sent away on a snail

I searched on my blog to see the last time that I shared any of my outgoing mail with you, and without counting the January “sneak peeks” or my Christmas Etsy orders, I haven’t shared any of my outgoing postal treats since June! This is unacceptable!!! Mail art is one of my favorite hobbies, and is also a great artistic outlet for me; when I share my artful envelopes it is just like sharing a new drawing or screenprint with you! Today I’ve got some super special and clearly overdue outgoing envelopes to share. Enjoy!

sent with ♥ to Kathy Dahl: sent with ♥ to Marcus Jackson: sent with ♥ to Paula Fullerton: sent with ♥ to Jane Murray: sent with ♥ to Jaime Madallena: sent with ♥ to Nick Oostyen: sent with ♥ to Amanda McNair:

welcomed home by a pile of letters

I came back from my Mexican vacation to find a stack of letters that my neighbour had collected for me – such a nice homecoming! A few other beauties trickled in this past week since being back, and there are three that I received the day before my departure.

Barbara Wanhill (@2catsandapencil) generously treated me again with a set of stamps for my postal adventures! There was also fantastic alphabet ephemera, vintage antelope tea card, handwritten letter and more, wrapped in an acrylic painted & thread sead envelope. As always, Jenny Cutnam wrote me a lovely letter on cute animal stationery and gifted me sweet postcards and these hilarious note papers. Charlotte Vallance (@charlsvallance) drew her exhibition for me and described the blue iced cupcakes that she served – Yummy. The queen postcard she included was also delectable, and the cute little labels will be perfect for future postal parcels.Emily Orpin (@ejorpin) from South Korea sent a parcel filled with sunshine! Inside the large rectangle, there were plenty of papers and mini envelopes to discover and enjoy. Other friends who were feeling the sunshine are pals Olivia Delorme (@o_delorme) & Nick Oostyen who have been sending me color themed parcels. This week: YELLOW! Marissa Falco (@czarcastic) is a genius, and if you appreciate zines you need to find her and prepare to be amazed. I was honoured when she recently gifted me her issue #5 entitled ‘my sketchbook.’ It literally blew my mind. GET ONE NOW RIGHT HERE… you’re pretty much robbing her, it’s only 4 bucks. Kathy Dahl is the mother of one of my infamous mail art friends, who I guess was unimpressed with what her mom had been sending me recently. She ordered Kathy to create a drawing and informed her of my love of animals and nature. Kathy ordered me in her letter to “rip it up after I laughed” but I love it too much. My jaw dropped when I saw how creative Hettie Van Riesen’s first mail art reply was! She sewed a custom fabric envelope and even recycled my address from my first envelope to her, by stitching it onto the front of hers. The contents continued to flow with her creative genius as I discovered poems written on birch wood, drawings of flowers & deer and much more. Anika Starmer (@aisforanika) sent a package that contained some awesome progress in our collaborative project, which you can read more about here, as well as a gorgeous woodblock print she made years ago and came across in a studio clean up. I love it. An envelope addressed to’ jazzy jess g yo’ and sent from ‘veg-e-table fantathy’ could be from none other than my talented pal Helen Young! Inside were gems such as watercolor splotch drawings, gnarly skulls, sweet stickers and prints. Jaime Maddellena (@sendmoremail) sent me a little Easter cheer with a painted egg adorned envelope and and adorable little letter in her small print on tiny little print out stationery. Sweet holiday treat. Nicole Palmer wrote another long, heartfelt letter and included a few wedding inspiration pages and some beautiful home-made stickers. Jeannine Saylor (@saylor_made) started a new initiative for our mail art, which is ironic considering we just hit our “mail art anniversary”: we send each other postcard sized cards along with random materials. the recipient is to create a mixed media piece and is allowed to add up to 3 materials of their choice, and glue is a freebie. I’ll be sharing the results of my first creation as soon as Jeannine gets my return envelope. Tomorrow’s post will chronicle all of the beautiful little envelopes (stuffed with ephemera) that I sent around the globe and have been discovered by the addressees.

almost a letter a day

Chilly knuckled-bike rides to the post boxes yielded more mail art for me this week than it did for my pen pals. Six goodies arrived here in BC, while three envelopes I created, showed up for friends elsewhere in the world. It’s so fun to find treats in the post box… an envelope never fails to make me feel extra special and I hope my recipients feel the same way. The first to spoil me rotten was the lovely Carol Whitley (@imsilverfeather) who went way above and beyond her call of duty! The deer sticker and stamp emblazoned envelope was stuffed full of generous gifts. A beautiful hand written letter, stickers, postcards & greeting cards, magnets, pin back buttons, scrapbook papers, a feather, a zine, collected ephemera & tiny trinkets! All nature, Canadian or ‘J’ themed. Incredible amounts of awesomeness in this one, eh? I was stoked to get my first package from Sarah Hutchinson Burke (@thesecondmagpie) that had a squirrel stamp on it! She gifted me one of her awesome hand bound tea books, a project that chronicles cups of tea enjoyed with friends. So sincere and unique! Sent with the book was plenty of other fun treats: lettraset, tons of pressed flowers, seeds, beads, fabric, a mini collage, postcards, prints and some of my favorite little things: optimistic mini “Half Full” tags and matching “Half Full, Half Empty” postcard. A long-awaited envelope from my dear friend Caren Gibb blew me away as usual. First and foremost, I got the final set of pages from the Bear & Dog SEASONS book that she has been gifting me throughout the year as the weather changed. I’m excited to look for her old envelopes and read the story in full, from start to finish. Also inside was a super sweet engagement card for John & I, adorable photos of her grandchildren, illustrated postcards, animal stickers and bookmark. But wait… the most unbelievable piece of all? A screenprinted beaver pennant from 100 Mile House, BC – THE TOWN I’M LIVING IN! This piece was amazing – where the heck did she find it, and did she know I had just thrifted a similar Victoria, BC pennant at a vintage sale the other week? Love it. The Australian wonder known as Jessica Mack (@brownpaperbunny) knows I’m love drunk from my engagement, so she sent a love-themed reply including a paper back book about true love stories. A sincere congratulatory note accompanied a monogram watercolor drawing, a plethora of love themed stationery (some of which is just so adorable I can’t get over it), an oragami heart and a handcut heart paper chain. win! The sweet Katie Whittington (@aspetalsfall) replied to me and in her letter she admitted that she is struggling to keep up with mail art now that she has 8 pen pals and confessed she couldn’t understand how I do it all. To best honest, the biggest thing I like to stress when people feel intimidated or overwhelmed by mail art is that the only rule for mail art is that if you get something you must send something back. I then go on to remind them that no where in there does is list WHAT you must send, nor does it detail WHEN you must send something. I think pen pals often forget that a reply can honestly be something simple or be sent months later! Plus, Katie shouldn’t be concerned, as the mail art she sent to me was lovely: a delicate doily, fabric swatches, buttons, a hilarious crochet fashion shot, owl ephemera and a postcard of Lake Windermere in the UK. Jaime Madallena (@sendmoremail) is the perfect example to show how a simple handwritten letter in a pretty envelope can be just as exciting as a giant pile of goodies. As always some gorgeous vintage stamps (ALL ANIMALS!!!) guided this lovely letter to me, which was written on adorable blue & cream stationery with the word hello repeated. It was a nice change to recieve a letter written in Jaime’s hand instead of by her typewriter, as I find her ‘script’ quite unique and interesting. The first person to be greeted by a special envelope created by me was Marcus Jackson (@luckyjackpress)! This one was made from a dust jacket of a book called “The Man Game” with a wicked illustration of a cowboy boxing a bull/human hybrid and I plastered it with giant stickers, washi tape, rad stamps and our addresses. A big part of the contents was hunting ephemera like a fishing postcard, magazine picture of a cowboy with a big catch, an illustrated vintage add for fishing gear, a special section of a 1970′s Oudoor Life “101 Ideas for Smoother Sports” all about hunting, fishing and camping. There was a sad article about coyote killings, but Marcus’s work investigates human-caused deaths of wild creatures… plus his totem animal is the coyote. I sent him some other fun treats, stickers,  a moose print and a letter written on ‘M’ index cards. I sent Jill Griffin (@jillgriffinart) two awesome found falcon illustrations in an envelope with a falcon stamp. The bird themed continued, only more tropical with a parrot flash card and a plethora of awesome Jungle stickers! I also included a large sticker, illustrated postcards, nature colored paint sample and an autumnal leaf.  Marissa Falco (@czarcastic) loves penguins, so I had one guard her envelope along with a royal couple stamp. The coolest thing I sent miss Marissa was an ESP test book (lol) to see if she has a 6th sense!!! Also included was a Mercury ’67 Cruiser Boat add and random drawing inspired by it, a tiger beat gaga poster (cause we love her) a moose print, circular king playing card, a red maple leaf, seasame street’s BERT, a waldo postcard, I can has chezburger cat and a wicked narwhale stamp! I hope my friends enjoyed their treats because in my opinion it’s such a privilege to be treated almost daily at the post box with something beautiful instead of bills. I am a very lucky girl. But as the saying goes: with great privilege comes great responsibility… and thus I ought to start conquering my list of owed replies. Until next week, happy mailing!