Kompadre Krafting

This weekend was a whirlwind of crafting activity (from which I am just now recovering), and I was joined in my adventures by my lovely creative kompadre, L.  Mr. Kaizer was gone for most of Sunday afternoon, so L and I were able to spread out in the dining room and get down to business with some serious cutting and sewing.  L and her boyfriend K (the charming duo with the silk screening setup) will be sharing a booth with us at Ueda Joint.  Aside from producing some stellar t-shirts for the event, L had some great ideas for accessories – you’ll have to wait if you want to hear more about the specifics of what she’s creating.

I do have to show you a little bit, though.  I mean, look at the colors she is using.  They’re fantastic.  Plus, she is using ricrac.  Is it possible that a project with ricrac in it won’t turn out well?  I doubt it.

The thing that really gets me, though is that she found all her wonderful fabrics at Yuzawaya.  It’s the same store I go to.  It’s not the same branch, but the idea with national chains is that you can find the same things at any location.  That’s kind of how they work.  But the thing is, I’ve either never seen the fabrics she is using, or I’ve seen them but walked right past them.  It really is remarkable how easily we can get sucked in to routine in a store and stop seeing the boundless possibilities behind everything.  At what point did I stop looking upon the contents of Yuzawaya as a source of inspiration and start to view it as an obstacle course to be navigated while in pursuit of one specific item?

I think there is only one solution to this: I must return to Yuzawaya when I do not have a specific project I am working on and just spend half a day wandering around.  The difficulty, of course, comes from trying to find a time when I have half a day to kill and no projects in the works.

Getting to see all of L’s goodies did remind me of a wise decision I had made many months ago – avoid the ribbon and trim section of the store.  When it comes to things this lovely I have absolutely zero self control.  L wisely kept her marvelous ribbons and laces out of sight, but I did manage to ogle this ribbon as it was being sewn onto a piece of fabric during the early stages of product assembly.  Absolutely wonderful.

Tomorrow I should have pictures of my own progress to share with you.  Until then:

May life continue to inspire you,

Miss Kaizer

Oodles of Supplies

On Thursday Mr. Kaizer and I went shopping for supplies at Yuzawaya, the seven-floor Tokyo crafting mecca.  Ueda Joint, a weekend long jazz festival in the Nagano area,  is coming up at the end of the month and we’re going to have a booth.  So it’s in to super-sewing mode for the aroma healing pillows, children’s tote bags, appliques, and a few other items that I will reveal later.  While I’m in the office, Mr. Kaizer has been cutting all the fabric for me between his conference calls.  Such a fantastic guy!

So, what lovely things did we acquire on our trip?  I thought you’d never ask!

For the tote bags:

I’m using the adorable Hello Kitty fabric again.  It’s just too cute to not use it.  I wanted to get some more of the dinosaur fabric, but they were all out.  I have to start checking other Yuzawaya branches to see if I can find some more.  But we also got Shinkansen (bullet train) fabric for the boys with a bright green contrasting fabric.  I plan to make a cute little train applique for it as well.  For my second girls fabric I got multicolored polka-dots on grey (as suggested by Miss Tanya – thanks Tanya!).  I couldn’t decide which of the contrasting fabrics looked best with the polka-dots, so I’m going to do some of each.  I’ve already made a panda applique to go on this one.  I mean, who doesn’t like pandas?

For the aroma healing pillows:

We got a wide variety of colors in the traditional Japanese asa no ha fabric.  It’s a stylized interpretation of the hemp leaf that was popular in the Edo Period (1603-1868).  It was most often used for baby blankets and clothing for children so they could grow up fast and strong like the hemp plant.

We also picked up some nice purple linen with polkadots, clover and ladybugs, and some checkered cotton with little country girls on it.  They remind me of characters from a Ghibli movie, but when I said so Mr. Kaizer he shook his head like I was nuts.

The floral fabrics we picked up are extremely soft.  We think all of these fabrics will do very well at the festival.  Right now, I cant’ stop touching them.  I love fabric!

Other goodies:

Most expats in Japan are working here as English teachers.  (Ok, I should clarify that most expats from English speaking countries are working here as teachers.  And that isn’t a statistic or anything, it’s my guess.)  I first taught English when I came here and many of the Kaizer Kompadres are English teachers.  They’re actually very good English teachers, and provide a quality learning experience for the children in their classes.

Where is this going, you ask?  Well, I have been asked to make bean bags.  Gloriously multicolored, differently shaped, fun for tossing, learning colors, and learning shapes beanbags.  You may be thinking that beanbags aren’t that big of a deal.  But guess what?  It’s my first commissioned project! I’ve been hired to make something for someone else.  Happy dance…happy dance…happy dance…  Ok, I’m done.  But look at those colors.  They’re fantastic.

Of course, I had to get the thread to go along with all this new fabric.  Reminds me of a box of crayons.  Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have some SERIOUS sewing to do!

May life continue to inspire you,

Miss Kaizer