New Year's Day traditional gift, Temari

For hundreds of years, the temari ball was in Japan the first gift given to a child in the first New Year. It is a gift which brings joy and happiness, and it was put on the baby's pillow, so that temari was first thing to see when waking up.

Made by mothers or grand-mothers, from bamboo and simple pieces of cloth, temari were made in every home. Of course, the families with high social status were making the temari from silk, like the one in this photo, taken at the Saigo Tanomo residence in Aizu Bukeyashiki.