A Day at the Art Museum

On Sunday, we visited the Chihiro Art Museum located at Azumino city, about 40mins drive away from home. Our kind neighbour gave us two free entrance tickets to this highly recommended art museum.

This museum displays mainly works by Chihiro Iwasaki (1918-1974), one of Japan's best-known children picture book illustrators.


As many of her works were painted in watercolours or pencil sketched more than 40 years ago, some of the exhibits are replicas printed with the help of high technology printers to prevent further deterioration of the originals. I wouldn`t have noticed if the museum didn`t indicate the replicas as they look almost exactly like the original works.



I never knew much about this talented illustrator until visiting the museum today. Her style is beautiful in its simplicity and the soft innocence of the children portrayed in her works do charm my heart more than I have ever known.

The museum has a second location in Tokyo. I hope that we can visit it someday.

37 weeks

This week I'm officially 37 weeks pregnant which is considered full term. As I near the end of my pregnancy and my body is getting bigger than ever, (41kg --> 49.7kg!), I am getting excited to be so close to meeting our little one.

During the last checkup, the midwife advised me to walk for at least 2 hours every day for an easier labor. At this stage, I feel too heavy and uncomfortable to do much by myself so I really appreciate my husband for offering to walk an hour with me every night after dinner.


Next week at my appointment, the doctor will see how dilated and effaced my cervix is. Apparently it is not a very comfortable check but I have to deal with that somehow.

We've finished all our to-do things like cleaning the house, attended all the prenatal classes, and packed the hospital bag. We're almost ready. We're just waiting for our little baby now.

Wish us lots of luck!

Sunday lunch

Takashi and I dine out at least twice a week and have always been up for trying new restaurants. However with a baby arriving soon, we probably won`t have time or the extra cash for fine dining.

Last Sunday afternoon, we went to a Japanese-French bistro restaurant recommended by Takashi`s colleague. French cuisines are usually formal and expensive, but this restaurant was casual with no fancy truffles or fois gras. It was not exactly `French` because
1) food was served in Japanese pottery
2) we were supposed to eat with chopsticks only
3) we sat on a traditional tatami mat

Nevertheless, the dishes did not disappoint. Being heavily pregnant, I had the privilege of selecting the most expensive lunch course menu which had both the meat and fish options. Here`s a glimpse of what I`ve enjoyed.

Appetizer - Chicken pate rolled in ham


Seafood avocado salad


Carrot and onion cold soup


Pan Fried Suzuki Fish with vegetables


Grilled Japanese Beef


Banana ice cream with custard cream sponge cake & Green Tea Mousse


English Tea served in Japanese pottery

Cross-stitch

I have stopped baking breads recently due to water retention in my hands. My fingers are slightly swollen and I`ve lost the strength to knead the dough. It seems like there`s nothing much I can do about it except reduce salt intake and maintain a healthy diet.

Besides baking, I have been busy stitching since March and glad that I managed to complete before my fingers started aching.


Since I am stuck at home more often due to the cold weather and pregnancy insomnia, I was stitching during the day and every evening, to the point where I almost feel like I’m churning things out.

This one is for my kitchen. The border stitches were more tedious than expected. I spent 2 weeks on the borders alone. phew..


I stitched this Suzy Zoo picture for our new baby`s room. Love the cute design and the bright coloured threads used.