winter tea towel by claudia pearson

i'm a huge fan of the work of claudia pearson--maybe in part because it all looks so darn good on tea towels, which i also happen to love.

this one is in honor of winter and its vegetables.

lately i've been too busy to cook properly as much as i'd like, but i am scheming about how to cook more veggies for bento lunches i'd like to make for myself. we'll see.

eat your local veggies

i just discovered the amazing work of illustrator claudia pearson via design sponge.
claudia has an etsy shop full of wonderful goodies, including this buy local design above, and a coloring book version.
she also has done more food and veggie inspired work, like this print. i recommend you visit her website and shop and blog, it's all great.

these are part of a lovely series of bowls molded on vegetables by mischer'traxler, via craft.
the matching color is an great added touch!

and, if you are growing your own vegetables, susan at west coast crafty is giving away a copy of the sunset western garden book of edibles, and a copy of
growing vegetables west of the cascades. (this book is one of my absolute favorites, and a must have for any gardener in the pacific northwest, in my humble opinion). susan also did a review of these books for craft.

bright and green

i've been drawn to this fabric every time i see it, and now it's finally in the shop! i love the feeling of the print, somehow it reminds me of scandinavian textiles, and i love how the animals are abstracted. i think another reason why i like it so much is also the bright colors, especially all the green.
it's hard to be patient when it seems like spring is just around the corner...but hiding. and this year i'm so excited about my little garden which makes it that much harder to wait. but remember the mini sunflower kit i bought? they came up! actually now the leaves are fully open, but this picture is from last week. and it still kind of feels like magic, that moment when the first green appears from the ground.
since my strategy for my first garden in kyoto is simply to buy the starts when they are for sale, it's a surprise every time i go to the garden store. last weekend was eggplants and tomatoes already. the good thing is that everywhere here delivers, including big bags of potting soil and planters. the bad news is that i have to wait until friday...i hope these little guys can hang on for a few more days in their tiny pots. and today it even snowed while i left them outside on the balcony!
this strawberry (and the honey in the jar) came from the handmade market at kamigamo jinja on sunday.

ok spring, you can come out now!

gardens and caterpillers

i have plants on my balcony! parsly and oregano,

lettuce,
and rosemary! this weekend was warm and sunny, and the perfect time to start my balcony garden, which i've been day dreaming about for the last week or so.
i found this adorable mini-sunflower growing kit at a 100 yen shop last week,
and i love the look of these veggie growing containers from muji, just burlap covered plastic.

and here are the caterpillers! the very hungry caterpiller, that is. available on blue, in my shop.if you want to start your own plants from seed, there was feature by ashley on design sponge last week. having grown up in the country, with a whole room in our house that was full of seed starting trays for several months every spring, i've never been that careful with calculating or planning. and once i moved away to college, and started several new gardens at several new houses, i also learned to appreciate the easiness of working from starts. but now that i am starting a new container gargen in kyoto, i realize that i don't know the growning season here, or the microclimate on my south facing balcony. my strategy is pretty basic: 1) i'm going to quiz everyone i know who gardens, and 2) i'm going to just buy plants when the starts are sold, which is a pretty good indication that it's the right time to set them out. there is also a lot of container gardening here, and i'm excited to try out some local varieties and see what happens!

goal: healthy eating

these lovely cards are made by drenculture on etsy.

part of my healthy eating goals for 2010 are more vegetables (obviously!) especially now that i know how to make spinach with sesame dressing (yum). and japanese pumpkin is also easy to cook and delicious. along with eating more veggies is my goal of packing a lunch for work, which so far is going great.

in japan, there is a lot of importance placed on the first (of almost anything) of the new year, including the first dream of the new year. in order, it's lucky if you dream about the following: #1 mount fuji; #2 an eagle; #3 eggplant! i don't think i've ever had a dream about any of those things, but maybe one year i will have a lucky eggplant dream on jan 1. hee. hee.

this wonderful eggplant family with hats is by yara on flickr

and one more cutie: a handmade upcycled eggplant from nataliemae.

felt food follow up

here's the rest of my felt vegetables!

they were so fun to make...i blogged about beginning this project here.

all from this book: cute fruit and vegetables made of felt; more info here.

i wove a felt basket for them. i will post a tutorial for how to make the basket later this week, when i am making one for a different project...

i finished these last month, for a gift, and seeing these photos again makes me want to make even more!