has some tasks to accomplish. One of them is putting up a fence to wall off the garden compost pile (formerly Gomi-yama #2) from the sitting area. A fence would make a visible end to the space and also provide a background…
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Family, photos?
Tod’s mom, Jeanie, and her husband, Tim, are visiting us. They were last here in 2018 but it seems like hardly any time has passed. Our days have been packed with activities that I have enjoyed so much I have forgotten to take pictures. But here is a daily log of highlights since their arrival…
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Stripey Tiles
The Tiles Mines have finally yielded a finished product at 555! For the last two weeks, in between rainy days, Sakaguchi-san has been coming over to lay the tiles I laid out in stripes in November. Yes, they sat there for six months before anything happened to them. My plan was creative and complicated. The…
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28 hours in Aomori
Yesterday I got on a plane for the first time since September 2019. I flew north to Aomori for work with Rob and CCJC. I was called in at the last minute to assist on a video shoot for the launch of Coca Cola’s new Ayataka tea products. My key task was driving, but I…
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Cutting grass, inaka style
Recently, I started hearing the buzz of kusukari-ki, our pared-down country lawnmowers, around the valley. I took it as a clear sign that grass cutting season had arrived. Last year I made a mistake and started cutting the jungle at 555 in March…several weeks before everyone else. That meant I trimmed back flowers and forage…
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Extending birthday week
I was wrong; birthday week wasn’t actually over. We had one final cake last night at dinner with friends. What a blast! P.S. Naomi said I look like “old Peko-chan” which made me laugh. I do look like her and I definitely have Peko-chan’s desire for sweets!
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Ending Birthday Week
It’s the cats’ birthdays today. Mine was yesterday. Birthday week is now over. Fritter and Maura were born five years ago. Facebook shared a memory with me today – a 25 second video of Three licking infant Maura clean. Little did she know she’d be doing that thrice more for Futatsuyama, Calico #3 (later Isabella…
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Birthday flowers
A log of what’s blooming today, a love letter to the plants 555, and a birthday gift to myself of walking around outside at dawn with with a cup of coffee and a camera. Before I even leave the house, I see flowers from the windows. The late-blooming camellia in the front garden is going…
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Package design
When I was a younger woman, I was fascinated by package design. I loved the way cardboard boxes could be fashioned in surprising ways to safeguard their contents. Tetrapacks were lovely little puzzles which I finally solved; see my Tetrapocket pattern from 2006. I seriously considered a degree in industrial and package design. In my…
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