It's all in the packaging: The Art of Preparing a Package for a Pen Pal

Dear friends and readers,

Like so many of us who enjoy writing to other people across the globe, I too, enjoy participating in swaps or even just sending random little gifts to my pals. A couple of days ago I sent a few little paper goodies to my pal Christelle in France and I hope she receives them soon! I spent a lot of time picking out each card and goodie I would send her and then I spent even more time packaging the paper items with great detail. This latter part is what I wish to focus on today.

Packaging is an art form. It truly is. When you receive a package that has been put together with great care you feel that the sender regards you highly and wishes for the package to convey that regard and affection through how they have put it together. Since I am a crafter I have a LOT of things at my disposal---ribbon, card stock, paper bits, you name it! So, I make use of what I have on hand to put together visually pleasing packages and the more detail the better, in my opinion.

Here is how I put Christelle's goodies together:

Since the paper goodies were of various sizes I wanted to put them together
according to such so I made detailed bands to hold the pieces together. I used
bits of scrap white card stock which I had saved from printed projects and, with
colored pencils, added the writing and drawing details shown above in the photo
collage. "Autumn Tidings" was the theme of the band since it was already autumn
by the time I made it and the colors resound with the season.

Here you can see the detail of the writing on the band around the small
square note cards. I placed the cards near the mug holding my crayons for
you to see what size this cards are. They are mini notecards I printed from
the Creature Comforts blog, there are TONS of free printables there for you
to use. I've downloaded many and love them! *Remember to use them only
for personal use if you should download them.* They are another's work of
art and freely given for us to use and enjoy--so please do not try to sell their
work. There are many lovely things on that blog and others I will share with
you later on but...what do you think of how I put these mini cards together?

This band was larger and made to hold together a set of four flat notecards
or 4 sheets of stationery, also found at Creature Comforts. I took my cue in
black and blue color from the sheets I'd printed out and used three different
shades of blue colored pencils added a quote and some doodles and voila! 

Here you can see the stationery with the "For You" band wrapped around
it and on the end of the band I added a little personal touch. 

The most enjoyable thing about preparing a package is knowing that the person on the receiving end will enjoy it because as you've gotten to know them you start to ascertain their likes and dislikes. I chose these papers for Christelle based on my knowledge of where she lives and the things she's shared with me and I believe that she will enjoy them immensely. Putting together little themed pieces is a great way to make the moment of opening up a package last a little longer because each piece is a discovery in itself. Once each component has been placed one can begin to put together the entire package. I love to "bundle" things so for Christelle I bundled each component into a neat little ribbon tied package; like so:

As you can see in the collage, the first photo on the top left has the two
pieces I detailed for you earlier the photo next to it has a third little package,
some Anne of Green Gables quote postcards which I printed from a blog
called The Green Gal, the blog owner is from the UK and makes some lovely
sustainable pretties!. You can also print out your own set by clicking here.
The two photos on the bottom depict how I bundled the three different com-
ponents together to for the completed package using about a foot of pretty
red satin ribbon from my enormous ribbon stash.

Isn't that a lovely way to send off a package? And it did not take any extra money, all it took was some creativity and good use of the scraps you have on hand. You can beautifully package virtually anything with just a little creativity. 

Here is the finished bundle with the card I wrote to my friend and a little
something extra for her pleasure. 

I hope you have enjoyed this entry as much as I have enjoyed writing it for you! I look forward to sharing my next adventure in pen palling and letter writing soon!

Lots of love,

Nadia Marie

Decorated letters...

Hello again dear friends!

Sunday evenings are the best for blogging, letter writing and the like. I find that sitting down to write while listening to classical music soothes the soul and gets the creative juices flowing. I wanted to talk about decorating letters today. Like most of you, I adore trying to find the cutest and most decorative stationery out there but I must admit that I rather like decorating my own paper and making unique forms of stationery.

This is a postcard I made using papers and ephemera I had lying around...

The postcard above was hand-made for a postcrossing swap I had done. You can see another example of a hand-made postcard by clicking here for my blog Mes Petites Creations. That one in the link was for a fall swap. 

Another form of decorative stationery is hand-made cards and I have seen some really gorgeous ones out there! I have a limited amount of resources right now so I make cards with what I have on hand. Here is another example from my other blog:

I made this one a while ago using up scraps of paper I had
around. To see more images click here.

Besides making and printing my own cards (I print my own photography onto card stock and make my own blank note cards) I like to decorate my letters with stickers or hand-drawn embellishments. I have an enormous sticker collection and find so many uses for all those stickers in letter writing.

Here you can see that I've used stickers to decorate plain white envelopes. 

...

Here you can see a couple of the stickers I've used. These were actually
images I'd printed myself onto sticky full label paper. Aren't they lovely?
Home printed stickers!

...

Sometimes I decide to get even more creative and include drawings in my
letters...this one unfortunately never reached it's destination, it has been
lost in transit...hopefully someday it will reach it's intended recipient...sigh!

So, those are just samples of what I've done...how about you? How do you like to decorate your letters? Do you make your own cards? I'd love to hear from you! 

Lots of love,

Nadia Marie