手繋ぎ人形袋が完成しました。
I’ve finally completed 5 children holding hands bag.
Make kimono sleeves
small hands
decoration strings
outside bottom and kimono hems
sew sleeves onto the bag and put in tucks at the shoulders
sew heads on
make obi sashes and sew them on
inner bottom and inner bag
castings
Complete!
This is a present for my mom.
お友達に差し上げた2014年に作った猫ちぐらの
現在の様子を教えて頂きました。
Here is a current condition of neko chigura: it was made by me
in 2014 and given to my friend as a present.
特に問題はないようです。
Cats also use it as a scratching post so it appears to be
slightly torn up
but there seems to be no problem at all.
2014年の猫ちぐらNekochigura from 2014.
お人形用の袴です。
Hakama for dolls.
足を入れる部分が二つに分かれている馬乗り袴があります。
There is two types of men’s hakama: one is called “Andon hakama”
which is a skirt-type (undivided), and the other
called “Umanori hakama” which is for horse-riding (divided legs).
襞の畳み方が左右対称ではないところが特徴です。
Umanori hakama is more masculine, so to speak.
It has a distinctive arrangement of pleats, that is asymmetrical.
腹部球を入れるために胴体を分割し
球をつけました。
写真を撮るのを忘れていたので
その工程の画像はなしです。
続いて腕をおおまかに作って
関節球をいれていきます。
Cut the body for joints
and add joint balls.
No photo images of this proces
since I forgot to take pictures.
After that, start making arms roughly
and place joint balls.
Upper arms.
体とのバランスを見ながら。
Not too thick, not too skinny
carefully balance the proportion.
殺さないように細部に手を入れていきます。
Considering its range of motion
work on details without messing his figure.
もうちょっと可動域を広げ
もっともっと細部を作り込んでいきます。
I need to increase range of motion
and work on more and more details.
猫ちぐらを作ることは、まず藁を手に入れるところから始まります。
Making of Neko chigura starts with getting fine rice straws.
よくお日様に当て、乾燥させた丈の長いものです。
中くらいの猫ちぐらを作るには、この藁の束が20~30必要になります。
I was lucky to have these nice straws from my friend this year.
They are well-exposed to the sun, well-dried, and long-stemmed.
For medium sized neko chigura, you will need 20-30 of this bundle of straws.
藁はすべて余計な部分を除き、編むのに適した長さに揃えておきます。
年に一度の猫ちぐら作りなので、しっかり作り方の本を見直しておきます。
Preparation of straws: eliminate unnecessary parts and cut to the adequate length.
Go over the how to make neko chigura booklet; it’s a once-a-year event
so you don’t want to mess it!
Nekochigura is a cat house with dome ceiling made out of woven rice straws.
ちぐら、というものはもともと農作業中に赤ちゃんを座らせておくためのもので、
それぞれのお家で作られていたものでした。
Originally, chigura was a woven basket in which baby sits during
parents are working in the farm and was commonly made by individual family.
それをドーム状にして猫のお家にしたところ、多くの猫が喜んで入ってくるように!
Then after making it a cat house with dome ceiling, people found cats actually love and enjoy it!
現在は新潟県の関川村を中心に作られていますが、編める人も少なく時間もかかることから、
注文してから届くまで6年もかかるそうです。
Nekochigura is currently made in several villages in Niigata prefecture, like Sekikawa-village,
however, there are only a few people who can make it and it requires lots of time to make,
now you need to wait 6 years to get one for yourself.
そこで、私は自分で作れるようになればいいと思ったのです。
At that point, I realized “how about making one by myself?”.
もとは、各家庭で作られていたもの、それほど専門的な道具も技術も必要なかったのです。
As I mentioned before, Nekochigura is made by each household, so you
really need neither special tools nor techniques.
関川村の猫ちぐらのご紹介↓Here is a link to Sekikawa-village’s Nekochigura makings
http://www.nekochigura.com/