Postcrossing Blog

February is just around the corner… which means it’s time for another Month of Letters challenge! Are you in? :)

On September 2011, Mary Robinette Kowal decided it was time for a break. She spent the entire month offline, and asked her friends to communicate with her through letters. The results of this personal challenge were a revelation:

When I write back, I find that I slow down and write differently than I do with an email. Email is all about the now. Letters are different, because whatever I write needs to be something that will be relevant a week later to the person to whom I am writing. In some ways it forces me to think about time more because postal mail is slower. “By the time you get this…” It is relaxing. It is intimate. It is both lasting and ephemeral.

How so? I find that I will often read the letters that I receive twice. Once when I get them and again as I write back. So, that makes it more lasting. It is more ephemeral because I don’t have copies of the letters that I write and I am the only one who has copies of the letters that my correspondents write. So, more ephemeral.

I know a lot of postcrossers share these feelings – this is part of the reason why Postcrossing exists!

Mary’s decided to turn February into a Month of Letters, in which she challenges herself and everyone who decides do join to write and send at least a piece of postal mail every day. Here are the rules:

• Mail at least one item through the post every day it runs. Write a postcard, a letter, send a picture, or a cutting from a newspaper, or a fabric swatch.
• Write back to everyone who writes to you. This can count as one of your mailed items.

We can’t help but feeling postcrossers have their work cut out for them in this challenge… :) Nevertheless, we wanted to dare you all to do it! Write postcards, letters or aerogrammes or surprise a friend with an unexpected package. Maybe even pick a Facebook/Twitter friend and send them with an offline “hello!”.

Are you up to Mary’s challenge? Grab your stationery and stamps and start writing!

It’s out! We’re happy to confirm that the Russian Postcrossing-themed stamp is now a reality!

Launching ceremonies were held in different cities throughout Russia, and groups of postcrossers came together to send their postcards with the special first day cancellation mark. Olga (aka Kelpie) attended a couple of these, and sent us some photos from the ceremony in Tomsk, where local postcrosser Anna (aka december_anne) did the honors and stamped the first postcard!

Despite the freezing –20°C, there were so many people in attendance that the post office ran out of stamps in one hour! :) Can’t blame the postcrossers though — it’s a really cute stamp, and we can’t wait to see one in real life!

Keep an eye on your mailbox… your next postcard from Russia might feature this special stamp!

Annett (aka knetty) from Germany joined Postcrossing about a year ago. A fan of crafts, she had the idea to invite members to send her pieces of fabric with their postcards, so that one day she could make a quilt with all the fabrics. Slowly, she started receiving colorful pieces of cloth from other sewing enthusiasts all over the world and putting them together on a single quilt.

Fifteen fabrics from 11 countries (and a lot of work) later and she is done… oh, it is a beauty!

The patchwork resembles postcards laid out on a blanket — and on the border, Annett stitched the names and countries of the postcrossers who contributed to her project!

When the quilt was finished, she went out to photograph it in the sun and met her postman, who agreed to let her photograph it on the bike used to bring the pieces to her!

We’re in awe of Annett’s skills and this lovely idea, which she carefully documented on her blog. And she’s already planning a second one… :)

Do you know of any other crafty projects using postcards or Postcrossing? Do share!

Good news, everyone! We’re happy to announce that Russia, the country with the largest number of Postcrossing members, is releasing a themed stamp to commemorate the project on January 27th!

The 23 ruble stamp was designed by O. Shushlebina, measures 37×37 mm and comes in sheets of 9 stamps. Here’s what it will look like:

Quite nice, isn’t it? I think you can guess what it says, even if you don’t know much Russian! :)

To celebrate the occasion, three postcrossers in Novosibirsk, Tomsk and Moscow decided to hold a lottery to offer 60 lucky members the chance to receive a postcard with this stamp and the first day cancellation mark! If you’d like to participate on this giveaway, just leave a comment below saying you’d like to receive one. We’ll draw 60 names by the end of the week, and send your addresses to the members who are going to write you a postcard.

You might find a surprise postcard on your mailbox in a few weeks! :)

While this year’s Deutsche Post & Postcrossing’s Postcards for a good cause campaign is still ongoing and looking good, the result of last year’s drive has just been delivered!

If you remember, during the 2013 campaign German postcrossers sent 78450 postcards, raising a total of 7845 euros… which Deutsche Post now kindly rounded up to 10000 euros!

This week, on a ceremony which took place in a kindergarten near Deutsche Post’s headquarters in Bonn, the check was handed over to Stiftung Lesen and immediately put to work on a two-day reading tutor training program. The program will prepare 50 “reading godfathers”, who will then visit schools, kindergartens, youth and family centers, libraries and retirement homes to read and help get everyone excited about reading.

Great job, everyone — we’re really proud of your commitment! This year, we’ll do our best to get other postal operators involved on the December campaign as well, so that together, we can do even more for this and other worthy causes! :)