Fine Finnish stamps: Miau mail!

Gorgeous stamps from #Finland on a recent #postcrossing #postcard #Suomi #swan #reindeer #cat #received #showandmail #snailmail #gold #metallicgold #foreignpostage #postagestamp @postcrossinghq

A post shared by Missive Maven (ilona) (@missivemaven) on Jul 7, 2017 at 6:44am PDT

I received a Postcrossing postcard recently with these fine stamps - I had to take a video of the swan stamp to show off the metallic gold. It also included the adorable "miau mail" priority sticker, and a marvelous reindeer stamp, too.



Here's the front of the postcard, a lovely image of a Siberian cat. Thank you, Tiina, for this wonderful Postcrossing treat!

Silver Halloween letter

Yes yes, I am terribly behind in blog posts. I'm working my way through October letter photos now. So, here we have one of my more decorative and exciting Halloween letters! I do hope the metallic silver envelope went through with no problems, along with the day-glo green gel pen ink for the address. (That ink isn't totally waterproof, so I covered it with tape.) The envelope features some of my favorite Halloween stickers, and is being modeled by a cute bendy skeleton I got from one of the Letter Writers Alliance RSVP Halloween packages.



Naturally, Soda had to get in on the photographic action. I took a bunch of her with this letter - she seemed really to like this one especially - but in an effort not to barrage you with a million Soda pictures, I just picked my favorite.



And ta-daa! - the back. I love those stickers that make a play on words with favorite alcoholic beverages and spooky imagery... skin and tonic! Eyeball highball! HA!

More spooky Halloween letters and postcards to come in future posts... because I know a lot of you readers, just like me, love Halloween year 'round.

Metallic ink powder calligraphy on black paper

One of my pen pals is an artist who writes every letter in calligraphy with a flexible-nib dip pen. She often uses these marvelous metallic powders (dip pens only, not for use in fountain pens) for sparkly flair.

After a conversation on The Fountain Pen Network (FPN), she sent me this letter, which was even more a work of art than usual!



The theme at the time, of course, was Halloween - I love the artistic embellishments!



I'll end with two different views of the same section, so you can see the different sparkles and the orange undertones of the metallic powders (I hope).



And in case you're wondering... NO, I can't do this myself! :-)

Giddily pleased with 3-color gel pens

Here we have a recent Edward Gorey postcard I sent, called "She danced on the sands Giddily" from "The Glorious Nosebleed," an Edward Gorey postcard book from Pomegranate Books. I am posting more about the embellishment than the postcard itself. Look closely, or view large, and you'll see I added some "color" to the ends of her scarf, her turban and the tips of her feet. (Yes-yes, I know, I'm not terribly creative or artistic, but it was fun.) I did this just for an excuse to play with my new Zebra Super-Marble 3 Color Changing Gel Ink Pens from JetPens. They're gel pens filled with 3 different colors, so you never know what blend of the three is going to come out of the pen. It's a heck of a lot of fun. Take a look at the JetPens description to get a view of the Blue-Purple-Red pen (scroll down for full effect and photos), which in my opinion is more of a pink-purple pen in practical application.



I have 3 of these pens, and above you can see each used differently for writing (or underlining, in the case of "Giddily"). These puppies are SO much fun, and they look different on light and dark papers. For a buck-fifty each, I'm hooked.

And hey - for once, I'm not taking about fountain pens!

JB's gorgeous letters

One of my correspondents makes letters that look like calligraphy throughout. She uses a flexible-nib dip pen with ink using metallic powder, which cannot be used in fountain pens because it will clog the pen.

Her letters are works of art! I won't post the text for privacy, but here is the date of her last letter. I tried in this photo to capture how this metallic powder, which she said is called "scarab," alternates from red to green based on the angle of the light. Amazing.

Best viewed large for full effect.

metallic sparkle letter bliss

This truly amazing decorative letter came from Wolfidy, who actually APOLOGIZED for not having cool stationery - whereas I think the home-made original doodles are better than any printed product! Wow. I held this under the light just admiring the metallic gel pen ink for quite a while.

It featured an awesome purple/silver salutation:


and a bat doodle which I love.


Hooray for snail mail! This letter, of course, made my day.