New Year's Eve

Collage sent to the Artist in Seine, a long overdue response to mail art he sent me in June.

And mimicking his style, I even added something to the address side.

Celebrate with restraint...

...in all the shades of blue.

Sent to Momkat.

Bonus Christmas Mail

Some great mail arrived on Christmas Eve, so not enough time to blog it.

A December envelope for Jean and Jan's exchange from Eric...

...and Eric sent me a beautiful Christmas card...

...which had a fun Santa postage sticker on the envelope.

More surprises arrived on the 26th. Large Christmas and New Year's wishes from Tony M.

With a cool personalized postage stamp on the front...

and neat rubber stamping on the back.

Thanks, everyone, it was wonderful to receive such great mail around the holidays.
_________________

Bonus video. I have a link on the right side to OpenInkStand Calligraphy. For her Christmas mail, Schin Loong sent out her cards addressed in the shape of a santa face. How I'd like to be on her Christmas list! Here is a video she uploaded showing her work.

December exchange part 1

I sent out hand made envelopes numbered 630, 631, 632, 634 and 635 for the December exchange. Any guesses what they're made from?

Cows and stars

A Christmas postcard  came in yesterday's mail from Eva. When I saw them on Eva's blog on Christmas Eve I thought they were a set of commercial cards, however Eva took the photos herself from her mum's nativity scene that Eva has known since she was a child.

The stamps Eva used are seasonal, from 2014. The A rate one has a foil application that you can't completely appreciate from this photo.  The religious Christmas stamp is the only one each year where all 4 official languages in Spain are on the stamp.

And the B rate stamp is a special one - here it is before...

...and after letting it sit near a lightbulb for heat for a while, the thermal ink is activated.

I wonder of this card had a little mail adventure of its own? It was postmarked by Correos  in Spain on  Dec 9, then again in Tampa, Florida on Dec 21.

Thanks, Eva, for such great Christmas mail. 

And thanks to all the people who have stopped by for Sunday Stamps this year. You can see more of people's favorite stamps by going here.

I hope you all had a nice Christmas!

Mice

Envelopes 640, 642 and 643 sent to Cara, CJ and Karen. Made from last year's unused wrapping paper.

Advent - eni looka

So far I've picked two blog posts from each of the 12 months (Dec 14 to Nov 15), so now we're at the last day (can't believe I made it - it was more work than I thought it would be), I've chosen one extra piece that I love.

Eni Looka received all the mail from the 5th World Day of Faux Stamp Artists in 2014. In 2015 he sent out this fantastic, large piece. It has a beautiful artists stamp by Eni in  the middle, and arrived without any real postage, just the large T in the corner. It came with other nice things, too.

Let me know if you enjoyed the advent idea - if you did, I may give it a go again next year.

A December Puffin for Christmas

This arrived from Heleen with perfect timing, and with two of the amazing December stamps that I've raved about twice this month - including my favorite one, the fox.

There are three ways to look at this.

First, the puffin right side up.

Second, the address side up.

Third, the way that the PostNL machine looked at it.

And another puffin inside - I feel that perhaps you can never have enough puffins!

Thanks so much, Heleen, you made my Christmas mail week very special.

Merry Christmas! 

And if you don't celebrate Christmas, I hope your day is a peaceful one.

Advent - bananas

I think the Banana mail group over at IUOMA is one of the most fun ones. Twice a year or so, a group mailing occurs to celebrate the world banana days. There is just something fun and crazy about banana-themed mail.

Here are some of the arriving banana faces I sent out last month, posted by the recipients: MomKat, Heleen and Artist in Seine.

Eric's plaid reindeer

If you're in the USA you may recognize this plaid guy.

Advent - collaboration

I've mentioned before that collaboration isn't really my thing, and doesn't come naturally to me. However, I have really enjoyed my collaboration with Keith C this year. I currently owe him the next addition, but in the meantime you can enjoy all of the updates so far this year.

My favorite is this spider he drew - it looks real!

Keith is also a master of envelopes - this one is one of my all-time favorites.

The first couple of December exchange envelopes are here

Just in time for Christmas...

This beautiful calligraphy bird arrived from Jean R.

And Charley Brown (this is my favorite of the 10 stamps) and shadow writing from Jean.

Advent - Halloween

Be careful if you click this link to all the Halloween-related posts in the blog - it does include the zombie calendar page envelopes!

Elizabeth O posted the envelope I sent to her on her Instagram page, where it was a (minor) hit. Only 314 days to go until Halloween 2016 - you've been warned.

Snow on Mt Olympus

Christmas mail art from Momkat. And a beautiful origami bird on the stamp.

Advent - United Nations

This was the year I found out the UN has its own postal service (but only from UN territory in New York, Geneva and Vienna) and issues its own postage stamps - in the six official UN languages. On a trip to New York I went there to send some postcards.

Envelope 126 to DKULT

Sent to DKULT

Advent - summer harvest

The Summer Harvest stamps is one of my favorite sets from  USPS in 2015. They definitely influenced the creativity in envelope exchanges and other mail art. This one from Carol C blew me away when it arrived, not only for the great colors and composition, but also for the patience in getting these labels of fruit and containers so neatly.

Camels on Sunday Stamps

Today's Sunday Stamps theme is religion on Christmas stamps.

My favorite from USPS in recent years is the Christmas Magi stamp. How can you not enjoy seeing camels on stamps? And the colors are great. 

This stamp is the second in a series (two so far - maybe there'll be a third in 2016). Here's the first - the Holy Family Christmas stamp, issued in 2012 and reissued in 2013.

Not that I can use them, I do like the impressionist art of Royal Mail's Christmas stamps this year, particularly the camel on the £1.

And can I just add this creepiest of the creepy baby Jesus paintings on a stamp where he seems to be crushing a small bird in his hand? Very strange. I wonder what the symbolism is there....