February is ume!

I am so excited that February has finally arrived! It means beautiful ume are going to be in bloom soon! But of course, not in Memphis. I will fortunately get to see pretty pictures of those is Japan because of the lovely members of the Immortal Geisha forums who take a plenty of pictures each season and post them on Flickr. But as for me, I have just been enjoying the nice weather here. It's been in the upper 60's and 70's all week long - which is my favorite temperature range. So comfortable, you don't need a heavy jacket (if any), and you're not sweating either. It's so nice! We were supposed to have some bad storms last night through this morning, but it never happened. Not even a clap of thunder. Just rain and A LOT of wind. The university I attend even put out a high wind warning to all of the students. It was quite funny, actually, because we have "TigerTEXT" which is an alert system that texts you when something happens. I was sitting in my Health Assessment lecture class, and everyone checks their phone at the same time because of the text. 200 phones at once. LOL.

Anyway, I decided to get into the February spirit by doing an ume-inspired kitsuke yesterday. The kimono is one that my fiancé bought me for Christmas (at the time seasonally inappropriate), but now it is PERFECT! It is light and dark blue checkerboard with "bouncing" ume blossoms. I paired it with a multi-seasonal beige and multi-colored obi, an orange shibori obiage, an orange and gold obijime, and a big white ume kanzashi. According to the "rules", the obiage and obijime are too formal for a komon and nagoya obi, but, hey, I don't always follow the rules. :)