Postcrossing Blog

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! :)

Jeffrey loves to create wacky mail-art and send it all over the world through Postcrossing. He lives in Canada.

How did you come across Postcrossing? What got you hooked?

I was looking for folks to send my handmade mail-art postcards to. The huge membership of Postcrossing is perfect for getting my wacky art all over the globe. Not everyone likes self-made cards, so I send those people “real” postcards from my extensive collection.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I’ve collected 600 different Polyester Disco shirts from the 1970s. They feature some of the most amazing graphics ever printed on fabric.

Show us your mailbox, your mailman/mailwoman, your postoffice or the place where you post or keep your postcards!

Here is a photo of my mailbox with an ironic magnet I designed. My mailman says I’m his best customer.

Show and tell us about your favorite received postcard to date, and what makes it special.

Many Postcrossers have sent me special cards. Over 200 of my favorite unusual designs are uploaded on my postcards wall. I couldn’t pick just one :)

Ever heard of PostCardens? They’re tiny gardens that grow up in postcards! Intrigued? Yvi-1 tried them out and is here to tell you all about it! :)

Ever since I visited the PostCarden site, I knew that I would one day have to own one. Initially, these flowering greeting cards were only available in some of the countries of Europe. I waited patiently for their arrival in the US. Around the beginning of April 2010, B5+10 (Brooklyn 5 and 10), a US online retailer, began selling them. I ordered immediately.

PostCarden produces three styles which are all available at B5+10. I ordered all three – Botanical Garden, Green City, and Backyard Garden. At a cost of $12.95 USD (plus shipping), they are expensive as just a greeting card but inexpensive when one considers that it serves as both a gift and card. The best part is that these can be mailed! The Carden comes in a cute cardboard box that has space for an address and stamp and message on one side and an artistic image on the other.

I chose the Backyard Garden for my growing experience. Once I opened the outer carboard box, I found a second box which revealed a seed packet and what looked like a pop-out book. I followed the instructions and set up my Carden. The seeds provided are of cress. When the seeds grow the plant can be eaten. I set the Carden outside in my lanai. Each day I watered the PostCarden with about four tablespoons of water and then set it in direct sunlight for a few hours. Within 24 hours my seeds sprouted!

Visitors enjoyed looking at my PostCarden and it was definitely a point of conversation. Once watered, the seeds take on the strong earthy smell of a garden. My PostCarden cardboard warped a bit due to my messy watering practices and the fact that local humidity is currently between 70–90%. My Carden lasted almost two weeks.

I will leave it as a surprise to you what a fully grown PostCarden looks like. Unfortunately, my PostCarden did not grow as high as the sample pictures on the official site but I attribute that to high temperatures and not enough water. I did not choose to eat the cress but was happy to find that the PostCarden is fully recyclable or mostly compostable (there is a thin plastic tray to prevent leaks). I have two PostCardens left and will be sending them as gifts soon!
Note that mailing seeds may be restricted by country, region, or state.

PS – Postcardens are sold on the PostCarden site, or through one of their worldwide retailers. And they have just released a fresh new batch of them, perfect for the World Cup! Check them out! :)

Luxembourg native, Luxi, loves the joy of giving – be it sending postcards, adopting children, or volunteering for charity.

How did you come across Postcrossing? What got you hooked?

Some years ago I heard about Postcrossing in a German forum. I was curious and found it interesting and so I opened an account. Up to that day I loved postcards but I was not a real collector. I was mainly attracted by the possibility of receiving postcards from all over the world to get an idea about the beauty and culture of other countries and to share the same about my country, Luxemburg. As soon as I received my first card I got hooked. I found it so amazing that a complete stranger sent a greeting to me from far away and so it became a real passion!

Through all those years I shared precious moments with so many people, I got an amazing collection of wonderful cards, and connected to quite a few people on a further level throuth private swaps and tags in the forum! Some became the sort of friends that exchange surprise cards from our vacations or on holidays. The best part of it is putting a smile on someone’s face! There are so many ways to do this and the feedback I receive is very rewarding for me. It’s kind of “sharing a moment of our life” with the people we exchange a card with.

Soon it became a real addiction and so now I can not even pass by a shop that sells postcards without having a look at them and buying some. I return from all vacations with a stack of special postcards. I also blog almost daily about Postcrossing. My family thinks I am crazy and often make fun of me when they hear me scream out in my office when I receive that special ID or a new country and of course when I am the one to send to a special unusual ID from little Luxemburg. But I guess that is the price to pay right?

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I love to read, lazy weekends on the couch, cooking, traveling, my dog and I love to shop (yes that can be a real hobby too!). But basically my life revolves around children. We are an adoptive family and our children have their roots in Peru, Vietnam, and Madagascar. I also work in the adoption field and so naturally I became invested in a charity organisation that got created out of my adoption work. Much of my time is spent on projects for children and women in need in South Africa. Of course this is much more than just a hobby – it is about giving and receiving. By writing these lines here, I also realize that this is probably why Postcrossing is so precious to me, it is also about giving and receiving ;-).

Show us your mailbox, your mailman/mailwoman, your postoffice or the place where you post or keep your postcards!

My mailbox in front of our house.


The way I collect my cards. Got many of these albums full so far!


My officedesk from where I write my cards.

Show and tell us about your favorite received postcard to date, and what makes it special.

It is hard to point out one single card and say that this is my favorite! Every single card is so special to me! Every scratch, every dent, every beautiful stamp. I love them all because they are all part of the project and make it so unique! It is like a puzzle, you cannot take out one piece because then it is incomplete. But one card that has recently touched my heart is a card from The Netherlands sent from the user Lubbers. (Thank you again Carolien) So I would love to share this one with you:

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! :)