Wasn't Expecting That

I watched the Japanese movie Tapestry because it featured two actors I really like: Masaki Suda, who is brilliant no matter what role he plays, and Nana Komatsu, whose subtle skills and luminous presence put her in a class of her own. I don't often enjoy Japanese dramas, but for once I was pleasantly surprised. This is a lovely film about a romance that spans eighteen years.

Masaki plays Ren Takahashi, who by literally an accident meets Aoi Sonoda (played by Komatsu) during a fireworks show. Both are 13 years old and have grand ambitions for their lives, but instantly fall for each other. Aoi comes from a very troubled home, however, and ends up abruptly moving. After learning she's being regularly beaten by her mother's lover, Ren runs away with her for a night, after which the police find and separate them. Their lives continue on different paths but they meet again at mutual friends' wedding at age 21. Although it's obvious that they still have feelings for each other, they separate again, and don't meet until the present, when they're 31.

Tapestry packs a lot of very realistic living into 130 minutes while illustrating the three eras in Ren and Aoi's lives. Although there's always a sense of something's gone wrong in the characters' situations, they do an admirable job of carrying on with life under the worst circumstances. By the time they're reunited at age 31 I thought "And now one of them dies" because, you know, Japanese drama. I'll just say that this is when the pleasant surprise happened.

This movie does briefly depict child abuse, and although I thought it was done well, it may be triggering for some. Highly recommend it otherwise. Available on Viki.com.

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Downsizing

This was my fabric stash once I sorted everything -- 22 full bins. I spent a day taking out and boxing up what I could part with, with the goal of trying to reduce it by half, so I'd have 11 bins. I was very strict with myself, and removed everything that for one reason or another I was sure I wouldn't be able to use. This is what I ended up with -- 12 bins of fabric that I'm keeping. It's not quite half, but close enough. Half of what I took out went to a local quilter friend, a school and Goodwill. These four tightly-packed bins will be going to the local quilting guild once I make arrangements with them for a drop-off place. I am relieved and a little sad and now determined to control my impulses to thrift more fabric. I don't want to do this again, so until I use up six bins, I can't for any reason bring any new fabric into the house.

In Progress

I promised myself I would show you the good, bad and ugly of my cleaning this year. This is what it looks like when you dump thirty years' worth of stashed fabric on the floor -- and oy, what a pain in the butt to pick up again! This is what it looks like after it's been sorted, folded and placed in containers, which took me about a week. Now the hard part is to downsize my stash by at least half, I think (that's my goal, anyway.) I've already e-mailed the president of the local quilting guild, a local friend who is a quilter, and a public school art teacher I know to see if I can donate some of the excess to them. The rest will go to Goodwill. Already I've reduced my vintage textiles from two bins to one, and my scraps from three bins to one. It's probably the hardest clean-out I've done, which is why I saved it until last. I know I have too much fabric, more than I can use in my lifetime -- but at the same time, I love it. So I have to

Other Stashes

Along with clearing out the spare bedroom and tidying my office and our guest bedroom, I decided to reorganize some of my stashes. This is all the yarn I have on hand, sorted by color. It looks like a lot, but lately I've been using up a minimum of half a bin every month, so this is approximately a year's supply. All of my solid color cotton perle thread. I go through a lot of this every year, too. I need a container in which I can fit all of it together, but I haven't found the right one yet. I won't show you all of my fabric -- I'm still reorganizing this stash -- but I went through everything and donated two bins of fabric I won't need to the local quilter's guild.

Valerean

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