More Belated Incoming Outgoing

I spent the mid-month of December working on mail, slowly but surely catching up on my replies.  These will be going out in the mail tomorrow.

Got this great envelope and letter from Anne Elizabeth from Letter Love.  This was her first letter to me and my second to her.

I love the washi tape and the labels.

I also love the stationery.

I am also replying to this great note from Erin Fickert-Rowland.  Her mail art can be found here at Elysian Studios.  She's kind of awesome and very adventurous.

I loved this card so much.  The texture of the paint left on the smooth stock was great.

This is a returned correspondant card from Katherine, who I think I found over at Pen Pal of the Week.

She has great handwriting and is my only Canadian Pen Pal.  I like the postmarks on her envelopes.

On the outgoing side, I sent all three replies in these airmail envelopes I had bought from Amazon forever ago.  Not fancy, but better than a plain #10.

This is the international stamp for Katherine's letter.

Also outgoing tomorrow is the awesome Pneumatic Post.  This will be its third trip through the postal system.

The Pneumatic Post comes from the LWA and is awesome.  The best part is finding fun things to fill it with.  The first time I mailed it out, I sent out a bagel dog bone and addressed it to Kathy's dog.  When I got it back, I received some great beauty samples.  I am not going to mention what I am sending out this time in the event she reads this post.

The LWA does a great job of explaining how it all works so I won't re-hash it for you here, but it is a fun mail toy.  I thought I would have a hard time with the postage removal, and it did take some work, but it was not too bad.  I soaked it for a few hours yesterday in hot soapy water and got as much of the sticky stuff off with my nails as I could.  Then I hit it with the Goo-Gone and it was good as new.  Probably should have tried the Goo-Gone first.

My plan tomorrow is to go to the main RI post office to see if I can finally get my hands on some $2 Waves of Color Stamps and hopefully pop one on this thing.  Either way it's getting mailed, but I am having the worst time finding that series.  My local post office said the don't have them and won't be getting them.  They called a second post office in my city who said the same.  The third post office I tried had never even heard of them, I had to show them a photo on my phone.  So we shall see how tomorrow goes.

Catching up on Incoming Mail...

And actually replying!

So because all of my outgoing letters to pen pals were lovingly wrapped in plain white business envelopes, I will be showing what I received and not what I sent.  Although each letter is long and handwritten, the envelopes are totally lame.

This is the stack of outgoing for today.  Two thank you notes to a waitress and a hostess of this amazing restaurant.  A 1970's fold-n-mail I bought from Missive Maven at her Etsy Shop, and boring envelopes to everyone below.

Catie has written me not one, not two, but three letters since I last wrote to her.

One came with a wax seal!

One with a very decorated envelope!

Catie is a new recruit to the LWA!

She's got more than one envelope coming to her!

I replied to a "Congrats on your new job" card from my friend Jackie

And a fun "just because" card from my other friend Katie, who has two Weimaraners herself!  Lots of glitter here!

A long overdue reply to the lovely LR MacArthur, who sent me this very cool fold-n-mail airmail.

And a beautifully written note, my 1st from Mr. Lucas from Lucas Writes.

A returned correspondent card from the lovely Katherine Pitt.

She's international and well traveled!

And a letter from Sam, that I replied to in August but just mailed.  Yup, that's how hectic it's been!

Thanks for sticking with me!

Good Mail Day and Good Mail Loot!

Today I received three items from Catie S!  A beautiful postcard from Boston, a letter and my correspondant card.

I wish you could see how beautiful this postcard is!  I love that it's mail-themed and it has a beautiful linen texture.

I went to TJ Maxx this afternoon with my friend Marisa and I scored these awesome mail themed things.  The clipboard is also magnetic, not that it will end up on my fridge.

The booklet contains seven postal themed post-it notes that are destined to be address labels and decorations for my new pen friends.

*drumroll please* I finally scored the "washi" tape at my local Target!  I have been checking for weeks at the two stores nearest me with absolutely no success.  I asked employees, I showed photos, I got nothing.  But today, here it is and I am putting it on mail tonight!

Correspondant Cards

In my very first letter from Anna, she sent me the most clever thing I'd ever seen, which I am calling a correspondant card.  Seriously, I swooned.

I didn't scan it because censoring out all of the details would ruin it, but trust me, it's beautiful.  She had hers done professionally, and it's obvious.  The card seems to be a thick cotton card-stock with lovely medium gray branch details on the top.  In a pretty pale gray, it lists her name, her date of birth, her address, her likes and her mail blog.  The font is lovely, the texture is nice and she decorated the back making sure I knew that card was for my keeping.

A second card, not matching the first, was for me to complete and send back to her for her records.

I told everyone who would listen about that card from Anna and what a brilliant idea it was.  Then I started thinking about how I could make a set to send to my new (and hopefully expanding) collection of pen friends.  I realized that I still had a box of Avery Post Cards left over from my college graduation party invites.  Not professional, but free and immediately available.  

So I stayed up until two in the morning copying Anna's genius concept while wishing I could have them professionally done instead.

This was the end result, with my personal details redacted :-)

And this is the card I that gets sent back to me.  With the exception of the card I sent to Canada, I include a self-addressed stamped envelope for my pen pal to mail back to me. It's strange to see my own handwriting arrive in my mailbox, but people seem to like them so far and I love getting them back!

So far my card has been received and returned by Emilie, LR McArthur and Anna.  The trouble now is that I've forgotten who I sent them to.  I tried to only mail them to people who had written me at least once.  The upside is that they surprise me in my mailbox.

So I graciously and gratefully thank Miss Anna of The Lettering for the idea.  If you're lucky, maybe you can get one of her correspondant cards in the mail too.