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October 30, 2016

Happy Halloween

普段は西部劇の映画村なテーマパークが、10月の間はお化け屋敷テーマパークとなります。夜6時開園、夜中12時閉園。やっと涼しくなってきた気持ちの良い夜でした。

Went to a western movie theme park that opens as a Halloween theme park during October.

October 23, 2016

Letting Her Go

アパート暮らしで収納場所が限られているので、いろいろと持ち物の見直しをしています。

書類箱の整理中、エコーをもらってきたレスキューグループの記録カードを見つけました。
エコーが虹の向こうに旅立ってもう4年。エコーの獣医さんの記録は以前処分したんだけど、この記録カードは、エコーの最初の記録なのでなんとなく捨てられず、とっておいたんだな。
頑張ってバイバイしました。
Before we got our blue healer, we had a greyhound. She came from a greyhound rescue group and before that she was a greyhound racer. Her racing name was Amazeme Mackie. She crossed the rainbow 4 years ago.

 
While I was organizing our document box (apartment dwelling does not allow having too much "stuff"), I came across her old kennel card from the rescue group.
I had already discarded her vet records but I kind of kept these cards because they were her original documents when she came to us.
Time to let her go.

October 12, 2016

Wearing My Dirndl

ドイツのミュンヘンで毎年開かれるビールの祭典、オクトーバーフェストでは、ほとんどの人がこの地方の民族衣装であるディアンドル(女性用ドレス)とレーダーホーゼン(男性用革製半ズボン)を着ています。
夏祭りに8割がた浴衣な感じ。
だから作ったのよ、ディアンドル。
日本人がディアンドル着ていいのか、っていうのもあるけど、その辺はコスプレ精神で。

っていうか、ものすごくコスプレーヤーの気持ちが分かったわよ。私、もしかして隠れコスプレーヤーだったのかも。味を占めてしまったわ。
丸二日、ルンルンでこの格好でミュンヘン市内を歩き回り、オクトーバーフェストを楽しみました。
あ、今思い出したけど、オクトーバーフェストではアルプスの少女ハイジの風船売ってたよ!ドイツでも放送されてたのか?


One thing you have to know about Oktoberfest is that literally everyone is wearing a dirndl and lederhosen. It's almost like if you are not wearing it, you are missing a part of the experience. We were so glad that we all wore ours too; it was so fun!

The Man of the House and I talked about cultural appropriation a lot during the process of my making a dirndl and while we were in Munich. MOTH is a German descent; both of his parents' ancestors came from Germany, so lederhosen on him is perfectly fine. But me, undeniably Asian, wearing a dirndl, that's another story.

I mean, I was so surprised that I did not see very many Asians in Europe. Well, I saw a lot of Asian tourists in touristy spots, but they were obviously tourists. Even at Oktoberfest, where thousands upon thousands of people were in this giant park/fairground, I didn't see many Asians, let alone Asians in dirndl.

Anyway, I just hope that my me-made dirndl did not offend the eyes of the local people. While I totally enjoyed wearing it and now I totally understand why people do cosplay, I did not want my dirndl to be a costume.

Serious thoughts aside, I could not be happier with my dirndl. I loved every bit of it and I wore it for 2 days, all day long, sightseeing around town and Oktoberfesting. Definitely it tickled the cosplayer side of me.

By the way, while I was walking through the Oktoberfest ground, I saw a guy with a Heidi balloon (tied to his kid's stroller). Heidi from Girl of the Alps. She is a character from an old (early 70s) TV animation series based on a Swiss children's novel. Was Heidi popular in Germany too? I've never seen a Heidi balloon in Japan and now I have seen it in Munich...

October 11, 2016

Making a Dirndl 13 - Last Minute Sewing

引っ越し作業で忙しくて、ドイツの民族衣装、ディアンドルと一緒に着るエプロンの裾上げに取り掛かれたのは、旅行出発2日前でした。
裁縫室をほとんど荷造りした後で、ミシンはあるものの、椅子がない状態でミシン掛けしました。幸い私のミシンは足ふみペダルを使わなくてもスタートとストップボタンがあるのでひざまずいてミシンかけ。
裾は、スモッキングしたウェスト部分と合わせて、赤い糸でミシンについてる小花柄刺繍ステッチで縫ってみました。
旅行前に完成してよかったです。

Since I was so busy packing, I could not get back to my apron hemming until 2 days before we were to leave for Europe. By then, my sewing room was all disassembled and supplies packed, and I had to use my sewing machine without a chair. Good that my machine had start/stop button. 

For hemming, I decided to just fold up the hem once (since the hem was on the selvage edge because I used cross grain as my grain line) and use small flower embroidery stitch on my machine and sew it from the right side. To match my smocking at the waist, I used red thread. In the middle of the hemming, I ran out of my top thread, and used a slightly different shade of red for about 1/3 of the hem. Nobody will look at my hem that close to notice it.

I started this dirndl process way back in June when we weren't even thinking about selling our house, thinking once I was done with one set, I could make a dressier version. Well, I barely finished one set in 3 months, but I am so happy with it and enjoyed making it very much.

October 10, 2016

Europe Trip

9月17日から28日まで、ヨーロッパ旅行に行ってきました。今回はオットとオットの小学校時代からのお友達二人とそれぞれの奥様計6人で、男子が40歳になったのを機に彼らの夢のドイツのビールの祭典、オクトーバーフェストに行くのがメインです。

実はこの旅行、今年の初めから話が出ていて、ベルギーのブリュッセルからオクトーバーフェストの開かれるドイツのミュンヘンまで車で移動しながら旅行しよう、と決まり、半年前に飛行機のチケットを予約したら、その直後にブリュッセル空港がテロ攻撃にあう、と、ちょっと不吉な旅行でした。

半年前には家を売る計画もなかったので、引っ越し作業の真っただ中の旅行となった上に、オットのイギリス出張まで入って、かなり勘弁してほしいタイミングでした。
オットはイギリスから帰ってきた数時間後にベルギーにとんぼ返りな、とても健康に良くない旅行日程でした。

EU圏内でのテロ事件が重なる中、目標になりやすいオクトーバーフェストというイベントに行くのは危険なんじゃないか、といろいろ言われたけど、全く問題もなく、引っ越し作業のことも忘れてとてもたのしい旅行になりました。

ちなみに日程はこんな感じ:
初日ベルギーのブリュッセル入り。ブリュッセル2泊。
ルクセンブルクを通り過ぎる間に数時間観光。
フランス1泊。
スイスアルプスの谷間に2泊。
オーストリアはガソリン給油休憩以外は通り過ぎただけ。
ドイツのミュンヘン5泊。自分で作ったドイツの民族衣装、ディアンドルを着てオクトーバーフェストに行きました。完成したディアンドルの詳細は後日。





We had our great vacation trip to Europe.
The Man of the House and two of his friends from childhood always talked about going to the Oktoberfest together some day, and the some say has finally come for their 40-year-old anniversary year. Though they grew up together, now that we all live in different states, it was a nice get-together too. With their respective wives, we were a party of 6.

The plan of this Europe trip began earlier this year. The boys decided to start from Brussels, then drive through Europe to get to Munich for the finale of Oktoberfest. We bought the tickets 6 months ago, and the weekend after we bought the ticket, the bombing happened in Brussels. As you know, there were more terrorist attacks in Europe since then, and especially after what happened in France in July (a truck driving through a crowd), it was slightly scary to plan to travel to Oktoberfest, the best soft target you can think of.

Also, the timing of the trip was not ideal. We obviously did not plan on selling our house and moving 6 months ago. On top of that, MOTH had a business trip to England right before our trip and he did not come home until the night before our departure. He literally came home from England at 8 pm, and by 3 am the next morning, he had to drive 1.5 hours to the airport to head to Brussels.

People told me it was not wise to go to Europe considering what's happening, but at the end of the day, I would not want terrorists to prevent me from doing what I want to do and I would rather get bombed and die on my vacation than live with the "I could have gone" regrets. Anyway, we had a lot of fun and everything was great in Europe. People were so very kind and food was great.

Some highlights of the trip:
We stayed in Brussels for 2 nights and visited Lindeman's factory. Lindemans is a lambic (a type of beer that is brewed with spontaneous fermentation) brewer and you can tour the facility with a guide. Since it was too warm for brewing, the only working part of the factory was a bottling section, but we get to stand at the bottling line on the factory floor, close enough to snatch a bottle, which was pretty interesting. We also had an ample amount of tasting at the end of tour.

We stayed one night at a chateau in France, which was awesome. By the way, bread in France is so good everywhere.

We stayed 2 nights in Swiss alps. We went on a gondola and did a dry tobboggan run on the mountain side. Yup, went down the tin course on a sled, looking snow capped mountains. It was awesome.

The finale was the Oktoberfest. The boys all wore lederhosen (leather breeches) and the girls wore the dirndl. More about my dirndl later.

Thanks to smart phones and the Internet connection, we never got lost and we found many good restaurants throughout our trip. Hooray to the technology.

October 9, 2016

All Moved and Settled In

お久しぶりです。元気でやっています。家売買の最終契約が終了し、アパート住まいになりました。
7月に始まった家を売る作業と引っ越し作業がやっと終了し、ひっさしぶりにぐうたらな週末を過ごしています。

7月、オットが家を売る決断をし、決めた翌日には不動産屋と契約。
その後2週間かけて大掃除し、見た目がいいようにものを減らす作業。
7月末にとうとう家を売買市場にのせました。

その後1週間は生活感の出ない生活、買い希望客の連絡があったら即犬とともに家から退散、な日々。

買い取りオファーが入った後も、エアコン・暖房系統の検査、配管系統の検査、屋根の検査、ローン会社の査定、買い手指定箇所の修理等々、業者の出入りが続く毎日。そのたびに犬を預けたり、仕事早上がりしたり、猛烈に家の掃除・片付けをしたりと休む暇なし。

買い手側の作業と同時進行で、自分たちの荷物の整理と、アパート住まいに備えて家具・持ち物のほとんどを倉庫に収容するための荷造りな8月でした。

9月は週末荷造りした荷物を倉庫に搬送。
オットとお友達と私の3人で強制肉体労働12時間な土曜日を過ごしました。
エナジードリンク1日3本ぐらい飲んだよ。
将来的にこの荷物を倉庫から出すときは引っ越し業者を雇いましょうとオットと話しました。家具、重すぎ。

引っ越し作業が続く中、オットがユニークな家が売りに出ているのを見つけて、不動産エージェントと一緒に下見に行ってきました。ユニークな家なだけに、下見に行ったのはその家が市場に出て3日目だというのに、もう3件オファーが入っている、とのことでした。
私もオットもとても気に入ったのでオファーを入れたら、カウンターオファーが帰ってきたんだけど、返事をする前に売り手側がカウンターオファーを取り消し、ほかの買い手と契約してしまいました。
あぁ、残念。
あの家が買えていたらアパート住まいにならなくてもよかったんだけど、世の中そう簡単にはいかないわね。

9月の半ばには、オットがイギリスに1週間の出張があり、一人で毎日細々と最後の荷造り。

しかし!オットがイギリスから帰ってきた翌日から我が家はヨーロッパ旅行だったのでした!
ベルギー、ルクセンブルク、フランス、スイス、ドイツ。
詳細は後日。

水曜の夜に旅行から帰ってきて、木、金と仕事に行って、土曜にアパートに引っ越し、日曜に家の最終掃除、翌水曜に家の不動産譲渡証書に著名し、金曜に譲渡作業すべて完成。
あぁ、ローンよさらば!(今後は家賃払わないといけないけどさ)

9年間住んで、自分たちの手であちこちリフォームしたり野菜を育てたりしたのでもうこの家が自分の物でないというのはすっごい感慨深いです。
Phew, it's been a while.  I am doing well. Now that our house has closed, we are apartment dwellers.
The whole house selling and moving process that started in July has finally completed, and this weekend is our very first weekend to relax, responsibility-free.

Recap:
In July, right after the 4th of July weekend, the Man of the House decided to put our house on the market to sell to capture the summer time housing demand. The next day, we signed up with a seller's agent.
We spent the next two weeks cleaning the house in every nooks and crannies and de-clutter the house to make it showing ready.

For one week following the house getting on the market, we spent every day lifeless, trying to keep the house at showroom quality (not that it was, but tried). The outside temperature was well above 110 degrees and we had 2 dogs to evacuate with when showing was happening. That was tough.

Even after we accepted an offer, there was an HVAC inspection, plumbing inspection, roofing inspection, appraisal, repairs that buyers wanted etc, etc. Each time, we had to get the dogs out of the house so we had to drop them off at our friend's place who volunteered to be their doggie day care, and pick them up after work. We also had to continue cleaning the house and start packing our belongings.

We spent every bit of free time packing and cleaning in August.

September was our moving month. We spend one Saturday moving 90% of our stuff into a storage facility. It was me, MOTH, and a friend. I drank 3 Rockstars in one day, forced physical labor 12 hours in 100 degree heat. We totally filled a 30-foot storage. Next time when we need to move, we will hire a mover.

In the midst of all these packing and moving, MOTH found a very unique house on the market. So we went to see it, like it, and put an offer in. Even though the house was on the market for 3 days, it already had 3 other offers. But we were making a cash offer, so we were hopeful. We got a counter offer 2 days later, and before we can make a response, unfortunately, the seller rescinded its counter offer and went with another buyer.

What a shame. If we had gotten that house, we wound't have had to live in the apartment, but oh well.

The following week, MOTH had a business trip to England, so I spend every night packing small stuff.

Well, it wasn't all oh-so-busy days. We had a vacation and went to Europe!
Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Switzerland, and Germany (hence the dirndle, get it?).
More detail about the trip later.

We flew back on Wednesday night, went back to work Thursday & Friday; we moved into the apartment on Saturday, and clean the house for the last time on Sunday.
We signed the deed on the following Wednesday, and the house closed and money transferred on this past Friday.
No more mortgage! (though we now have a rent to pay)

I have been quit nostalgic and sad for letting go of the house. We lived there for 9 years and renovated it on our own almost all of it. No more vegetable garden either.
But, I am also excited to see what our next chapter of life will bring to us!