We take Christmas very seriously in our house.
We have an elf from Prep and Landing who makes sure the house is ready for Santa…
Uncanny
And of course Santa himself makes an appearance…
Carrying his toys (and a passenger) on the back of his sleigh.
But how would he get anywhere without his reindeer?
It takes a team to make this whole Christmas thing work.
Christmas is next week. Next. week. I’m not quite sure how it crept on me but somehow it managed to sneak in there between school and work and family time and general business. Sadly, the blogging has been suffering.
Not that you’ve been missing much. As it so happens, winter is my least favourite season for taking photos. I lost my inspiration somewhere between the yellow color cast of indoor lighting and lack of inspiration offered by the four walls of my house. I think we need to get out more.
Just to prove we are not, in fact, hermits, here is a sample of the few photos I have managed to capture over the past weeks.
1. The kids bundled up on the walk to daycare during a brief cold spell. Although I hate how long it takes to get them into all of this gear, I do love the colourful burst of cuteness.
2. The “arctic blast” sent us a teeny tiny sprinkling of snow (apologies to anyone East of the Dakotas), so I walked back through the park to capture a few photos. I was told off by one of the park landscapers for walking on the public grassed area while it was fragile with frost. Apparently even our grass is ultra-sensitive when it comes to the cold. How many months until Summer?
4. I suppose it WAS cold enough to produce icicles in the pond that were large enough to impale a small child. Anyone else frightened by this photo? Just me?
5. We spent a little time searching local secondhand/vintage stores for the perfect side table to use as a docking station in our office. Although we had no luck on the side table front, we did spot this fantastic couch. Would make the perfect addition to a man cave if only we had a finished basement. It even has a built in record player.
6. It also offered us the opportunity to introduce our children to a rotary phone that (gasp!) plugs into a wall. Samuel still needs a little practice.
7. I finished my Christmas shopping and managed to ship a package to Australia before the deadline. Sorry, just had to throw that in there…
8. This man had a birthday. I won’t tell you how old he is except to say that it starts with a three and ends with a nine. Happy birthday sweetheart.
I was not a photographer when I lived in Japan twelve years ago. Sure, I took more than a few snapshots during my visit, but I have always regretted the fact that I didn’t have the passion for photography that I have now. In many ways it feels as though 12 months of photo opportunities passed me by and it’s difficult not to feel a small twinge of regret for those lost moments. One in particular stands out as the photograph that got away and I remember, even back then, that I was disappointed not to have captured it on camera.
I was 23 when I first arrived in Tokyo and already fairly well traveled having undertaken the 3 month backpacking trek through Europe that is almost a right of passage for Aussie University students. Still, the bus ride from Narita airport to our hotel in Tokyo was eye opening. I remember looking up at the enormous apartment buildings with thousands and thousands of identical windows and wondering what it must be like to live in such a confined space. I was a long way from my suburban Melbourne home and, for some reason, this image was the one that made it a reality.
When we traveled back to Japan in October, I tried to capture this image on camera. It’s not perfect – taking photos out the window of a speeding train has its challenges – but I was grateful to have captured, on film, this memory of my first visit to Japan. To me, it’s much more than just a photograph.
Photo taken outside a temple in Kamakura. I think I need one of these for my desk, and my house and my dashboard…
This year I am definitely in the Christmas spirit. It seemed that the day after (or maybe even a few days before) Thanksgiving, I was ready to go out and get a tree and begin decking the halls immediately. Maybe it’s the promise of opening a new door each day on our Lego Advent calendar (really, it’s embarrassing that I am just as excited as Thomas to see what’s next) or perhaps the thought of experiencing the holiday with two little boys who are now old enough to truly enjoy it. I
Last year I scheduled a few activities in the hope of building traditions. We went for a ride on the Polar Express (fun, but the boys were a little young, especially Samuel) and took in two tree lighting ceremonies, including the one in downtown Portland (at one point Kei was carry both kids). This year, I realized that our traditions can be the simple things like sharing some spiced cider or hot chocolate (and perhaps a little mulled wine for Mummy), trying two separate Trader Joes stores before finding my Eucalyptus wreath for the front door, reading the christmas stories that come out only once a year and finding some time to do random things together as a family, whether that be decorating the tree or spotting Happy the Elf in the morning.
All pictures taken on the iphone with hipstamatic.
And then yesterday the spirit overtook me and I baked cookies. I. Baked. Ok, it was from a cookie mix but I still added the egg and butter and rolled the dough. The kids had SO much fun and were still taking about it today. Of course now we have about 20 cookies to eat over the next couple of weeks (I knew I should have added that gym membership to my wishlist), but it’s a small price to pay for a little bonding time over baked goods. I thought about taking the cookies to work to share with my colleagues until I caught Thomas, more than once, licking the knife that he then used to spread a little more icing. I apologized for the lack of cookies today but said they would thank me when they avoided the plague that has been infiltrating our house.
I still have a few things on my list this year – Zoolights, watching holiday movies, visiting Santa. Thankfully, though, Christmas shopping is not one of them. When you have to send gifts to a variety of different countries, you are not afforded the luxury of last-minute shopping. I like to think of it as a cure for procrastination. Most of the gifts are in my hot little hands and now I just need to package them up and send them. That DOES mean, however, that I need to brave the Post Office during the busiest time of the year. Not looking forward to that little adventure.
Oh, and there’s a birthday to celebrate on Saturday. CAN’T forget that!
Overall, though, I’m looking forward to a relaxed and peaceful Christmas. I would even welcome a little snow should it wish to appear at a time that is convenient to me and then disappear again when I need to run errands… Told you I was in the spirit.
Came across these almost-forgotten treasures while looking through my photo files from the past year.
Well, Thanksgiving is over, the turkey is almost gone (almost) the Ishida boys are back at school (albeit grudgingly) and most of us are sick or in recovery. Sounds like a pretty successful holiday weekend to me.
We celebrated in traditional style with our take-out turkey dinner – a tradition I started when we first moved to the states about 8 years ago and one I intend to maintain for years to come. It’s just so much more relaxing than standing over a hot stove and then having your children reject the food anyway. This year our good friends spent the day with us which made the whole day a little more festive and fun. The men watched football, the kids watched Totoro (highly recommended) and the women enjoyed a day when everyone was occupied and they could enjoy a few hours of chatting and sipping on hot mulled wine. Perfect.
I didn’t take any photographs, mainly because it was dark and dreary and I preferred, this year, to simply relax and enjoy the day rather than deal with the disappointment of trying to catch a few moments on film without a decent shot in the bunch.
So, without a thanksgiving photograph to share, I thought a little I Heart Faces challenge photo was in order. This week’s challenge is a tough one – scenic black and white with a person in the photo. A. My photos are 90% colour and, B. I usually choose people OR scenes. It’s rare that I combine the two unless it’s the standard tourist-in-front-of-a-landmark pic.
At first I was focused on finding a landscape shot, but ended up settling on this photograph that shares a little of the hustle and bustle of Yokohama’s Chinatown. Frankly, we didn’t see a whole lot of landscape during our recent visit to Japan but I love that I was able to capture a snapshot of time in the city and I feel as though the black and white places more focus on the people than the bold red and gold colors of the street.
Now, off to lie down and try to kick this illness so I can finish up my Christmas presents this week. Printing and international shipping deadlines are breathing down my neck.
It feels like so long ago that we were in Japan and I keep having to remind myself that it was only a month ago. To be honest, planning a vacation in October has completely messed up my sense of time. Suddenly we were back and it was Halloween and now it’s almost Thanksgiving and Christmas is around the corner. I am madly trying to pull together christmas presents before printing deadlines as well as keeping up with school vacation schedules and work schedules.
It’s a crazy time of the year. But, surprisingly, I am very excited about Christmas this year. Maybe it’s the fact that we have no plans to get on an aeroplane and that I have two boys who are anxiously counting down the days. I know it’s not because we have been threatened with snow this week. I can do without that. (bah! Humbug!)
So all of this makes Japan seem like a lifetime ago and I am doing my best to hold onto the memories – at least until I can find a few moments to write them down.
This week’s I heart faces challenge is “paper” and I found this little gem while going through our photos from Japan. Kei’s mother was extremely camera-shy so of course I made the most of every opportunity to take her photograph when I could and I just love the moment I captured with this shot. It’s not perfect – even a little blurry – but it tells the story of our train ride to Hakone and brings back so many memories.
Nicole Ishida Photography 