Spacecat: The Case of the Empty Envelope

I recently received this phenomenal handmade envelope from Allison Anne, a mail enthusiast with whom I connected via Twitter. We'd exchanged a couple of postcards, and she sent me a letter... but alas, I only received the envelope! It appears the letter fell out en route somehow.

The envelope is so spectacular that I had to share it with you. She tells the full story on her blog, and we both blame the tape used to seal the edges. It wasn't too sticky, and on one edge the tape had come unstuck, giving the letter an escape route as it was squeezed through the mail sorting machines... or so we surmise. (I had to secure it with transparent tape for this photo.)



I'm sure it was a spectacular letter - how could it not be, transported by such a space cat? - and I'm so sorry to miss it, but nevertheless, I am delighted by this excellent envelope.

Bats cheer me up

This week I got a lovely letter from S., a pen pal in Germany, and she drew this fantastic bat on the back of the envelope! I love how the bat is holding her return address label (which also has a bat on it). What a treat! This really cheered me up. S., I still need to write you back...

Thank you all for the good wishes on my broken thumb. I wish I could bring good news, but in fact it is healing very badly, so I am having surgery on it tomorrow in hopes that I can regain mobility in the joint. I had hoped the healing process would be well underway, but now with the upcoming surgery, I am looking at another two months in some kind of cast or splint, and a lot more fresh pain tomorrow. So please forgive me if I continue to lay low here, and on Twitter... I've got my hands full just trying to deal with this injury. Thank you all for your good wishes.

Meanwhile, everyone enjoy autumn (at least those of us in the northern hemisphere), and may you all get wonderful mail in general, and especially Halloween mail.

Surely all this is not without meaning

This amazing envelope came to me from Liz, a very talented mail artist. I forgot to take a photo of the back or the contents - she included some weird and wonderful postcards, and vintage NKOTB trading cards with gum. Wow.

I love how she uses a variety of stamps, both legal U.S. stamps and artistamps and stamps from foreign countries. How awesome are those sleepy cat stamps from Japan?? And I can't quite tell where it's from, but is that a cat writing below the flag stamps?

Airmail awesome from Catwrangler

Here is another stamp-tastic envelope from Catwrangler. Man, does she have some amazing rubber stamps. How 'bout that PUG? YAY!! Also, I'm totally coveting the stamp in the bottom left corner that shows the envelopes/letters. Yay meta mail.



Par avion! Cats in boxes! Airmail deco tape! Mail happy. Oh, she writes some mighty fine letters, too. :-)

Rainbow envelope from chewy tulip

Another one of my very favorite etsy shops is Chewy tulip. Her tag line is "pickles, postcards, puppets" - what's not to love? I first discovered her shop when I did a search for "Narwhal postcard" on etsy, and her narwhals are not magical postcard is my favorite one ever. My latest order from her - because I have vowed never to be without some of her postcards - came in this wonderful rainbow-decorated envelope.



I highly recommend her pick 5 postcards/make your own custom set offering (which inspired my own, to be honest), to get a nice taste of her designs. The two horn unicorn, hey ladies turtle, and Hey! kitten designs are a few more of my favorites, along with the aforementioned narwhal, but to each her own. Go browse. Her stuff is really fun. (She has lettersets and notecards, too.) I should have photos of the actual postcards but I am blogging from my couch and it's hot and I'm lazy. Someday, I am sure you will see more of them on this blog...



Not only did this order include a sweet little note from her - and we've been exchanging postcards, too - I got this hand-drawn unicorn! Gaaah! This whole set of envelope/unicorn is now hanging above my writing desk, providing daily rainbow-unicorn letter-writing inspiration.

Red + black&white washi tape

I'm really into washi tape lately! Washi tape, for the uninitiated, is decorative Japanese masking/paper tape. You can just tear it with your hands, you don't need scissors, and it's really easy to handle. You can even remove it and replace it, and the variety of designs is really lovely. I myself am partial to the black and white patterns, but there's a lot of different options out there. I get my washi tape from Pretty Tape on etsy. I also used an official Letter Writers Alliance mailing label, but I can't link to it directly because it's a members-only purchase. (Go join!) Oh yes, and some cute cat stickers and a little sparkle-pen embellishment.



I sealed it with a sticker from Glitter Old-Time Cats and Kittens sticker book, which is full of weird gems like this one.

I've blogged a lot about postcards lately - and while it's true I've been doing more postcards than ever, I still write lots of letters, too! (It was high time for this letter post.) For a little statistics break - I don't post my sent stats regularly any more, but I still keep them for myself - June was an unusually post-ful month. I sent 104 postcards and 48 letters.

Happy summer mailing, everyone!

Another sort of penvelope

This lovely meta-decorated envelope came in from Sirpa, my favorite Finnish mail-artist pen pal. I think every one if Sirpa's letters has been a work of art - literally, as she hand-paints many of them! She took my love of pens and meta-writing themes and crafted a beautifully decorated envelope.



More nibby goodness on the back.



Here you can see a bit of her hand-painted border stationery peeking out from beneath photos of her adorable new kitty, Killi! Yay for getting a cat!

In her post "Letter to a fountain pen lover," she posted more photos of this letter, including a better one than I took of the way she painted around the edge of the paper.

I think it's so much fun to see before and after mailing photos of letters. This one survived beautifully, as mail from Finland usually does.

Penvelope

This correspondent remembered my love of (and devotion to) fountain pens, and made this fantastic handmade envelope.



In fact, they're all vintage fountain pens. Swoon!

Looking at them makes me want to pick up one of my fountain pens and go write a letter right now.

Vintage bee illustrated envelope

This vintage stationery set was one of my favorite fantastic eBay finds. The paper itself is sort of a textured pink - I haven't photographed that, as it's not all that special - but the envelopes are amazing! This is the bee design, and there are 3 others with similar styles: illustrated and printed all over both sides.



These photos are fairly true to the color - sort of a yellowish green. Of course I love the directive to "Mr. Postman."



The back of the envelope is seriously amazing! I confess I am a bit of a sucker for puns, so I love all this cheesy word-play. And I adore the bee who is lounging on top of a mushroom, brandishing a fountain pen, with a cute little ink blot below.

My favorite verse is in the pink box:
"Is writing notes a thing you love,
or do you need a 'lil shove?
I'll furnish the shove!"

Tee hee. Bee well, springtime readers.
Now buzz off and go write a letter!

Bobberdilly's cat conversation

I met this pen pal through Swap-Bot... amazing mail art, heartfelt and real and unique letters and it's just such a joy to exchange letters with this incredible artist. I probably don't deserve Bobberdilly's patience, because it took me about 6 months to respond to this letter...

You can see other letters Bobberdilly's sent me or go right to the artist's blog to see more of this fabulous artwork.

Oh yes... and Happy New Year!
May 2011 be a Good Mail Year for everyone.

A fancy package

This went out to a special acquaintance who moved on to another phase of her life. She never responded to the letter or gift, but I think she probably appreciated it anyway.



Sometimes you just gotta send something really special, even if you think you may never get a response.

My stationery is not stationary swap envelope

Way back in July, I participated in a wonderful Swap-bot swap called My Stationery is not Stationary, hosted by the lovely PostMuse. She sweetened the deal with a giveaway on her blog, too.

I knew any swap she hosted was going to be well-organized, and it sounded great, so I participated with glee. Above you see the envelope I decorated for the swap,



...plus a little glitter-pen embellishment to the deco tape. The recipient liked birds, so I used a bird theme for the stationery and used more birds on the envelope.

I miss the summertime, when I had time to decorate envelopes like that...

PostMuse later did a summary of the swap, with her wonderful follow-up, if you're looking to read more about it.

It was one of the best swaps I've participated in - thoroughly enjoyed it.

Purple cat lady envelope

It's been AGES since I posted about a sent item instead of something received, so this is long overdue. I had a crazy fun time making this envelope from a page of the crazy weird book "Why Paint Cats" by Burton Silver and Heather Busch. (You can see more of the book on Amazon.com.) It is a parody of art books, and I hope that is sort of obvious as the shots are kind of hilarious, but anyway... they make killer envelopes. I have a hard time looking at that photo without smiling.



Because of the light at the time, I scanned this instead of photographing it. So the sparkly stickers may not look their best, but you get the idea.

I sent this to some very fun people in the UK; hopefully they've received it successfully by now.

Pen-stamped envelope

This fantastic envelope came to me from a very knowledgeable fountain pen aficionado pen pal. If memory serves, I believe his wife did the stamping.



I am envious of such a fine collection of fountain-pen-themed rubber stamps! They sure jazz up an envelope nicely.

Bobberdilly's envelope critters

Here is another fantastic artistic envelope from a wildly creative and interesting pen pal. He turns stereotypes about Kansas (and hey, a large part of my own childhood was spent in Kansas, so I have a reason for my stereotypes) upside down and all around. His letters are as interesting as his artwork, but I have to say - this is pretty damn unique and interesting stuff! Yes, every envelope is a work of art. (Here's a past example of another envelope he's sent me.) You can see more of his work at his own blog, Bobberdilly.com.

Fairy stamp letter from Finland

This amazing letter came to me from the amazing and artistic Sirpa. She posted about the Finnish Fairy stamps when they first came out, and I and another blog reader kvelled over them so effusively that she made us both mail art envelopes incorporating these lovely stamps. I love how she has continued the artwork beyond the stamps. This photo doesn't do them justice - the stamps each contain a little bit of glitter in them!



On the back of the envelope she used an image of the stamps from a post booklet.

What a magical treat!

A whale for a rooster

I got this fine handmade envelope featuring a cocky rooster. Very great colors and contrast.



It had a fine red wax seal on the back...



...which looks even cooler close up.



In return, I sent an envelope with a whale and an underwater theme.



I have this great old wildlife photography book that is the perfect size for making sure the animal and photographer's name appear right at the bottom of the flap.

Kawaii kitty stationery with clear envelopes

This incredible kitty stationery came as a surprise gift from a pen pal (thanks, Carroll!!), and I am so very taken with it. I need to photograph the writing paper part, I think, but here you can see that the envelope is clear so that the design of the paper shows through. Neat-o!



I have seen glassine/vellum type clear envelopes in the past that are some kind of paper, but these envelopes are actually plastic. No ripping these guys! It does take a special sort of pen to write on them, but that's okay, I've got some handy, of course.



This is the perfect medium for Sakura Glaze gel pens, which write with a thick plastic-type ink that dries to a glossy, textured surface, which I think I captured pretty well in this photo. One must write very slowly with the pens to get a nice, thick ink line, but it's a sort of zen experience, writing an address really slowly.

Envaccordion!

This is truly one of the most incredible handmade envelopes, letters, and pieces of mail art I have ever received. Ever. The lovely Bianca of Goodnight Little Spoon sent me this amazing "envaccordion" a while back, and I absolutely cannot believe how much energy and creativity she put into it. She did a very fascinating blog post about how she put the whole thing together - I highly recommend a visit if you're plotzing over this beauty as much as I still am. (Warning: extremely photo-heavy post!)



I am so glad she included clear "how to open" instructions, complete with easy-to-remove tape. I made sure to photograph this before I sullied anything by opening... but it was actually quite easy to open and unfurl.



Here's the view inside the first opened flap.



It's a bunch of envelopes glued together by the flaps, and each one flips down to reveal the next one.



So of course I photographed every step of the unfolding process.



The details! The colors! The harmonious patterns!



Each envelope had one page of a letter, one ad postcard (they were all quite beautiful), and one bit of extra - a tag, a teabag, a sticker...



So here you see the whole long thing, from the envelope-open side.



And here are descending bits...



...of the incredibly fascinating...



...backs of the envelopes!



And finally, the whole long chain of the backs of the envelopes.

Wow.

If you had fun reading this and looking at the pretty pictures, and especially if you're wondering how the heck she made this, do have a look at her blog post about it. It is nearly as fun and illuminating as the envelope itself.

(Wombat stamp! Can you see the wombat stamp in the first photo? Squee!)