Good mail day from PodPost maven

I'd love any card from Carolee of Make Every Day a Good Mail Day and PodPost (as in, one of the amazing authoresses of Good Mail Day itself), but this one is particularly meta-mail-alicious.



As if the envelope isn't cool enough already, dig that rubber stamp of a chicken on a nest of letters!



I am predisposed to like any card with a mailbox on it, and not only did this one have a little slot where you could put in various included sayings, it's also edged to look like a stamp.



AND, the back is edged with the postally perfect red and blue airmail border. *sigh of contentment*



I took a close-up photo of the card info, but don't be thinking you can just whip on that website and find out whatever you want to, because it's a #$^@#%$ division of Random House and deeply ridiculous to navigate. I couldn't find a damn card set, and I know they make a ton. So pooh on you, Clarkson Potter / PotterStyle printed in China / Division of Random House publishing, if your website made more sense (hello, I search for stationery and I get two books and no writing products?) perhaps I would make a purchase. Is this why the publishing industry is in so much trouble?

Sorry, rant there... just really hate bad websites. But back to the cardly goodness - this was such a treat!

{Edit: I do understand how to get around the Random House / Potter Style website, dear readers, and I can find the cards I need to... I was just complaining that the was poorly organized and clunkier than necessary. And so out of spite, I am deliberately not linking them up here. I have received scads and scads of comments telling me how to get to the cards and giving links - I've approved one of them and that's enough. Because it's so much easier to find them on Amazon, though, I'll provide that link for any interested readers.}

Handmade meta letter envelope

I made this envelope for Carolee, one of the fabulous authors of Good Mail Day, in response to one of her lovely notes. I found this page in an old book about how things work - this page came from the section on how a letter gets mailed. I loved the fountain pen, of course.



I still feel like such a beginner at making my own envelopes, but it's a lot of fun!

GMD zine: the making of

It is entirely possible that my love-fest for Good Mail Day may never end. It certainly won't, if they keep sending me such lovelies!

In this fabulous meta mail art envelope, they sent me a zine about the making of the book.



It was delicious, and I probably should have taken more photos of it before I filed it away in the place where happy mail goes.



Of course it was chock-full of meta-mail goodness. Those PodPost Goddesses rock.

Envelope for GMD Faux Post Giveaway

When I saw this post on the Good Mail Day blog, I fell in love with the "special delivery every day" faux postage. And those awesome gals, they said they had a few to give away if you sent them a SASE! So I did, but of course I had to pretty up the envelope for them. We've seen this goatmail stamp recently, but I don't know if I've shown off this combination of vintage postage stamps yet.



On the back I used a vintage air mail POD label from 1957.

On another note, thanks to my laptop, I can blog from the road! I'm not at home to get my mail right now, but I'm with family in the Midwest for Thanksgiving. In fact, I'm writing this blog entry from a hotel lobby.

Happy Thanksgiving to all my American blog readers!

Good post package, direct from PodPost

How awesome are the PodPost princesses? They saw my blog post salivating over this wonderful postcard I received from PostMuse, and as a way of thanking me for the mini-review I did of their book Good Mail Day, Carolee sent me this little envelope...



...full of those fine postcards!



I was kvelling and plotzing all at once, I tell you, to get such a rich and lovely gift. More eye candy:



Now I have mailbox postcards, to fill mailboxes...



...with this awesome and uplifting quote.



Make every day a good mail day!

Fan mail art for Good Mail Day

A little while back, I kvelled over Good Mail Day. See that link for all kinds of nifty info on how to buy this awesome Mail Art book. Before I read it, I never would have called myself a mail artist. Sure, yeah, I decorate things, but I'm not an artist. Then I started reading the book, and I got totally inspired.



So I made this fan mail/mail art postcard to send to the fabulous gals who were responsible for the book. (OF COURSE they put their mailing address in the book so readers could do this very thing.)



We all know I can't really draw, so I went for a simple idea of various ways of punctuating "I love the book" written all over the back of an airmail postcard, in one of my ever-awesomeZebra Super-Marble 3 Color Changing Gel Ink Pens (about which I blogged so merrily in July). Then I drew over that and filled in a larger slogan with glitter glue. I think this photo, above (after about 15 different angles and attempts!) actually shows off the many glitter colors pretty well. (And if you have a Flickr account and can actually view large, you'll see it even better. But I know not everyone can access that. Sorry.)



And here's the "Star Wars view" angle. Yay, mail art with mail art book! I know I'm but a novice, but I have to say this was a lot of fun. I know I'd really get a kick out of pulling something like this out of my mailbox.



Finally, behold the front of this vintage air mail postcard, which even oh-so-meta-ly features an air mail plane. I'm pretty sure I added some silver glitter to the front of the card, but I forgot to photograph that before it landed in a mailbox.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, in my previous post about this book, that the creators of this book have an excellent blog, Make Every Day a Good Mail Day - check it out!

Then go make some interesting mail.

Go buy this book right now!

So I normally just hawk stationery products and stuff you can use for letter-writing, but this book definitely falls under the umbrella of "stuff you can use for letter-writing" so I'm going to share my immediate postal excitement about it.

I preordered "Good Mail Day: A Primer for Making Eye-Popping Postal Art" by Jennie Hinchcliff and Carolee Gilligan Wheeler a few weeks ago. It wasn't due to be released until Sept. 6, but it came early and was waiting for me today.

I had reservations about whether or not I should buy this book, because I figured I pretty much know the scene for pen-palling and have my own happy style already, and some of the promo materials make it sound like a how-to guide. Also, I am a mail enthusiast but not a mail artist; I'm not much into art for art's sake and prefer the communication of a letter of postcard. (Bracing for attack from mail artists now) BUT, this book is just great for any postal enthusiast, from the beginner to the advanced. Not only does it include envelope templates and suggestions on where and how to find pen pals, but it's got great resources for supplies and other things, the writing is very witty, and the photos are inspirational and beautiful. Just go buy it. Oh, it's listed as a paperback, but the cover is kind of cardboardy and it's really more sturdy than I expected, too.

If you're unsure, definitely have some fun at their blog, Good Mail Day. (It's been linked in my "letter blogs" sidebar for a while.)

I haven't even finished reading it yet, but I've paged through it and am (obviously) just ridiculously excited about it.

A 5-letter day

Tuesdays are supposed to be the slowest mail days of all, yet I got FIVE letters today - hooray! One was a Christmas card but it had a nice note so I'll let it count.