Peacock Progress

Yes, I’m still working on this one and I am making progress. I’ve worked on the feet,

 

The crown,

 

And the face.

 

P.S. Ted revived his photography blog with a post yesterday. Check it out here.



Saturday or Funday?

 

We had a fun day in snowy Sapporo yesterday. It’s mid-March and there are cherry blossoms in other parts of Japan, but it is still winter in Hokkaido.

Sapporo is the largest city in Hokkaido and the fourth largest in Japan.
It’s kind of exciting to be able to find our way around the big city on public transportation, being illiterate and all.  Some things are in English, but addresses and directions are totally different than what we are used to in the US.  That’s a post for another day.

We traveled to Sapporo by bus, getting off near Odori Park, two blocks from the subway.  Since it was Saturday, we bought the all day subway ticket, which is available on weekends and holidays.

Our first destination was the art museum.  I had already seen the Ainu Arts and Crafts exhibit, but wanted to see it again and Ted wanted to see it too. Photographs were not allowed, unfortunately.

Next we went to Maruyama Koen and had lunch at a Chinese restaurant. We ordered the “lunch for two” and had to make lots of choices.

 

We ordered squid with celery and chicken with ginger sauce and cashews from the first category.

 

Shrimp wontons from the second. We both ordered shrimp in chili sauce for the main course.

Fried rice was next.

 

Chinese tea and mango custard finished the meal.

It was a bit more than we usually spend on lunch, but it was a lot of lunch and very delicious.  When you eat out in Japan, the price you see on the menu is the price you pay at the end.  You don’t have taxes and tip added on.

(2900 yen was the food, 680 was a beer)

After lunch we went to the zoo. We wanted to see the animals that were outside in the snow. The animal enclosures here are much smaller than we are used to in the US, but as a result, you get very close to the animals.

The snow owls probably think this weather is just for them.

The wolf pack consisted of four wolves.  The wind was blowing their fur and they seemed to like being outside in the snow.

The Hokkaido Bear was my favorite animal of the day. When we were at the zoo in the warm weather, he was hiding. When the bear saw Ted's camera bag next to the plexiglass, he ran up to it, like he thought it was a picnic basket of food. I’ve never been so close to such a monster of a bear.

 

 

 

 

We’ve seen polar bears other places, but this was probably the first time we ever saw a polar bear in real snow.

The penguins were so cute.  Several of them were at the edge of the water, like they were trying to decide whether they would go for a swim. Finally one dove in, but the others didn’t follow.

Splash!

It was dark when we made it to the bus station.

It was still snowing and blowing and the temperature had dropped, so the roads had gotten bad. It took a very long time to get back home, but we did make it home last night.  It was both Saturday and a fun day in Sapporo. Today will be funday Sunday and I'm going to stay home and stitch.

The Peacock's Tail

I start stitching before breakfast and only put it down at night when I’m too tired to continue working on it.  Blackwork is like that.  The repetition is soothing and the simplicity of using so few threads is appealing to my clutter-free, frugal nature.

Here’s what I’ve done with the peacock’s tail,

 

 

 

and the shadowy undertail.

 

Peacock Feather Eyes - That's All

TAST 58 Woven Detached Chain

This week’s stitch on Sharon B’s Pintangle blog is woven detached chain.  Here are my samples.  The black is done with perle #5, the grey is perle #8, the blue is perle #12, the light green is three strands of floss, and the darker green is done with soy luster.  I continued with the soy luster to make a vine (whipped stem stitch) with five leaves.

I can use a lot more practice with this one.  It's important to keep the tension even on the "leaves", otherwise there are lumply edges.

Blackwork Peacock Start

The Blackwork Peacock is a Tanja Berlin design and is one of my 2013 New Year’s Resolution projects.  At the Louisville EGA National Seminar, I took the Blackwork Pheasants class with Tanja.  I finished it and had it framed in 2010.

I purchased the Kingfisher and Peacock blackwork kits and have been wanting to work on them for some time now. Since I acquired the Peacock before the Kingfisher, I decided to work on the Peacock first. The first step is to trace the design outline on to tissue paper and baste it to the 32 count fabric with red sewing thread. After basting, the tissue paper is removed.  The red thread provides the outline of the areas to be filled with blackwork and will be removed later.  The project uses DMC black floss, DMC black #12 perle cotton, and four colors of Kreinik #4 very fine braid.

 

I’ve worked on the wing,

 

The shadow under the wing,

And the neck and stomach.

 

I like the evenness and the repetition of blackwork.  I can hardly wait to get back to work on this today.

Miwako's Dinner

In Japan, the school year goes from April to March, so the school year is ending.  The university’s graduation is next week and our friend Miwako is a graduating textile artist.  We invited her to come over for a celebration dinner. Miwako and I stitched while Ted prepared a delicious dinner.

 

We had a sparkling wine toast before enjoying Ted’s secret recipe fish and brown rice with vegetables, followed by a crème puff with fresh strawberries.

Our stitching consisted of me working on my blackwork peacock and Miwako working on some beaded earrings that she finished before going home.  It was a most enjoyable evening. Congratulations Miwako and best wishes for the future!