This month. Man, oh man. Is there anyone out there who loves February? The Christmas and New Year’s high is gone; we’ve stopped going to the gym and given up on nicotine patches and regular bedtimes. Valentine’s Day brings either anxiety or bitterness, sometimes both. Though the winter solstice is past, why is February the darkest month? February sucks.

I’ve had a bad case of the Februarys as I do every year. I caught a wicked cold, stopped cooking, skipped taiko and aikido (see “wicked cold”), started watching really awful TV shows online, and gave up on living in anything but squalor. Speaking of terrible TV, if you ever think to yourself, “I wonder what the Brits have done with the legend of Robin Hood lately?” I urge you to squash that thought like a bug. It’s horrifically bad.

Last Sunday I got a boost. Though the sermon at church was not related to productivity or taking care of one’s things—it was about the beatitudes—I came home ready to make goals. I didn’t, but I was ready. I also did nothing on Monday, but I sure thought about it. Today I awoke with vim and vigor, ready to tackle my Februarys by washing dishes, hanging up clothes, and organizing my beads [over the course of the next three days].

Having my Internet give up the ghost (or go into a coma) put a damper on the spirit, especially since I a lot to prepare for school that involved finding pictures. Most of my Monday was dedicated to finding ways around that hindrance, but I did start a rag rug to keep my little piggies warm while I practice piano. I was going off of the tutorial on the Little House in the Suburbs blog (the only one I could find that didn’t involve sewing or giant crochet hooks) and trying to make it ovoid, but it mostly ended up looking like fabric naan.

After weeks of zero jewelry making I cranked out two pieces that might never make it to the Etsy shop, I like them so much.

Number One: cracked glass rondelles with violet felt and sterling silver saucers (not visible at these angles) and a sterling hook and eye clasp (see “not visible”)

Also, I cooked. One of my New Year’s resolutions was to cook for myself twice per week, and I’ve been fairly consistent in keeping that resolve alive. During those weeks when I was sick I ignored the goal, but with nothing ready to eat in my house except marshmallows and a lime I reckoned it was time I renewed my cooking habit. My rice cooker is my new favorite tool; I can steam vegetables or make a jambalaya-style one-pot meal. Luckily I had a red bell pepper, black pepper sausage, and an onion ready to be used, so I threw those and a beef bullion cube in with an unmeasured mount of rice. The result is tasty, if a little salty. I add roughage by shoving a package of baby leaf in my mouth like a crazy rabbit.

*The voice of resentment.

- Posted from my iPad

In that long week of no computer whilst you pined for an update, here’s what happened on my side.

Christmas. It was surprisingly busy; I partied like a fiend. Which is to say that I ate out a lot with many of the same people. Look, I have friends on Christmas Eve.

Admittedly, most of this dinner was about Kim-Chi’s new haircut. We have the same hairdresser, hence this picture. See how I’m smizing so hard?

I finished the fruits on my mural with crayon. Why had I ever thought that using Posca paint pens was the best way to go? Done learned my lesson. Now all that remains is to turn these random circles into a fruit tree. I might break out my old calligraphy brush for this job.

My chopstick light fixture was coming apart because I kept hitting it with things. I figured it was high time I redid it, and maybe made it look less cock-a-hoop. Geometry or a degree in architecture might have really shortened this process, because it took me four hours and a lot of Christmas music to figure out that I would never be able to remake the bird nest structure with the giant fluorescent bulbs in the way. I settled for a more modern Japanese aesthetic. Materials: Kitchen paper, hot glue, chopsticks.

Additionally I remade the old light fixture into a crown. My computer was in the shop. I was bored.

I bought a new camera, completing one goal on my Projects list. I’ve been saving for an Olympus Pen E-PL1 ever since I saw it over on the Cozy Little Cave blog; although it helped a lot that there are two newer models. Blogging regularly about life in Japan, trying to sell jewelry online, and having dropped my previous camera in a koi pond all contributed to this decision, but I think part of that choice was to hold myself back from buying a different expensive toy that I didn’t really need just yet, like an iPad or a new computer. Never a shutterbug, I feel awkward just pulling it out and snapping shots of my friends and it’s real Japan winter now which means I don’t run around outside very much. What I’m saying is that all I’ve had to photograph is my messy apartment and myself. Even when I’m just playing with the art settings and aperture [like how I drop that in there, like I know what it means?] snapping dozens of photographs of myself is both narcissistic and depressing. To whom am I going to show these pictures? “This is me on the pinhole setting. Now here’s me in the same pose but in sepia. Same pose, but can you see that I’m smiling with my eyes? That’s the portrait setting so my pores are really obvious. Ah, from here on my hair’s in my face because the angle makes my forehead look huge. Doesn’t everyone, meaning me, look better in Grainy Film setting?” I did take a picture of some of the chocolates I was eating in bed. This is the Pop Art setting.

New Year’s happened. I was at home and in bed (with my new camera) by 9:30 p.m. on December 31^st. On January 1^st Nanami came over to feed me the best of traditional osechi left over from her family’s lunch. She was more excited about my camera than I was; as soon as I handed it over she started snapping shots of my apartment, explaining, “It’s your memory,” when I asked why I needed a picture of my dirty dishes. I said my itadakimasu and dug into the special New Year’s dishes. Amazing how readily I ate congealed fish eggs covered with fish flakes, and popped soy-soaked jako into my mouth without a second thought for the eyes that stared balefully at me from the dish. The ham is not tradition—it was a gift from business associates.

This picture is a twofer. In the background are the fruits of my labor mural and on Nanami’s head is my light fixture cum crown. When I make a short film about the queen of a ghost town in the Oklahoma panhandle, the props department will be ready. In the meantime there’ll be a weird chopstick twig hat sitting around my living room.

Okay, you guys, I need help. This is a cardboard elephant from Muji that I put together after I finished the chopstick light.

I feel that it needs paint. I have sky blue, silver, and white spray paint at my fingertips (not right now, per se. Figuratively) but a big part of me wants to make it a rainbow. Too childish? Or I could go with my favorite royal purple.  You’ve seen pictures of my apartment. Help me out.

Lastly, there is no change on the computer front. According to the apologetic Genius Bar supervisor, the reason only 1/3 of my laptop screen works is because of a mysterious liquid that has attacked and destroyed the blah blahs inside. Japan is very humid. It happens. We have to change the cost. So, instead of the original three Benjamins repair price it would have cost me seven. Nevermind, Apple Store. Never you mind.

I am without a home computer without further notice. Last night I took mine to the Apple store in Shinsaibashi to get the display fixed. Weirdly enough, the same guy from my last trip to the Apple store helped me out. Dear Ingen told me that because of the holiday rush (New Year’s is bigger than Christmas in Japan) the repairs would take seven to ten days. City Hall will close from tomorrow through January 2nd, so I’ll have only my iPod to keep me connected online. In a way I’m looking forward to it. I’ll read some books or play some music. Constant internet access is my biggest distraction; who knows, perhaps the upcoming days of disconnect will spur me to knock off a few of my goals on ye old Projects! list.

Anyone else gone computer-less in these modern times?

“Revenge” is a borrowed word in Japanese, one that I occasionally hear in class. If a student answers a question incorrectly but retries later in the class, s/he will often raise a hand with a declaration of “Ree-BEN-gee!” Were I to give them a more accurate translation of the sentiment, all my students would be shouting, “For my honor! Redemption!” I wrote earlier about my troubles with gingerbread. The mere thought of that day can make my blood boil with the fires of righteous indignation. As you may remember I ended that blog entry with a declaration of war. Or just one to make real gingerbread houses. Same thing. Either way, with Christmas right around the corner the time for my revenge drew nigh.

That goal was not without its hurdles. No molasses, different candies, lofty goals, laziness; I needed motivation. Nothing like a party chez moi to get me going. It was a casual affair. I sent out a curmudgeonly Facebook invite to the folk nearby, something to the effect of “I ain’t gonna feed ya, but you can come to my apartment Tuesday evening to slap together a ginger-flavored shanty town. Get out before 11 o’clock rolls around.”

Thanks to an all-day taiko practice on Sunday and spending only about 40 waking minutes in my home on Monday, I had to rush home and throw the gingerbread dough together after work on Tuesday. Which is to say that I had to go home, wash a bunch of dishes to use for baking. Then I loaded up some classical Christmas music, tapped Aunt Blah blah’s Gingersnaps on Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything app (it’s my go-to cookbook), and started cooking.

I had purchased kurozato shiroppu (black sugar syrup) as a substitute for molasses. It tastes almost exactly like molasses, but is a little thinner in consistency. I didn’t think it would be a problem until I noticed how grainy the butter/sugar/syrup mixture was. Something about the altitude and humidity level in Kameoka makes all of my baked goods turn out very flat if I follow the recipe exactly. As soon as I saw what had happened to the butter mix I knew I’d be throwing in some extra flour. I’m sure that it didn’t help that I accidentally melted a third of what was supposed to be softened butter. I say that’s neither here nor there, and you should say the same because it’s Christmas.

I did add plenty of extra flour, and possibly should have added more because the dough was pretty sticky. Gingerbread dough is supposed to chill for at least an hour before cutting. No problem. I shoveled the dough onto some plastic wrap, pressed it into a vague cheese wheel shape, and threw it in the freezer. I reckoned that 30 minutes should give me time to run out and get some more supplies for apple cider and royal icing.

Finally I was ready to cut the dough. Thanks to this blog I had templates and basic instructions for tiny gingerbread houses. I had laminated the templates at the office to keep them from sticking too much to the dough. Unfortunately I discovered that my 30 minutes was not sufficient for such a thick wheel of dough, and was forced to return it to the freezer. Had I but known, I would have frozen the dough in small rounds. It took nearly an hour to chill sufficiently and even then I had to return it to its frosty home as soon as I had rolled and cut a portion.

Cutting out the pieces was a tedious and inexact process. Most of the lopsidedness in the following photos is due to my inability to cut things properly, thereby providing my adventuresome guests with lopsided materials. After one, just one, try with cutting out doorways I gave up. More curmudgeonliness—I ain’t carving out no rootin’ tootin’ doors. Do ‘em yer dang selves. With icing. Or candy. I don’t give a whoop.

Martha Stewart’s website suggested using a caramel syrup to fasten the pieces together instead of royal icing because it dries much more quickly. I agree that it makes a better mortar and is vegan-friendly, but since the syrup must be used while fresh off the stove it makes for a dangerous tool. One sage soul compared it to being burned by a glue gun, and as a victim of the sticky stuff I agree. Be warned.

Kim-Chi, Lars Martinson Cartoonist, and senior high ALT/resident Irishman Jack all arrived first, followed not long after by Margaret. I served hot cider, gave basic instructions (do it yerselves!) and the mostly left them to their own devices. Jack, Kim-chi and Margaret worked together to create what Jack termed “the Shire” but what I’m calling the Shire Shanty Town.

Also, nameless members of the group who were not sick-of-cookies-thanks-to-grandma Lars ate a few of the pieces intended for house construction, so they got creative and used some Japanese snacks instead. I’m not sure why the Shire has a church spire, but I certainly don’t object to it. Jesus is the reason for the season, yo.

Later in the evening Dara and Nanami showed up to try their hands at home building. Dara found the burn potential of the caramel syrup frightening, and to stuck to the slower-drying royal icing. She was convinced that she had failed on some level, but I assured her that a shanty town had been the goal all along (K-C and I spent a fair amount of time trying to find pictures of gingerbread shanty towns from behind the City Hall firewall). I tried to help her make a lean-to, but didn’t want to detract from her artistic vision.Nanami, ever the artist, made three different structures.

She made a stable (the one she’s pretending to eat), and then found some rectangular chocolate candies that I had been using as pebbles. She attached them to the base of the structure, declaring, “Uma no unko house.”

That would be the “horse poop house.”

Here are the two creations that I worked on throughout the evening:

It’s what the evil witch’s house looked like right after Hansel and Gretel had set it on fire during their escape. That wasn’t my intention, but after those cola gumdrops on the roof there was no saving it. I did better the second time around.

The best part is definitely the tree in the back, which is made from Japanese snack cookies and not gingerbread whatsoever. Still, I am pleased. I’m glad I bought those pumpkin seeds, after all.

I wrote about how my complete lack of Christmas spirit had taken a turn for the festive. I did not, however, provide evidence to back my words. Here’s your pudding. The proof is after the jump.Last year I made a Christmas tree from origami paper, but it was small and not particularly inspiring. This December I was determined to do one better, but for free. Did I have green construction paper? Nope. Green origami paper? No, used that all on Tree of 2010.

I had giant white construction paper, double-sided tape, weak metallic tape, and brown wrapping paper. Well, you know what they say about necessity. Here’s her offspring, or at least the birthing process:

The top of the tree, and the point when I realized I needed geometry.

The point when I ran out of paper…

but managed to use the leftover pieces to my advantage.

Wrinkling packing paper is an old teacher/VBS trick for making vines for jungle/Garden of Eden decorations.

This was one of the most tedious parts of the process.

Even with the star in place and the lights hung, it didn’t look complete.

For ornaments I used a technique learnt from dear Kim-Chi. You can learn it here. I made three before I looked at the clock and realized that it was past my bedtime.

Lights off.

Lights on, before the blinking starts!

Only after the tree had been up for a couple of days did I remember that I had inherited a pack of green construction paper, enough to line my walls. Oops. I took a look at the tree I had already made, cut up a couple of green papers to see if I could work them in around the edges, and gave up. Meh. I did spend an action movie marathon making a paper chain. It is as yet unfinished; I’ve at least The Girl Who Played With Fire to watch while I tape origami paper together.

Ergo, to be continued…

Let me first assure you that I’ll spin no yarns about my genius. I can’t chain it down; my genius comes and goes at will. Let me second assure you that I’ve already exhausted my stock of jewelry puns for this post. Wait, I almost forgot one: As soon as I get a bead on where I’m going with these puns I’ll move on to the next paragraph.

That bit about my genius is true, for the record. It is the will-o-the-wisp of attributes, I do declare. I’ll go for a month without making a thing, and then churn out seven new pieces in a week or two. That week or two is usually devoid of social interaction, and once the well of inspiration/jewelry supplies runs dry I emerge from my invariable squalor and start being friends with folk again.

As is likely evident from both my Internet absence and I Japan Go roller coaster of emotion, October was a tough month for me. I was really sick of being a foreigner, I was tired of teaching, completely over getting up before 7:00 (I’ve never been “under” getting up before then, anyway), done with my inability to communicate in Japanese and fed up with my illiteracy. I can’t say that I’m over this phase of culture fatigue, but I’m working on it. A gym is the thing which is joined by me, so progress.

Though it was terrible for my apartment and diet, October and November 1st-9th was great for Petunkalunka. Inspired by a custom piece for my jewelry muse and some of the mistakes natural elements in the Indian Summer necklace, I made two new beaded fringe necklaces using the regular yarn I mentioned in the Yeti Yarn post.

[Pause for unrelated "Tears of a Clown" dance break.]

Also, why is everyone so crazy for felt? I like the stuff, and enjoyed the felt storyboards of Noah’s Ark and Zacchaeus up in the tree while in Sunday School. I made a weird forest gnome costume with the stuff for Halloween two years ago. Everywhere I look online is felt this, felted that. Ooh, a felted sculpture of something useless! Yay, felt slippers! Huzzah, felted sweater panties! I mean, felt’s nice and all, but I can’t see it being…wait, shut up, it’s coming to me. Oh, yep, there it is, a font of ideas for jewelry that looks cozy and classy all at once. Blammo.

Now I have to price them and write cheesy descriptions for it all. I’m still struggling with setting the price so that it isn’t too scary, but at least breaks even on cost (especially for those fringe necklaces. Oh, the hours of labor). Yelch’s Boring Juice. But hey, I’m back on the radar.

Back in September I was buying embroidery thread when I ran across the craft section bargain bin. I don’t knit or crochet, so there was really no good reason for me to buy six skeins of yarn. I thought a finger-knit necklace with some beaded fringe detail would be the cat’s pajamas. Plus, the same length of chain would have cost about 2,000 times as much, so I’d be saving my [four] customers money. I used to make friendship bracelets and hemp necklaces, so I knew a tiny bit of macrame technique. I’m from Oklahoma. The Great Depression and its drought has left my people a culture of bargain shopping and hoarding* for emergency’s sake. What I’m telling you is that overconfidence in my own creativity and problem solving skills led to what still might turn out to be a foolish purchase. But 50 yen a skein? Give it here.

As you can see above, I bought two types of yarn. There’s the regular stuff, and then there’s this shaggy business that looks like it might have been spun through a shredder. I thought it would add some much needed texture to some simpler pieces. Hah hah. Oh, hah hah hah. Younger Laurel, if only you knew what I know now.

In my stash of semiprecious stones I had some dragon vein agate. I was convinced that they would look fabulous with this weird yarn, so I made a long necklace with finger knit chain. See the results below.

I wore it once on a test run. It was clunky, awkward, and I received zero comments (that’s how sensitive friends tell you you’re wearing something hideous). Moreover I quickly realized that a textile would not hold it’s shape under the weight of stone. It would seem like common sense, sure, but the thought really didn’t cross my mind.

I still think the two together look fabulous, but suck as a necklace.

During one rare day when my jewelry muse and I were at the office at the same time I explained my issue to her. Three skeins of shaggy yarn, much of it I had wasted on failed projects. I drew a sketch of the yarn and she nodded.

“Okay, I know exactly what you mean,” she said. No surprise there, she can knit and crochet well. “Can you make it look like a Bigfoot?”

I cocked an eyebrow, laughing, “Like a yeti? Like an abominable snowman?”

“Yeah.”

So I tried to do exactly that.

The above I made because I was still in love with the fringe idea. Jewelry Muse agrees that it looks like a yeti that lives in an adobe. Below is the piece in which I finally use these beads whose name and specific origin (a Chinese factory, I reckon) I no longer recall. They look like globes. Sadly, they’re enough of a statement that I find it hard to integrate them into my pieces without loosing my style. I think this necklace does them justice.

I’m working on other pieces at the moment, but I’ll return to the yeti yarn soon. I could make a bracelet to mach the Yeti Eyes necklace. There’s an untouched skein of cranberry pink to play with. I’m teaching myself how to make a monkey fist knot, which would make some pretty sweet earrings, no? Yes? No?

*My grandmother, born in 1910, used to save Cool Whip containers to use in place of Tupperware. To this day I don’t trust that a tub of whipped topping in someone’s fridge isn’t full of leftover mashed potatoes and gravy or pistachio pudding.

Miz Creatrix of CreatrixCommunications.com interviewed me about my Etsy shop and it’s up for all the world to see. She was a wonderful interviewer; it was clear that she took the time to read through my blogs. Her questions really made me think! So check it out or die trying. You have your orders.

Creatrix of the Moment: Petunkalunka—Joyful Jewellery Designer

to Bring You Life

I’m still working on two “You Can Wear It With This” posts, one for last week and one for this week. Plus, I’m working on the stories behind the Yeti Eyes necklace and the Elegant Breast Cancer Awareness necklace. October is a busy month in Japan. I’m doing my best to keep up with this website, teaching, and my other activities. Wish me luck.