september snail mail

This year has flown by, but this month especially so. Life is in full swing now that summer is over and since I started working a part-time gig during the day; blogging, of all things, seems to have gotten away from me… but I am hopeful that I will make a conscious effort to share more of my on-goings this week and in weeks to come. It has been too long since I have chronicled some of my snail mail adventures, so writing up this post seemed to be the right thing to do. Above is my beautiful mailbox where all of my postal pleasures arrive and below are half of the mail art goodies I’ve recently received. with ♥ from Heather McGowan (@heathemcgowan)with ♥ from Kimi Kobashi (@kimikobashi)with ♥ from Pagrum Boon with ♥ from Jill Griffin (@jillgriffinart)with ♥ from Kristine Hajas with ♥ from Kira Walker (@gali_gal)

I’ve been busy in my attempts to reply to the stacks of incoming mail, as you can see in the photo above of my messy mail art desk. I’m looking forward to sharing some new outgoing nature’s my friend treats, creations and letters, plus documenting 4 more packages from beloved pen pals! Until the next mail art post, happy letter writing.

happy postboxes all over the world

After creating a flurry of replies during my holidays, for the 22 people I owed mail art to, packages have now begun arriving in mailboxes around the entire world. Marcus Jackson (@luckyjackpress) got a real gem from me that I was SO proud to send his way: The Deer Hunter’s Bible, complete with BB gun shot holes from target practice. I added a few goodies to the front cover and decided to send the book as is by, sealing the edges with airmail tape, and adding hunting-esque vintage postage stamps & a typewritten address. I wrote a lovely little postcard to Kira Walker (@gali_gal) with a festive holiday fox on the front drawn by Helen Macdonald. I’m glad this treat as well as a fun order from my etsy shop showed up recently to give this deserving girl a big smile. It makes me feel happy to send rainbows off to Rhya Tamasauskas (@rhyat) who often sends me more than my fair share of postal sunshine. Hannah Montana stickers and magnets, Minney Mouse rainbow card, triplicate owl drawings, and a typewritten letter on one of my holiday advice cards are the surprises she found hidden in a rainbow and cloud adorned envelope.For Tessa Brown (@talulabblogger), I found a hilarious section in a tiger beat magazine called Fashion OMGS, which I thought she would have a chuckle about. I sent clothing themed stickers and paper ephemera, a mother flash card, an illustrated postcard and an info card. I sealed it all inside a animal kingdom envelope with vintage postage stamps.  Valeria Poropat (@valeriadraws) was gifted one of the prints from my first ever intaglio edition. The image is of a tower in Italy, a photo I took when I visited in 2004. It made sense for my Italian pen pal to own one… I sent along a bunch of fun stickers and wrote on a postcard for her then had to add quite a few stamps to the envelope to get it there. Sarah Hutchinson Burke (@thesecondmagpie) got an envelope that had to fly all the way to Ireland, but luckily it had a lot of wing-power inside: three bird postcards (2 of my designs), bird postage stamps, bird stickers, big bird flash card, bird covered mini card, book & magazine bird cut outs and a little graphite portrait.Jenny Cutnam is a doll who I met at the OOAK show. She was there working for a friend who was also a vendor and she ended up purchasing one of a my large scale etchings of a fox (“Curled Up”). We instantly had a connection and I was excited to hear that she is also into snail mail. I started our pen pal relationship with a little letter, some funny postcards, garfield cartoons, stickers, a/p screenprints and a red maple leaf. Nick Oostyen & Olivia Delorme (o_delorme) found a plethora of silly items in their postbox this past week: grafitti stickers, cookie monster flash cards, drug facts for young people (since they are living alone in Victoria, they need to be educated on these things), world map stickers, music & record ephemera (Nick collects vinyl), an illustration that looks like the Oostyen family greenhouse and a couple nature’s my friend badges. I wrote ACAD buddy Amy Liebenberg (@amygillian) a letter on a screenprint proof of my animal kingdom piece and sent it along with french matchbox stickers, typewriter poetry about printmaking, and blank postcards. I sealed it all up in an air-mail color themed envelope covered with Christmas and Canadian pride stamps.And lastly, this morning Anna Gwenllian (@annagwenllian) found her Birth of Adam parody envelope which contained a screenprint of our glorious queen Liz, a handbound mini notebook, postcards,matchbox stickers, paper ephemera and typewriter poetry! It feels so good to start the new year spreading my love out across the globe to friends near and far with snail mail! I hope you all loved your treats… tomorrow I’ll be sharing what I discovered this past week in my postbox.

final postal pleasures

As I am headed to Vancouver on Tuesday, there will be a mail art hiatus for 2 weeks, so get your fill while you can with this final snail mail chronicle! My Italian pen pal Valeria Poropat (@valeriadraws) is always so sweet to me by gifting many generous things from her wonderful home country. This time I was spoiled with: a beautiful drawing on rag paper, a fold out pack of postcard images of Venice, vintage stamp, fake million  dollar bill, a sweet note and an incredible stationery set with gold leaf and peacock pattern. Alistair Gow, my dear scottish friend and fellow printmaker, treated me with the longest, loveliest letter filled with so many kind words, exciting tidbits, and just general love from across the pond! Not to mention the fact that he gifted me several prints: one of which is the loveliest color lithograph I have ever had the privilege of putting my hands on. Su Ying Strang is up to her usual fantastic tricks and wrote me two lovely pieces of fiction inspired by found images and tucked them into a decorated envelope. One was a portrait of Judy: night & day (aka moral lesson about drugs haha) while the other was a story about the life of pig farmer Jeremiah. What an imagination! Kira Walker (@gali_gal) is a great pen pal; we have been writing some beautiful letters to each other. This time she also added in a fold out map of Norwich, so I could see where she lives. Cute little “rainy london town” type stickers were in there as well. Jaime Maddellena (@sendmoremail) used her typewriter to write me a message on the back of a postcard about a holiday craft fair she is participating in. She wished me lots of luck at OOAK and I wish her the same at the upcoming Handmade Holiday event.  Jill Griffin (@jillgriffinart) expressed her new found love of washi tape thanks to me. (I can only assume it was my ‘washi wonders’ post that prompted her recent tape shopping spree). The envelope was decorated with washi, and inside was a tape sampler from her little daughter, and paper rosettes trimmed by washi as well as lovely stickers, paper ephemera and a little mini book of doodles!To those of you who are planning to send to me, or to those who already have and are waiting for it to arrive, fret not as I have the post office holding my mail (so all mail art will be well guarded during my absence!!!) When I return home I am looking forward to diving into more recently arrived letters not to mention my own stationery, stamps, ephemera and envelopes when I get to writing my many owed replies. For now I hope you enjoyed the last 6 mail art replies that spoiled me during my final week of preparations for one of the biggest art shows of my life!