It has been sunny since this morning, with beautiful autumn weather again today. Many people seem to be driving to places for a day out, and there are long traffic jams on the expressways. As I wrote yesterday, the holiday weekend in Japan continues through tomorrow. I have something to do tomorrow, so I stopped by the workshop this afternoon and did a little more work. I also prepared several packages to ship on Tuesday, after the holiday weekend. These include the 3-sun puzzle boxes I finished yesterday, so the packages were waiting for those boxes to be ready.
An extra shipping fee has been added since October 1. Apparently, this is to help keep international deliveries running smoothly as the number of packages increases from now until around January. If you notice higher shipping costs when other shopping online, this may be one reason. I have not added this extra fee to my usual shipping charges, so there is no need to worry when ordering from my online shop 😊
The photo shows the finished 3-sun 7-steps puzzle boxes being packed into their gift boxes. Recently, I changed the paper used for the opening instructions to regular copy paper. Before this, I used slightly thick cards about the size of a Japanese business card. However, the thick paper often caused printing problems, so I went back to thinner paper, as I used in the past. I have heard that feeding paper through a printer accurately is quite difficult. Home printers have become much better over the years, but thick paper still seems to cause trouble. The thinner paper may be a little harder to handle, but thank you for your understanding. I have also replaced the thick A6 cards used for the 5-sun boxes with regular A4 paper. The A6 card introducing my workshop and Japanese puzzle boxes, which I send with each purchase, has also been changed to regular A4 paper. And as you can see in the photo, each puzzle box is placed in a plastic bag before going into its gift box. I recommend keeping it in this bag when storing it. The bag helps protect the puzzle box from changes in humidity and dry conditions. The outer box is important, but this bag is very important too. By the way, these are ready-made bags sold in various sizes. I choose a size that fits each box. For example, I use a 12 × 18 cm bag for this 3-sun puzzle box.
I have received some nice feedback on the slightly narrow puzzle box I made recently, the “Slim 14-step.” Perhaps the word “slim” caught people’s attention. It seems to have been well received. Unfortunately, I made it alongside another order for Hakone and only made two for my own stock. One has already been purchased, so only one remains. This box is a limited edition, but the response has made me think about making another model with “Slim” in its name in the future. I have made several boxes called “Long” before, so long, narrow boxes are not unusual for me. Those were a little flatter, though, like a standard puzzle box stretched lengthwise. This box is almost square when viewed from the end, giving it a shape closer to a long wooden block. That may also be why it looks a little different. For this batch, I needed to work within the requirements of the Hakone order, so I made the boxes to fit the size of the Yosegi sheets I already had. In the future, it might be nice to make one large enough to hold pens or other writing tools. This version is a little too short inside for that. I have also shared some videos and photos on social media, so please take a look (@okapuzzlebox).
