FOCUSING ON TOKYO!

After going to THE quilt festival in Houston in 2007 and falling in love with the quilt exhibition from Japan, I had been thinking and thinking about how fabulous the quilt festival in Tokyo would be. Could I go? Should I go? How? It's SO FAR AWAY!  I LOVE the gal who writes this blog. I had followed her trips to the Tokyo Quilt Festival and she made it sound so fun and accessible. http://bemused.typepad.com/ Hmmmm.........

Then I took a quilt class with Freddy Moran at Aunt Marys Quilt shop,  and Freddy shared a story about her husband. She said that for years he had been saying over and over again that he wanted to go to the British Open. One day Freddy had had enough and turned to her husband and said, "If you are waiting for the phone to ring and the person on the other end to say, "Neil, you should go to the British Open." it's never going to happen! If you want to go, GO!" He got on the phone and started making plans. They went and it was fabulous! Of course it was. Once you set your INTENTION, the act of narrowing your FOCUS makes the stars ALIGN and the dominoes fall. It was an AHA! moment.

I took this story to heart, thought about what I wanted, declared my intention this time last year, and SHAZAM all the pieces of the complicated coordinating of a grand trip to Tokyo for their quilt festival fell into place. Jim would not be traveling so he could stay with two sons. My mom was in good health and would come with. William, my youngest could miss a week of school without too much trouble. AND (this is how I KNOW this trip was meant to be) there were three seats left on the dates I needed to use up some of Jim's miles!!! Despite needing antibiotics for the firsttime in ten years for a bad cold two nights before we left - we did leave and, of course, it was truely fabulous.

As I think about what quilting direction to go in next, I have been thinking a lot about the trip to Tokyo this past spring. Here's some photos, ENJOY!!!

We took the subway every day to a different neighborhood.

The subway was easy to use, clean, and felt safe - even with BIG sumo wrestlers!

   Sumo wrestling was very cool but there was a lot more ceremony than fighting much to William's dismay!

Try it yourself!!

A manhole cover indicating where water was for firemen.

There was a long line to get to the top of the Tokyo Tower, but groovy art to look at while we waited.

Fun looking neon signs were everywhere.

We happened upon a celebration!

With this great float.

And all these fish!

                                                                          Great sign!

QUILT FESTIVAL!!!!!!

The Quilt Festival is in the Tokyo Dome baseball stadium!

LOTS of shrines! All beautiful. All evoking a very calm, ancient, special, powerful feeling.

                         At all the shrines you could write a prayer and tie it to the prayer board.

A perfect ending to a great adventure.

My last posting was about "turning on the light". After I remembered to take my sunglasses off (LOL!) the light revealed some heavy feelings of scatteredness and lack of direction/focus. I know how powerful intention can be...time to focus on focusing. Join me?