Today's outgoing: January 1, 2016

Now the holidays are over, time to get back to #happymail ! 6 down, 4 to go #unlessmyhandfallsofffirst #snailmail #diy #penpal #missionarymail #mexico #finland #newjersey #missouri #massachusetts #texas

A photo posted by Natalie Miller (@findthosedreams) on Jan 1, 2016 at 5:31pm PST

Where'd October go?

Hello, everyone!

I promise I haven't forgotten you, but October was just a really busy month for me! I actually stopped taking pics of stuff I was sending because I guess I felt like I didn't have the 10 seconds it took to take some.

I figure in the month of October I have sent 3 Postcrossing postcards, 6 postcards for Swap-Bot swaps, 12 letters/flat mail for Swap-bot swaps, 3 missionary letters, and 4 letters for my pen pals totaling 28 pieces of outgoing mail if I counted correctly.

In any case, here's the pics I do have:

Incoming Postcrossing, Swap-Bot and personal postcards all arrived on the same day. That's one happy mailbox!

Some of Today's Outgoing: September 21, 2015

I can't believe I didn't notice earlier, but Fairy Godmother is totally enchanting that stamp.

Believe it or not, I've been sending TONS of mail out this weekend, and have failed to photographically document almost all of it.

Recently I've discovered a new snail mail website, Swap Bot, and am just barely getting my feet wet testing it out. I plan to post a more complete review when my research is complete. ;) The above letter is just one item from my five initial swaps I'm experimenting with. Because I'm a noob who has yet to establish a solid track record for coming through with swaps, I'm limited to participating in simple exchanges.

This weekend alone I've sent 8 postcards for Postcrossing, 5 Postcards detailing the highlight of my week for Swap Bot, 1 postcard featuring Colorado wildlife (also for Swap Bot), a full blown introductory pen pal letter to a stranger in New Zealand (assigned by Swap Bot, pictured above), and two more tourism themed postcard swaps to 4 more partners I plan to send tonight. Grand total: 19.

Today's Outgoing: September 16, 2015

I'm afraid I smooshed Cathleen's face, but this is probably my favorite envelope of the moment.

Yesterday's Outgoing: August 31, 2015

Finally staring to catch up now that the move is over!

Today's Outgoing: July 8, 2015

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Bad news, guys. Google got rid of the awesome, nearly identical to Photoshop, photo editor it had built in and replaced it with garbage. That said, looks like we're back to ugly striped pics. :(

Good news is that Iris' envelope turned out awesome. Crystal's isn't exactly bad either, but I'm afraid Iris' upcycled children's book/Cameo addressed one is far superior. Sorry Crystal!

Today's Outgoing: June 17, 2015

New batch of missionary mail.

Totally diggin' that jelly bean encrusted cake. I made these top two envelopes from magazine ads. I'm hoping they aren't too fragile for international travel.

Pusheen is always birthday appropriate.

Today's Outgoing: June 12, 2015

And here is the first of the Where's Waldo envelopes.

Today's Outgoing: June 9, 2015

I completed a new batch of desecrated/evolved children's book envelopes! Cathleen gets to be the first recipient of the Cinderella edition. :)

Today's Outgoing: May 28, 2015

Today's Outgoing: May 27, 2015

Today's Outgoing: May 12,2015

Still learning how to part with my awesome envelopes I made out of children's books, but Nikki's worth it. ;)

Today's Outgoing: May 9, 2015

Easy DIY Watercolor Envelopes

As the subject line states, this is a really easy project. The painting process probably takes less than one minute per person, and just a couple minutes to dry. (Definitely a good option if you find you are behind on letters, but still want to have a nice touch to the letters you send.)

Headed out to Cathleen in Washington!

Today's Outgoing: April 2, 2015

Birthday cards

More missionary mail.

Feeling pleased with myself. Work was pretty busy today, but I still managed to squeeze out 2 missionary letters and 2 birthday cards! Olaf will probably arrive late, but at least he'll arrive!

I really gotta make some more cards. I am pretty cleaned out!

Mickey and Minnie Mouse Envelope

By special request, Mickey and Minnie Mouse for Jamie. :) Outgoing March 31, 2015

Stamp licking pup

Here's my latest piece of mail art. I learned recently that having your stamps adhered to the upper corner at perfectly right angles is a rule that can be broken! The trick is just to take it into the post office and kindly ask your friendly mail worker to hand cancel the envelope.

However,  my local post office always has an hour long line, and the agitated tones and scowling expressions on the faces of those workers scared me away enough that I wimped out and retreated. (Apparently the friendly mail workers were off that day.) I deposited the envelope into a drop box instead, so we'll see if it ever arrives. :-/

EDIT 04/04/2015: Turns out it arrived just fine! :)

DIY Envelopes From Used Children's Books

Thanks to Pinterest, a few weeks ago I discovered how to do make the most vibrant, colorful, awesomely illustrated envelopes; and it was even easier than I ever thought it would be! All you need is a decent, mostly scribble-free children's book full of large and interesting illustrations.

 Lucky for me, almost all of the children's books at Goodwill are just 99 cents. I was surprised that most of them were in like new condition! Plus, the paper had a nice weight and gloss to it unlike the big stacks of printed scrapbook paper I usually use. Like I said earlier, it's important to get books as large as you can find so that there is enough material to make a good sized envelope. With this Disney Princess book (about 11x14) I was able to make envelopes large enough to hold a 5x7 card.

Once you arrive home and are ready to desecrate/upcycle some beloved children's books, the real fun can begin! Step one is to remove the pages from their binding. None of my books were exactly tomes by any means, but even for being pretty thin some of the pages were sewn and others were glued. The glued pages could be gently peeled out, but the sewn pages needed to have a few threads snipped before coming loose. Overall, it was quite easy and I managed not to rip any of the pages.

 The template I used was more or less like this one. I wanted to have large rectangular flaps to include as much of the image as possible on the reverse side of the envelope.Looking at the template, you can tell you'll want to find images that have the focal point slightly above or below the center of the page if you want it to line up with the front panel of the envelope. Since I am lucky enough to have a Cameo, cranking out all of these envelopes took no time at all. However, even before my Cameo days, I discovered the time goes right by if you cut them out while watching an episode or two of LOST. ;)

My cost per envelope was 8 cents each for polar bears and 12 cents each for Disney Princesses, and will vary depending how many good pictures you can pull out of a book.  If you pay full price for a "The Stack" of printed scrapbook paper, you'll come out somewhere around 11 cents per envelope. (But who pays full price?? With my most recent acquisition of scrapbook paper, I'm at about 4 cents per envelope). You can probably do even better than that on the used books if your thrift store does special sale days too. Even though it does cost me roughly double, the envelopes, in my humble opinion, turn out more than doubly awesome than the usual printed paper variety.

Today's Outgoing: February 11, 2015

After giving some very specific directions, the intrepid Pusheen gallantly set off into the unknown in search of Nikki's mailbox. Good luck, little guy!

Zentangled envelopes

Hey everyone! Just wanted to share my earliest attempts at a Zentangle inspired envelope.

 I'm not going to call this an easy project. The concept is simple and straight forward, but it really relies on precision and detail to be any good. Naturally, high precision + detailed details = lots of time spent creating. I did this one in my down time over the course of three days at work, so I don't have an exact estimate of the time involved, but I would guess at least 3 hours. I also was armed with only a simple bic ballpoint pen which makes darkening large areas a tedious task, but I think those are really the only negatives to this project. On to the pros!

Despite the somewhat tedious feeling, Zentangle is actually designed to be a relaxing activity. I find it enjoyable on those days when my brain just won't shut up about all it's inane reminders every other second. It actually reminds me of the beautiful and amazing mandalas created by Buddhist monks. I was once lucky enough to see one in an art museum that was painstakingly crafted by carefully pouring colored sand to create the intricate design. (Can I just say I would hate to be the one monk who sneezed?) Being so deeply focused on making a precise pattern feels meditative and can ease all that brain noise.