Stampin’ Up! is an international company, with divisions outside North America in Europe and the South Pacific. Stampin’ Up! is also in Japan – and that’s where this stamp set started! The New Year Celebration stamp set is now available in North America for a limited time – until January 31, 2020.
I love the images and the calligraphy in this one, and being of Japanese heritage, wanted to get this stamp set for sure! Sadly, my fluency in Japanese is almost non-existent…though my son is taking it as his university elective!! (I think that it’s a crazy amount of work, but he’s enjoying it).
Even though it’s a new year set, the images can be used at other times of the year, and quite honestly, unless the recipient can read the Japanese characters, you could use those as well!
Here’s the image only/non-new year card. I used the Golden Glitz Delicata Metallic Ink Pad for the background and bow – but the photo doesn’t show how glitzy it actually is!
Here’s the new year version (well, for those who only read English….LOL). I used Sahara Sand as the colour for the other images on the card, including the faint flower images on the cardbase itself.
New Year used to be the bigger celebration (as opposed to Christmas) during the holiday season in Japan – not sure if that’s still the case, but it’s also a good reason to still send holiday cards….especially if you miss the Christmas mailing deadline! (…um….that’s typically me….)
HINT if you’re stamping these two images together. I stamped the mountain outline first – because the background “sun” image is a bit more flexible. If you stamp the mountain first, you can adjust the sun so it (roughly) fits around the mountain outline. My first attempt had the sun overlapping the mountain and that wasn’t quite the look I was going for. Also – the Stamparatus is great for 2 step stamping, and also made it easy for me to stamp the sun a couple of times with the Golden Glitz ink to make it really glitzy.
My next HINT – if you’re not sure which way the characters are supposed to go, look at the stamp case LOL. Even though I can’t read kanji, I can often tell which way they are supposed to go because of the brush strokes, so it bothers me if I can see that it’s upside down. True confession, I actually stamped it upside down the first time and had to check because I thought it looked weird.
If you’re interested in getting this stamp set, remember it’s only available until January 31, 2020. You can grab it through the YamStamps Online Store (shortcut: yamstamps.com/shop) or contact me for assistance placing an order.
