Japanese Hiragana alphabet quilt.

My Japanese friend who lives in my area gave me an idea of making a Japanese alphabet quilt for sale. I think a crib quilt with English alphabets is very common to make in the USA, but I have never thought of making it with Japanese alphabets.

She told me that there are many mothers who would like to have this kind of educational quilt, because a Japanese alphabets poster is not enough to let children learn it. Just put the poster on the wall doesn't make them learn, but if you see the alphabets all the time closely in various colors, and even you can use it as a quilt would be better tool for them.

Japanese language fall into 3 general categories - Hiragana (50 characters), Katakana (50 characters), Kanji (thousands : share some of them with Chinese characters) -. Maybe I should make Katakana one as well?











My friend has 2 years old girl, so this quilt will be hers.
Hopefully I get some orders from other people :)

It is very interesting to hear from my friend that she has been teaching Japanese to her girl very hard. Her girl will learn English without huge effort as we (non-native English speakers) do, since she lives in the USA. My friend would like her to be a bilingual. She always talks her girl in Japanese, but her girl seems to pick up English words more than Japanese words because of the English environment. I am very surprised and impressed when I heard from the girl saying "It's a baby! Where is mom?".
She is only 2 years old... she already know English grammar..... Oh.

My sister-in-law who lives in Japan has been trying to let her boys learn English in early time of the life, using English Disney DVD, or American animations. But, sounds like it didn't go well. My friend's sister who lives in Japan also trying hard to let her children learn English, she speaks English to her children. It seems going well. Children would learn language from parents, so maybe my sister-in-law should speak English to her boys.... Very interesting, isn't it.

Comments

  1. Your quilt is gorgeous - I hope it is as good a learning aid as it is beautiful.

    I think children always learn more from their parents than from TV!

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  2. Hi Kate,

    Thank you for the comment :)
    Yes, I felt like as you said. My sister-in-law will have a new boy this Feb. I have to tell her that she needs to learn English first. Woo, it's a loooooooooooooooooooong way.....

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  3. this is really beautiful. I love it and i think you are amazing!!

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  4. Thank you, Wynn!
    I think your stuffs are wonderful, too! They are really "present Japanese style" that is popular in Japan :)

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  5. You must be an incredible quilt maker! I love all the things that you have made. Do you still use the machine that you showed earlier in your blog? And I enjoyed your stories about your rabbits, and life.

    I always wanted to play the violin, so when my son was four, my husband, my son and I all started playing together. My husband goes to orchestra with my son now. I will go with my daughter when she is a little older. Children value what they see the important people in their lives find valuable.

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  6. Hi Cheryl,
    Thank you for visiting!
    Yes, I still use the old sewing machine that my friend gave me. It has been performing very well :)

    It is very nice to start what you wanted to do with your family. I wish I could do that. I agree with you that they will find value and learn from what you did. I don't tell my sister-in-law much about what I think about children, because I haven't raised any children and people has different way to raise them. I am always wishing her and my brother to give my nephews many new experiences as much as they can, so they can learn something from it even they don't continue what they started they will learn something anyway.

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  7. Oh my goodness, I love your quilt! What a good idea! My girls need one!

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  8. shayzamn7:04 AM

    That is a beautiful and wonderfully elegant quilt. Even as old as I am (definitely not a child), something like that would help me learn the hiragana alphabet!

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  9. Hi Fuji Mama!
    Thank you for leaving a comment!
    Sorry for taking so long to respond you. I see your name is kind of Japanese??
    I checked your blog, and the 5-minutes chocolate mag cup cake looks so good!! I thought I would try since it looks very easy to make, even though I am not good at cooking. Do you think a cake can be made without a yolk? My husband has high cholesterol, and avoiding eggs animal fat, meat, and oil...

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  10. Hi shayzamn,
    Thank you! Are you learning Japanese language? How difficult for you to learn Japanese? English is very hard for me to learn, but I think it is easier compared to foreigners learn Japanese. Good luck!

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  11. Anonymous3:14 PM

    Your quilt is beautiful! I've seen your other quilts and admire your style but this is both pretty and functional! I think there are many people who would appreciate this -- my husband is a (native) Japanese speaker (but has lived in the US much of his life). When we do decide to have a child, it will be important to him to teach our child Japanese and this would be the type of thing he'd really appreciate.

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  12. Hi Kelly,
    Thank you! Happy to know you liked my style in a quilt.
    If your husband lives in the US such a long time, he might forget Japanese language if he doesn't use it often. I have been in the US just for 5 years, I realize I sometimes cannot remember Japanese words. But my English skill doesn't improve very much neither, so I feel like my language level is just getting lower and lower... :(
    Please add my Hiragana quilt on your list for your future baby! ha-ha-ha.

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  13. Such a beautiful quilt. I am very interested in making quilts for my daughters and this has given me inspiration, thank you.

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  14. Hi Martina,
    Thank you for leaving a comment! I am glad to know that this quilt could inspire you for your project! Enjoy!! :)

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  15. Anonymous5:14 PM

    Hello, I was wondering how you got all those Hirigana characters on the quilt? Did you use a template? Or did you cut them by hand?
    Arigato!

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  16. Hi, I cut them by my hand. This process kill my hand :( ha ha.

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  17. I am new to your blog, and I loooove this quilt! I just blogged about it at hiraganamama.wordpress.com, hope that's ok :)

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