Figured I'd just share my week of mail journaling on here at a time.
Monday, Feb 11: I received 6 pieces of mail, but only three of them had stuff that would journal well. The ones that didn't have anything were a personal swap of die cuts, I just couldn't bear putting in any on the page. The second was a large lion sticker, but that was the only thing in the mailing envelope and it was from China. The third item was a second part of my favorites swap, it was a bunch of butterfly ephemera, but didn't really work for this. The ones that did were:
A grant a wish for a stuffed animal tag, that's the main paper on the page. There's some washi and a sticker from a toss away tag, basically stuff you would throw away. The third thing was from a frozen in time tag, you send some computer printed ephemera, I included her note and the washi from the envelope.
Tuesday, Feb 12:
I received a pen pal letter in the mail, so I cut up the envelope and added the valentine she included along with some stickers.
Wed, Feb 13: I didn't receive anything.
Thursday, Feb 14:
I received a medium flat rate box full of Valentine's day gifts, so I cut apart the card she sent, added her return label and some of the stickers that were in the box.
I also received some heart tags from a swap. I put her note in here as well as a die cut she included and a sticker.
Friday, Feb 15: no mail.
Saturday, Feb 16:
I received a Love is in the mail swap. I cut out the unicorns from the mailing envelope as well as the stamps. I also included her note.
I signed up for a green pocket letter. My plan was to make it all green, but then I found all these cactus stickers I've been hoarding, so I decided to use them.
I buy a lot of cactus stickers and can't bear to use them, so when I was looking for green items and found them, thought I should use some. I like how they all came together.
The goodies:
tea, stickers, sticky notes, paper clips, washi
The back:
Found this paper with the bird's nest on it.
What I received, she packaged it in this cute folder:
I signed up for a flipbook tag in one of my groups. I really wanted to make one out of journaling cards, but the universe thought differently. I ended up altering one I got in a swap. It was an envelope style.
All folded up:
I added the ephemera piece here:
And the gold piece and stickers here:
And the stickers to this part:
And nothing to these:
Though I did add some washi on the top and bottom of the book.
The goodies:
I added some chipboard ephemera and some printed ephemera:
I thought it was pretty cute.
Here's what I received in return.
First flip:
The side flips out:
Second flip:
Not too excited about the bible quote.
The top flips down:
The director at the library I work at is retiring, she's also a friend of mine, so I made her an explosion box as her gift. I wanted to do something more book related, but realized I don't have a lot of bookish papers, so I went with flowers as the background instead. I did, take apart some pages from a book to decorate the insides. Here it is:
For the outside lid, I used some pink cardstock, added some sparkly peachy lacy trim. I added a bright seafoam green doily diecut with a purple doily, a circle diecut and a flower I got in a swap to the top. The outside of this box is brighter flowers:
First box:
Here's where I used the book pages. I took some that I thought worked for things to do in retirement. I didn't really embellish much:
The backgrounds of all of these are a botanical paper.
This one I added some cloud wood veneirs that I colored with blue ink. The picture is pretty bad.
Second box lid:
I used blue cardstock and trimmed it with some ribbon that had circles on it. The top has a white doily with a flower die cut, a rosette I received in a swap and a flower I received in a swap. The outside of this box is a map paper.
Inside second box:
Again, I used some book pages and also some journaling cards to decorate.
This one is a journaling card:
This is a book page, I realized you can't see the whole 'quote' it says grow something.
It was a bit too big for this box, the book was about 4.5" by 4.5" so I had to cut all the pages down and this one didn't work so well. I should have just cut off the flower at the top of the banners and added something else. I ended up adding some dimensional flower stickers and some butterflies to it.
This one is another journaling card.
I wanted to find a ticket to add to this one, but they were all the wrong size. The backgrounds on these are cactus paper.
The third lid:
I used a dark green cardstock for this one. I added some flower trim and embellished it a bit with some pearl centers. The top of the lid has a flower applique.
The inside:
The backgrounds on these are all a leafy paper and I used stickers to decorate, as the book pages were too big at that point.
This was a clear sticker that I added to white cardstock.
This one was a banner sticker and I added a butterfly embellishment I got in a swap.
Another clear sticker.
And a third clear sticker.
I know she'll like it, I just hope she is ok with the flowery theme.
I signed for a swap in one of my groups for a couple Vintage Valentine ATCs, thinking I'd use some actual vintage Valentine's I had.
Here's what I created:
The backgrounds (which you can't see) are actually vintage book pages, I wanted to have a background in case the valentines didn't cover the cards. The one on the left was more delicate than the one on the right, I had to use foam tape because my double stick tape just ripped it. I added some puffy stickers on top of the hearts she's growing and some sparkly heart stickers to the corners. The right one, I actually cut apart and put back together, it originally folded to have them holding hands. I added a puffy heart sticker to his valentine and some sparkly heart washi on the bottom.
Here's what I received:
I like the collage technique. Sadly they smelled very strongly of cigarette smoke. I found out putting them next to my off-brand Glade air freshener took the scent out.
Also, used another vintage Valentine to make a Valentine ATC for a tag:
I didn't really do any embellishing on this one. You can see the vintage book page background much better here, I also distressed it a bit with some red ink.
I included the rest of my vintage Valentines in the envelope:
There were extras of the heart doilies and the stickers, and the white envelope, the washi was in the envelope.
Destash tag:
I used her note and added some stickers that were in the envelope.
Favorites swap:
I attached her note with some washi from another swap. The 'princess' piece and item on the side were part of tags in the envelope.
Valentine Happy Mail:
I used her note, traced the cookie cutter she included and used some tags from the spatula and cookie cutter that were in the envelope. The washi was used on the envelope.
Vintage Valentine's ATC's:
I just cut apart the card she sent with them.
Happy mail tag:
I cut apart the envelope she send them in, added her note, the sticker that was on the envelope and some other stickers. The washi was on the envelope as well.
Heart tags:
The heart, the band and the tag were extras. The washi was used to close some bags.
Favorite color, green, tag::
The W was from a set of sticky notes, the washi tape were samples that were included. The 'sticky note' was on the package the W's came in. I also used her note.
