tomorrow, tomorrow... off to Japan

Tomorrow, tomorrow... (in the words of "Annie")... I'll be heading back to Japan. This visit will be mostly vacation, versus most of my Japan travels which are filled with research and interviews. I am very excited

This quilt above is one of my favorites and I love to look at it as I head back to the place where all this vintage cotton fabric came from. I'm also about to take my 2nd tour of Mt. Fuji. I feel so blessed to be living this life!

Stay tuned for lots of travel blog posts on all the latest adventures in textiles and quilts from Japan.

1. I'll be attending the BRAND NEW Quilt Time Festival in Yokohama.

2. I am going to see an invitational quilt exhibit sponsored by Japan Handicraft Instructors Association (JHIA) - this will be a best-of-the-best display and I'm really looking forward to it.

3. Heading back to my favorite temple market in Kyoto and plan to purchase all the vintage textiles that I can afford (and carry)!

Timing for this trip is also perfect for me since I just finished a massive new book project (as you saw in my last post). Over the past year, I've been getting around 10 or so important emails every day in response to my research questions and I'd spend days and days incorporating this new information into the manuscript. Towards the end of this project, the emails were coming fast and furious and all day long I was culling the info and making the final edits.  A writer's work is very solitary and tedious, usually slow going, but it can also be stressful ... especially right before a deadline. So now that the deadline has been met, the emails have trickled to zero. Its so strange. The only people who are communicating with me are the click bait ones. So this is the perfect time to go on vacation!

Zero emails and time on my hands.

Teresa Duryea Wong. White Rain. Antique Japanese cotton. White cotton sashiko thread. Hand stitched. 2016.