Outgoing postcards

It’s been a while since I’ve sent many postcards… I had a real block on letter writing recently, I’ve got a stack of replies to write and I just can’t get the words down. But here’s a few postcards that will go out tomorrow. I decided if I want to come home to nice post I’ll have to send more!

The cards on the left are off to China via Postcard United – to someone who likes flags, and someone who likes local views. That’s a card from my hometown of Shrewsbury 🙂

The cards on the right are going out to Russia via Postcrossing. The Jane Austen quote is to someone who likes anything which always makes a hard choice of what to send. The Postcrosser who likes yoga was easier to pick a card for!

The card on the left I’m sending to my Dad, my big nut brown hare (for anyone who knows ‘Guess how much i love you’ 😊).

The ‘once upon a time’ card is for a swap-bot swap for the first and last lines of a current book. I’m currently re-reading one of my favourite books – ‘Saving CeeCee Honeycutt’ by Beth Hoffman. It’s a story about a young girl who loses her mother and goes to live with an Aunt in Georgia where she rediscovers how to be happy.

And the carved stones are off to a postcard pal in Taiwan 👋😀

I actually got the addresses at least a week ago so I’m still struggling with getting post ready to send, but it feels good to be sending them out to start their journeys.

Lettermo days 4 & 5

I definitely wouldn’t have got any post done today if it wasn’t for the challenge! And I’ve even done tomorrow in advance because I’m out at my sewing group tomorrow evening and probably won’t have time for letters.

Today’s letter is off to my penfriend Jennifer in Germany. A long overdue reply from around Christmas.

Tomorrow’s post is 2 Swap-bot travelling postcards heading to the USA. They’ve still got some travelling to do before they get sent home 🙂

(Postcards) travelling home the long way round

I’ve been participating in the Swapbot ‘Adventures of the travelling postcard’ for a while now. I suspect that my original card is long lost but I love seeing where the postcards have been. The last cards I received came with a philosophical travelling note too. The note is now on its 4th journey! If I’m not going far for a little while, at least I can send other things on journeys 🙂

These two cards are following the same path but will end up so far apart

One card will eventually go home to Germany, the other card should soon fill up with names and head home to USA!

And all part of the adventure, the cards were rather damp when I received them so they look well travelled!

The first day of advent (calendars)

I did a couple of advent calendar swaps again this year. Everyday becomes a bit more fun with little gifts to open in the morning 🙂 Obviously I haven’t seen much of the calendars I received yet – I’m resisting the temptation to open everything at once! but I’m pleased with what I sent out so I hope my swap partners are enjoying their advent too.

Full advent calendar, sent to Australia:

I rearranged some of the order after I’d taken the pictures, but the calendar includes note pads, note cards, stickers, craft items, coasters, and a bit of chocolate. I also included a little note for each day, the first advent calendar swap I did a few years ago included notes and it made the calendar extra special, so I try to do the same now.

And of course it all got wrapped up nicely 🙂

The second advent calendar I swapped was slightly different. It’s made up of 4 swaps of 6 items, with a theme for each set. I can’t quite remember now which swap went to who, but I think it ended up mainly within Europe.

Random flat items:

Possibly not all technically flat, but I sent 2 swaps to the same person so it was never going to be a slim package! Includes fabric, beads, stickers, decorative paper, and a clear stamp.

It’s only just December but I’ve already used up several rolls of wrapping paper so far!

I also sent the 6 pairs of socks swap to this swap partner, but I forgot to take a picture before I wrapped them!

Kitchen items:

Cake decorations, cupcake kit, a tea towel, cookie cutters and felt coasters. All very festive and hopefully useful.

Cards with gifts:

I raider my Christmas card stash for an extra festive feel 🙂 Surely everyone has some cards left over from previous years?! Gifts included bath salts, craft items, a face mask, and a bit of tea. I tried to brighten up the plain envelopes too 🙂

I hope the recipients are enjoying starting to open their gifts. I definitely had fun this morning – I got penguin gift tags and an owl key cover 🙂 I can’t wait to see what I get tomorrow!

Quilt-as-you-go block swap 2

Most of my creative time recently has been taken up by one big project but I didn’t want to miss the second round of the striped quilt block swap on Swap-bot. All my colours recently seem to be blues and greens with a bit of yellow and brown so this block definitely has a colour theme!

The block on the left is off to the USA as part of the swap. The block on the right I’m keeping to add to my eventual quilt, to help it grow faster. They’re nearly the same, but I used a wider strip of a nice Japanese print on mine to get more of the design, and of course I didn’t cut enough strips so the additional corner fabrics are different.

I need to start labelling them now, it will be nice to see where everything has come from once I have enough for a quilt.

Happy Mail supplies swap

I feel like I haven’t blogged for a while… I’ve been struggling with low energy and feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the things I think I should be doing – getting all my post organised, written, and sent; sewing a large birthday present; my scrapbooking is 6 months behind; preparing for my next holiday; so many things I want to sort out and tidy up; and then just all the things that I need to keep on top of in basic living… Most evenings I do very little of that and then the weekends fly by and there’s a whole new week to deal with! Maybe at some point I’ll feel like I’ve caught up with myself.

I’ve still been doing a few swaps. It’s amazing how much time can vanish when preparing the perfect envelope of goodies! I’ve been thinking recently it might be nice to have a penfriend who does more mail art, I’ve had a few ideas for more creative letters but no one to really try them out on… I don’t want my existing penfriends to feel they have to reciprocate but I do really enjoy receiving more creative post. I’m not entirely sure where to find such a correspondent, the methods I’ve used before have introduced me to lovely people but with more normal letters. Anyone have any ideas?

A recent swap was for “happy mail supplies”, I sent items thinking one way and received from someone thinking differently…both valid by the swap and it wasn’t profile based but I’ll admit I was slightly disappointed – I don’t do a lot of papercrafting so I’m not sure I’ll do much with the smaller bits of card I received.

Sent to UK – I can send a lot more for less postage within the UK so I didn’t have to worry about it being flat 🙂

Watercoloured envelope

Stickers, envelopes, note cards, postcards, sticky notes, paper clips, patterned fabric tape, and a shaped peg. And a flow magazine journal because they listed it as a magazine they liked – I bought them because they looked fun and I like the magazine too. but then I never used them…

Received from Chile:

A fun envelope and bright little parcel 🙂 And yes the confetti went everywhere!

Tags, decorations, bits of card and paper, various types of stickers, decorative bits and pieces. All bright and fun but not stuff I typically use. It could be good to have something unusual to play around with, I might use some bits in a few mail art ideas…

I sent another couple of envelopes of nice things out recently, just need to wait and see what I receive next 🙂

Quilt-as-you-go block swap

I’m doing my second ever sewing swap on Swap-bot! It’s for a striped quilt-as-you-go block, so fabric sewn directly onto the backing fabric/ batting which I can see would be a really quick construction method. The requirements were that it’s constructed on a thin backing (I used a white cotton) so it can be sent as a letter, and to use at least 6 fabrics. I haven’t done a block like this before and underestimated the size and amount of fabric needed so my block uses 11 fabrics all drawn from my stash. My swap partner likes bright fabrics and I have plenty of those! The idea of the swap is that it will be held approximately monthly to slowly create a full quilt. My plan is to make myself a matching block every month to remember what I’ve done and build a quilt more quickly.

I like being able to spot bits of other projects in this block – my first quilt and several different gifts I’ve made in the last couple of years.

Now to wait and see what I receive…

Easy pillowcase swap

I recently took part in my first proper sewing swap on Swap-bot! The swap was for an pillowcase using a simple tube method with 3 fabrics. The instructions in the swap directed us to this video, but I think there’s plenty of similar instructions out there.

Sent to USA:

My swap partner likes pink and red, so a raid of the fabric stalls in the market produced a couple of nicely contrasting patterns with similar colours. I used a wide woven ribbon for the small strip of fabric because it coordinated better than anything else I had. I also added some text detail with freehand machine embroidery. And French seams too! I was really pleased with how it looks.

I was a bit uncertain about the size of the pillowcase, it seemed really wide for my pillows, but my swap partner was really happy with it 🙂 and the pillowcase I received is a similar width so it must be the design. Are American pillows wider than UK pillows?!
Received from USA:

I was a bit uncertain about what I might receive but look at this! A perfectly coordinated beautiful floral fabric pillowcase. It’s really well made with French seams and sharp corners. The sender told me she made lots of these as Christmas gifts, so maybe practice makes perfect 🙂

I’m looking forward to finding my next sewing swap now!

Month of Letters – 24th to the end

So Friday night (24th Feb) I did a load of of letter writing and swap sorting, spent a small fortune on postage of Saturday, had visitors on Sunday, then woke up on Monday and decided I really wasn’t well enough to do things like get out of bed. Probably explains my tiredness for the past week… But I have just about posted an item every day this month, with a couple of delays and make up days.

To finish the monthly report – outgoing post:

25th – My final item for the swap-bot ‘month of happy mail’ swap. I made a weeks worth of positive notes and little gifts – 7 notes and gifts individually wrapped. It’s based on another swap I once did and really enjoyed.

I wrote a few nice quotes and some hopefully cheerful notes on a variety of postcards and note cards, then put each note in separate envelopes with a little wrapped gift. I raided my little gifts stash, I hope they enjoy everything. I did forget to pack the chocolate raisins so I’ve eaten them instead!

26th – Technically posted the day before, I sent off a swap for a homemade pillow case. I’ll post about it separately soon.

27th / 28th – I started to recover from my cold/ flu type thing to realise there’s 3 birthdays coming up in the next week or so! So I dug out a few cards, and added a little gift and letter to one to a penfriend. There’s only 1 I’m fully confident will arrive in time!

The round-up:

In February I’ve posted 31 items to 10 different countries – UK, USA, India, Netherlands, Slovenia, Italy, Germany, Russia, Turkey, and Australia. I’ve spent £47.32 in postage. I have one letter to write still outstanding that I feel a little guilty for being so slow to reply to, but it’s a first letter and I want to do a good job of it.

I don’t as fully track incoming post, just enjoy it and blog about it occasionally, but I’ve had a whole mix of stuff. I don’t think I’ve received more than normal despite sending nearly every day, but maybe that benefit will come as replies over time.
I’ve also realised I do much better at keeping to resolutions when I have a challenge to meet, even if there’s no competition or consequences. Maybe especially then, it’s just me trying to be better but not stressing over anything extra. I don’t have great will-power or determination so I need something else as well… The next challenge begins as the last one ends – now it’s Lent! Can I really fully give up milk instead of the half-way I’ve been doing for years? And will it make much difference? Let’s find out…

Lettermo 21st – 23rd

I’ve been writing, I’ve just been bad at updating…

A few days of incoming post:

3 of these are from the Swap-bot ‘happy mail all month’ swap – a colouring card with flower seeds, a selection of stationery items, and a postcard of a wooden bridge apparently common to certain areas of USA. The cat face card also comes from USA as part of the ‘postcard roulette’ swap.

Outgoing:

21st – I made this scrapbooked art letter thing I have forgotten the name of a while ago but never figured out who to send it to… the ‘happy mail all month’ swap seemed appropriate 🙂

22nd – a letter to a penfriend in Germany

23rd – I didn’t feel up to letter writing this evening although I have 2 I want to get out over the weekend… today I’m sending a postcard to Italy through Postcard United. She likes UNESCO sites so I’m sending Strutts Mill in Belper.