So, we've just spent a few hours putting all of your submitted photos for the birthday contest together in a little video and we have to confess that we are currently feeling a bit teary-eyed... The two-hundred and seventy smiles that we have received from all over the world that have swept us off our feet.

Just look for yourself:

Thank you all, you're the best! Paulo and I are currently wishing we could make a biiiiiig roadtrip around the world to hug each and every one of you! :)

Paulo's little random number generator selected the following winners for this contest: Miza, arlene037, Mayalost, Patflash and Angerona. Congratulations, we'll be in touch to deliver the code for your new pack of 60 MOO postcards!

No luck this time? Don't worry - we have a new contest coming soon!

PS - Do you subscribe MOO's newsletter? They featured Postcrossing on their newest issue, and offered everybody 15% discount on postcards using the coupon 9MW4J4, until August 15th. Now's your chance to make some neat postcards :)

On 14th July 2005, the Postcrossing project started its first steps in spreading smiles through postcards. It was a small project done for the love of sending and receiving postcards from all over the world, and the hope was that there would be more people sharing the same love and interest for snail mail.

Fast forward 5 years and this same project is now responsible for over 4.5 million postcards connecting about 200 countries. It binds together people from different cultures of all ages and genders, with different political and even religious beliefs. Few other hobbies can claim to have achieved the same results, and we are quite proud of this!

Throughout these years, Postcrossing has gone through several milestones, thanks to the work of a team of volunteers as well as the precious support of its members who helped it reach what it is now.

Postcrossing is sending out a bold message to the world today: postcards are not something from the past. In fact, we feel like we are starting a postcard revolution and proving that no technology will ever replace the intimacy of a handwritten postcard. :)

Thank you everyone who made this possible. Let's make the next 5 years even greater!

Please join me wishing,

...aaaaaaand because a birthday is not complete without presents, we have a big contest to announce! :)

We would like you to take a picture of yourself posting some postcards at your local postbox. Why not go do that now, we'll wait here for a bit... Done? Now mail the photo to this email address, and don't forget to add your username, so we can know who you are! That was easy, right? We're hoping to make a big slideshow of smiling postcrossers around the world!

By July 31st we'll randomly choose 5 people, who will each receive a pack of 60 postcards from MOO. :)

Many of you already know MOO, but if you don't you should really check them out - they help you to make batches of professional glossy postcards, with a set of your own pictures or using some of their cool ready-made designs. If you're a postcrosser who has never tried MOO before, you'll be happy to know that they are offering all new customers 10% off 20 or 60 packs of postcards with the voucher code POSTBIRTHDAY5! (valid for one order only until the end of July, excludes delivery).

WOW! The response to June's contest was amazing, we had almost 300 very creative submissions... which made the task of choosing just three of them a very hard job!

The Postcrossing team has chosen the following captions as the winners of MOO's postcards:

Caption: "New flight attendant uniforms for budget airline Dot-to-Dot Air" by ezbub

Caption: "After several viewings of Castaway, Jack began to grow comfortable with his unique love" by katier

Caption: "You clean, I'll pour" by wakegrace

Congratulations to our three lucky winners and thank you to everyone who participated!

The month of July is a very special month for Postcrossing, and we'll be back soon with another fun contest and more MOO postcards to give away!

Welcome to the second installment of our monthly contest!

This month, we challenge you to embrace your inner copywriter and come up with witty captions for some handpicked postcards.

Here they are:

#1:

#2:

#3:

So, use your imagination and submit a comment with a funny/quirky caption for one (or all) of these cards. Enter as many as you like! We'll gather them all in the end of the month and select the best one for each.

And what's in it for you, you ask? Well... we happen to have packs of MOO postcards for the winners of the best caption for each image! That means if you win, you get a pack of professionally printed postcards with neat ready-made designs or your own pictures!

What are you waiting for? Go go go! :)

Soooo.. our first monthly contest is over, and we've received some enthusiastic videos! Who knew postcrossers had such nice video skills?

Here are the entries:

How does Postcrossing work (Misio)

by mrpotato

An Introduction to Postcrossing

by DerbyDragon

What is Postcrossing

by oixxo

Postcrossing world

by paneleroze

Postcrossing!

by the_beatles_4_ever

how Postcrossing works

by piotrek

Postcrossing and how it works

by positively postal

How to Postcross

by Vandom

Postcrossing manual

by R4

And here is the one we selected as the winner:

Isn't it such a sweet video? Congratulations oixxo, good job! :)

Video isn't your thing? Fear not, we'll try something different next month!

And of course, thank you MOO for gracefully sponsoring our monthly contest. Need to get some postcards, business cards or stickers done? MOO's got you covered, with outstanding quality and original designs! :)