Mountain Musings...And Letter Writing

What is your source of inspiration?

These pictures are from a vacation a year and a half ago. I had been meaning to write a blog post using them but never did.  But looking at these pictures (in my draft file) got me thinking about a subject that writers often talk about.  What is the source of your writing inspiration?  If you are a letter writer, you are a writer. And letter writers, like book,or magazine writers, get into slumps.  What do you do?  Well, whenever there is a vacation planned, I take the opportunity to use that time to "recharge" .  I try to  reflect a bit and see what is new in my life or maybe what I have learned.  Even a change of scene is invigorating! Maybe that will get you thinking in a new direction!  Maybe it will slow you down enough to actually spend some quality time  to write letters!  Look at that view we had EVERY DAY!  This was just a breath-taking view and plain awe-inspiring.  If you are curious, this was in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.    It was a family vacation, and the house was HUGE!  It slept something like 40 people, but we "only" had 27 of us, I believe.  That included I think 11 or so grand kids, so just imagine Legos and all sorts of kid toys scattered everywhere on this carpet.  Ha, ha, I swept them away temporarily for the purpose of this photo.  :-)

This was the summer that was just after  the Pigeon Forge fire...literally 5 months.  Up the treacherously steep and narrow road (which gave me a near panic attack--no kidding!) there were countless slabs of cement where recently stood majestic cabins.   The above photo shows how  the fire had nearly  surrounded this house.  This mountain top was just to the left of our house for the week.  I wanted to shout, "HALOOOO" to our mountain neighbors....

I took along my tea stash and literally just enjoyed sipping my tea and gazing at God's glorious creation. It's nearly impossible to see this site and not think about God and his goodness and mercies.  I also took my mobile writing kit and did pen a few letters.    What about you?  What keeps you focused and writing?

Give Your Brain A Vacation

Go visit a friend

take your tea

Enjoy!

Pam

Incoming Autumn mail (late post)

My Happy Mail Box!

I am sorry to be so behind on posting incoming mail.  But here are two of my most recent.

This cute little Halloween Letter made it to me rather late because it was sent to my old address.

But, because we live in the most efficient  postal  country in the world...it was delivered to me after a little visit at my former home in the country.   Laura is a Pinterest folllower, and if my stats tell me ANYTHING....there are a lot of you out there! ;-)   Laura is a calligrapher...and her work is beautiful! Thank you so much, Laura, I will be writing you soon!

The beautiful autumn themed envelope was from my dear friend , Elaine!  She is one of my super talented card making whizzes!  I absolutely love to be on the receiving end of one of her beautiful cards.  She has recently started selling her cards locally at a local book shop.  She should do very well!

My Incoming Mail Pile

Is in sorry need of

me to start

writing

back.

!

Pam


Pen Pal Kit

Envelope Watercolors...Autumn

The air is cold and crisp.  The trees are losing their leaves faster than I can rake them up, and I find myself drinking hot tea by the gallons... It's time to get out the paints and start dabbling away.  First, I must caution you.  I am a complete amateur, I really don't know what I am doing...but hey!  Watercolor is a friend to all.  I must warn you also, that trying to do any blending on regular paper is next to impossible.  If you try your hand at watercolor (and I completely urge you to do so...) you might find yourself a bit frustrated because if you work on anything but watercolor  paper you will have a big puddle of wavy paper.  So, this is about the best I could do with the paper envelopes I had.  I did find a link to watercolor envelopes, but they were outside of my budget for now.  If anyone wants to go in halvsies let me know!  :-)  

Here is one going out to Sheryl!  The nice thing about pumpkins...they are so naturally irregular that they are very forgiving to budding artists. :) I love the postage on this letter!

 

 

 This particular study.... I'm pretty sure that I overworked it a bit.  Ah...there is always next time!

I love this sweet little watercolor birdie with its cauliflower bloom  on it's breast!  haha.  Oh the joys of watercolor!  I think that the postage on the birdie envelope is my favorite!

Here is some of my top pics of  washi tape that I am using right now on outgoing snailmail!

 

 I do almost all of my work at my desk.  It's not usually so neat and clean, I think I dumped everything onto the floor for this picture  so you wouldn't see how messy I really am.  

Well, I think that wraps up the autumn themed snail mail that I sent out this week.   What are you sending out?

Happy Snail Mailing,

Pam

P.S.

Free Shipping on all my letter writing kits through December!!!

Pen Pal Kit

Well...hello, it's been awhile...

 

It's been almost a year ago that my "life event" occurred.  My dear husband of 34 years passed away from an illness, and my life took a sudden turn.  My charmed life of a wife, mother to 10 beautiful children and grandmother, now looked different. I was physically alone and making all the decisions.  Facing challenges, duties, and mundane items that I never had to bother with prior to this event. Notice, I said "physically".  I thank God that I serve a Lord that has promised to never leave me or forsake me.(Hebrews 13:5) But still...it has been a year of adjustments...change...and just struggle.  But, slowly one learns what one must do and as Elisabeth Elliot used to say  just "Do the next thing..."!  This simple advice has carried me through the long year and for that I am grateful.  

So many of you have sent cards and letters of love and precious thoughts.....I have so appreciated this.  I tried countless times to answer them...I did manage a few attempts, but I still have several letters that I wrote...never sent.  Finally I submitted to my relegated season of life  and focused my attention on the immediate, the necessary...life.  

I still face new challenges (who doesn't?).  I now use  youtube , not just for pleasure, but how to fix items around the house, and if that fails...I call a professional! But the sun still comes up, and I find myself falling peacefully into bed each night.  Thank you Lord!

All this to say...I hope to get started with letter writing again.  So, first things first...my desk!  This is where it all happens, so I want my supplies at my finger tips...and whatever inspiration I can find.  (More on that later-- it's still a work in progress) .  So here is a picture  (sorry it was taken at night) of my desk as it stands right now.  Leave a comment below if you have any questions about my set up.  Also, if you love your desk and find it to be a happy place for you, tell me why in a comment!

Check back later this week to see my outgoing snail mail!

Happy Snail Mailing.

Pam

Pen Pal Kit

I've Got The Blues: Snail Mail Flipbook

This is one of my small, simple to make flip books ....you can find more examples of this style of flip book here.  Need some more inspirations?  Try this link...  

Just a few things I put inside my flip book...actually I should probably call them "fold overs"...what do you think they should be called?

Happy Snail Mail Inspiration!

Pam

*Available In My Shop*

Pen Pal Kit

This Little Mail Man...Snail Mail Postal Theme

Who Wouldn't Like to receive this cutie in the mail? 

I absolutely LOVED receiving this super creative , vintage postal themed envelope and long, chatty letter. This was from a pal  I met at the DC Postal Meet Up, organized by Global Pen Pal!  Carrie is a great creative talent in the snail mail community.  You can follow her work on Instagram:  

Carriejojo212. She pumps out mail like no one's business, and ALL of it good mail!

Urgent!!!  I needed to get something out to Carrie...and I decided to  continue the vintage postal theme!  I grabbed one of my vintage children's readers and  was thrilled to find a picture of "Mr. Postman"!!   Then I had to get out my post office stamps, and vintage stamps...and here you have it!

And this cute photo  as a pair!  Yay!  We LOVE our post women AND men!

Happy Snail Mailing,

Pam

*Available In My Shop*

Pen Pal Kit

Pen Pal Letter Set

Hey Girl, Hey...Snail Mail Antics

Hey Girl!

Michele always sends such wonderful mail to me...I needed to get busy. As cappuccinoandartjournal would tell us..."to get good mail,  you gotta send good mail"!  The pressure was on.  The group from the " D.C. Postal Meet Up" are some serious mail artists.  And here I am just doing my cutesie, crafty little thing over  here in my corner of the world...but not these folks. They are into all their cool artistic techniques churning out mail nearly EVERY day.  I'm slow folks. And the pressure was on.    So this is what I came up with for Michele who sent me this GREAT mail pictured below...

Isn't her "stamp head" spot on?  She is just oozing talent in very direction!!  So much fun to receive such great mail!  Thank you Michele.  You can follow Michele on Instagram:  mbcano1.

My son , Benji, went off to camp for a week this summer.  I tried to find something that a teenage boy would not be  too embarrassed to receive.  I think I asked him weeks after he was home from camp (when I remembered to ask) if he ever received the letter... he said, "oh yeah, mom".  Ha, I guess he appreciated it.

Have fun with your outgoing mail...put a smile on the postal carrier's face!

Pam

*Available In The Shop!*

Pen Pal Letter Set Kit

Incoming Stationery Haul....

Parcels are so much fun to receive, right?  

This nice big envelope arrived in the mail from Global Pen Pal.  (And I have NO idea why her cute envelope is upside down in each picture!) She was so thoughtful to send me her nice de-stash of stationery.  

For those of you not familiar...this stationery comes from the Victorian Trading Post.

I try to send "global" themed mail to Global Pen pal whenever I can.

And of course...a letter also!  Speaking of which...If you have written me, I am attacking my pile as quickly as possible.  More posts coming on YOUR beautiful snail mail!

Happy Snail Mailing!

Pam

*Available in My Esty Store*

Pen Pal Letter Set Kit

How To Make A Calendar Envelope

Re-Purposing Calendars into Mail!

I was in Dollar Tree today and I happened to see the boxes of calendars for sale.  I like making envelopes from calendars so I took a closer look.  try to find pictures that have a small to repeating design, so that it will be able to be used on an envelope. Florals usually work well, and I have made some with landscapes.  The problem with land scape calendars is that they are hard to get the center of the picture where you want it. I I liked what I saw so I picked up two.

My smaller template for envelope making has been missing for some time, so I decided to make an envelope template out of this thin sheet of cardboard.  I took an envelope size that I thought would work with the size of my calendar sheets, then opened it up to trace around the envelope.

Here is the finished template.

Don't forget to make the folding guide piece for your envelope. This is the template that is the size of the finished envelope.   It will help you to make the folds where they need to be.

You can use a creasing tool to make sharper folds.

Then a little glue to glue the flaps in place.

First batch of envelopes are just about finished!

Since the envelopes are so flimsy, I decided to add a liner to the envelopes.  Just use any paper that compliments the envelope's primary color.   A.C. Moore carries the sturdier , thicker paper calendars for a dollar , but I haven't seen them out yet...check that store after the New Year.

Here is the second batch of calendar envelopes.  I really like how this one turned out, a very nicely centered yellow rose!

All done!  24 envelopes made in just one sitting!

I thought I was done, until I noticed the back of the calendar pack.  I thought maybe I could do something with the mini pictures of the calendar pages...

I'm rather undecided as what to do with them...book marks?  Tags?  What would you do with them?

Hope this gets you interested in making your own calendar envelopes.

Happy Snail Mailing,

Pam

*Available In The Shop*

Sunshine Mini Kit

Outgoing And Incoming Mail.....

A little of this and that....

A couple of outgoing Flip Books....I make sure to enclose them in a cello bag so that they will not get damaged along the postal route.

Some fun out going postal philately!  

I absolutely adore Yapping Cat Studios!  Cindy is an artist , using acrylics and water colors.  Her work is amazing, and I am  an undying fan!  She recently posted this tiny acrylic book on her instagram feed:  yappingcatstudio. (you won't regret following her for a daily does of inspiration!) I wanted it so badly...and you know....she actually sent it to me!  Pinch me!  Anyway, she of course wrapped it in a beautiful way and I just adore it.  I have placed it on the top of my desk for inspiration!  Thank you again, Cindy!

I can't help myself!!!  When sales happen, I just can't resist!  Look at these beauties!  I can't wait to start putting these to use!  Washi tape just adds that certain little touch to any envelope  or plain piece of paper.  So if you are in a hurry and don't have time to make a flip book, or anything else.  Get your Washi tape stash out and put it to good use!

Happy Snail Mailing

Creative Ideas YOU  Can Use!

Pam

*Available In The Shop*

Complete Children's Letter Writing Kit