New year, new project (1000 postcards)

It wouldn't be January without a million people making plans, would it?

Mr B and I spent the days after Christmas slowly recovering, and hatching schemes. He bought a book called The Barefoot Investor and declared that this would be the year we take back control of our finances. I let the children consume their very last icy-pole and bucket of chips while we were in Bendigo, then returned home and emptied the 'fridge and pantry of all the leftover chocolates, cakes, biscuits and ice-creams that had made their way into our house over December. I declared that this was the year we would take back control of our health. 

And then together, Mr B and I hatched a plan that involves YOU. 

He purchased for me a giant box containing one thousand vintage and antique postcards, all unused. The postcards date from around 1905 through to the 1970s, and have been waiting all these years for someone to stick a stamp on them, scrawl "Wish you were here," and send them into the world. 

Well, that someone is me. I have decided to launch the Thousand Postcard Project for 2017, a year-long project in which I intend to send a thousand vintage postcards to people anywhere in the world. Each one will include a unique message: maybe a short story, a snippet from my life, a recipe, a poem, and so on. 

Every now and again, I'll share photographs of some of the sent postcards on my blog, so you can see what they look like (I'll only show the picture sides of the postcards, never people's addresses). 

Would you like to receive postcard from the Thousand Postcard Project? Fill in the form on this page to give me your postal address, then sit back and watch your letterbox for a little vintage surprise. 

Lost for words

These nifty Correspondence Cards take postcards and "thinking of you" to the next level. When you want to reach out to someone by snail mail but you don't really know what to say, they'll do it for you! With sweet and funny little choose-your-own comment prompts, you simply tick the box that is most relevant.

Such as... 

I'm: distracted / well / a superhero / lost / drinking tea

This place is: beautiful / smelly / prickly / peaceful / interesting 

I've been: mugged / knighted / fishing / studying / adventuring 

Please: write back / dream of me / send money / feed my cat / take care  

And so on. The comments side of the card is illustrated with a lovely photograph originally captured on 35mm analogue film, and the back simply contains lines for the address, and space for a stamp.  

Tell me: would you use these? I think they are fun and pretty, and a postcard like this would put a huge grin on my face if it arrived in my letterbox (unless of course the person had ticked that they were lost and had been mugged), so I'm going to assume others might feel the same. 

I spend a lot of time writing to strangers to bring a moment of happy surprise to their days, which is something I love to do. But sometimes that means I neglect to write to the people in my life who are nearest and dearest. I feel like these cards are best suited to someone who already knows me (and appreciates my sense of humour), so that's where mine will be headed. 

Right now I have a box of 10 of these cards, sent as a gift from Brenner of Boots Paper, and I am itching to use them.

This all happened after I ordered some new notepads from Brenner, because I was running out of resources to write to you all. Her shop Boots Paper appealed to me because the notepads were not only beautifully-illustrated and lovely to hold (good quality recycled paper), she also donated a percentage of profits to conservation charities.

After I placed my order, Brenner found me on Instagram and reached out to say hello (this is her), and to celebrate the snail-mail joy that she and I have both spreading in our own ways. The following week, the most incredible box of stationery goods arrived in my letterbox as a gift from Brenner, and you can see it all here. She left a little note: "For all the stationery love you put out there, I wanted to give some back." 

It was an act of extraordinary generosity and kindness, and I intend to repay it by sending these gorgeous Boots Paper creations far and wide, as I write to each of you all over the world. 

ps. Have you signed up to receive my monthly mail-art template emails yet? They're free, and the first one will arrive in your Inbox about mid-January. Sign up here

I'm ready to send you mail again!

I have a little Christmas present for you, my friends. Actually, I have more than one to give! 

You may remember that I used to send letters to people who subscribed to this blog, to say thank you to them for reading. I had to suspend that in July this year, when I discovered I was more than 60 letters behind in all the mail I owed. It was overwhelming, and I felt terrible for being so slow. 

But here we are a week before Christmas, and I'm all caught up. If you subscribe to this blog and you haven't already requested this mail from me, I invite you to share your address now. The sign-up form is here and I look forward to making mail for you.

UPDATE 7 Feb 2017: Aah I'm so sorry. I've been making mail as fast as I can but you guys are KEEN (I do love that!) and, as fast as I've been going, there are now 123 people on the waiting list. So I've had to disable the form again while I catch up. Again. Watch this space. 

I mentioned I have some other presents to give. While things have been quiet on this blog of late, I haven't forgotten you, and I've been working away behind the scenes to develop some resources that I hope you might enjoy. 

The first is a free monthly newsletter that will launch mid-January. Short on words but big on inspiration, it will contain an original artwork every month, that you can print out and customise into your own mail-art.  

The second is my new e-book, Making Mail. This is a 10-part guide to writing letters that will become keepsakes, by writing entertaining missives that look beautiful, survive their journeys, and make the recipients feel special. This book is free when you subscribe to my newsletter. 

I really hope you enjoy all of these gifts, and I want to thank you for sticking with me as I've developed all these resources in the background. I'm looking forward to bringing you more inspiring, uplifting, funny and creative content in the New Year, and wish you every happiness for this festive season. 

Love, Naomi 

The pop-up letter shop

This is the best idea I've heard of in a long time. In Seattle, USA, a woman named Rachel Weil has launched a snail-mail truck, known as The Letter Farmer. Like a food truck, you know, but serving up food for the soul (awwwww).

She has fitted out a beautiful, red truck with all kinds of carefully selected stationery supplies - pens, paper, cards, stamps, even sealing wax, and hits the road every day. Wherever she stops, she sets up some tables and chairs outside, provides free postcards (and postage!), and invites people to start writing. She keeps a stack of prompts - people to write to and things to write - for those who are stuck.

When they're done, folks can even pop their missives into the post box attached to her truck.

Rachel says, "Sharing the narrative of our life through pen and paper as they meet and the nuances of our handwriting, paper selection and an envelope is addressed, stamped and mailed is priceless and timeless. Letters can be reread over and over, giving us the opportunity to have voices of our past speak again. Holding and touching something that someone who is either no longer with us or geographically far away is a way that we can feel physical connection with that person."

Can you imagine how fantastic this would be in your city, turning up at parks and carnivals and open spaces? How perfectly would it fit in at a food-truck festival! The Letter Farmer would be my dream business, except that I never have managed to master the art of hook turns in Melbourne. Maybe Australia Post could launch a fleet of these mobile shops, and bring their business to the people...

Here's an article about The Letter Farmer in the Seattle Times

Image credit: all photographs are from The Letter Farmer website

Things left unsaid

This is the truth about what really happened that weekend. I have loved you for years. A secret. I have to know why you did that. I’m your biggest fan. There’s a question I’ve always wanted to ask you. I’m sorry.

Is there something unsaid lingering in your life, that is eating away at you? Is there someone out there who you wish you could tell, or ask, that one thing? But you can’t find them, or you don’t have the courage... you don’t know how they’d react?

Me too.

This blog post is a story about six degrees of separation, which seems to happen to most of us at some time or another, but it is also about snail-mail (so hooray!), and there's a way for you to find some personal resolution on those unspoken words, too. So really, there's something in this blog post for all of us. Read on, comrades!

About six months ago, I received in the mail a little book of short stories, from my dear friend Sonya. (Once, Sonya and I and my dog Oliver squeezed into a tiny, tin-pot rental car and drove across the United States from New York to Florida, into New Orleans, up to Oklahoma, and then all the way to LA along Route 66. I have been lucky to travel to a lot of wonderful places in the world, but that was the best journey I ever had). The book she sent me, Portable Curiosities, had been written by another of Sonya's friends, Julie Koh. It was full of stories that were magical and whimsical and disturbing and challenging in all the right ways. "This writer is my kind of person," I thought to myself.

Then earlier this month, Julie put out a call for participants in a fabulous new snail-mail project, planned for ABC Radio. I might not have heard about it, except that my sister-in-law, who also works for ABC Radio, did hear about it. So she sent a message to Julie, telling her about me, and Julie sent her back a photograph of my book, Airmail. Turns out Sonya had been busy sending books between us! And then my sister-in-law sent a screen-shot of part of the conversation to me, also alerting me to the aforementioned fabulous snail-mail project.

And so everything came full circle, and yesterday I reached out to Julie at last, because I think the universe was saying, "Do it!"

Onwards to the bit where you come in.

You're wondering what the fabulous new snail-mail project is, aren't you. Well, it's called Expressive Post, and here's what it's all about in Julie's words:

Have you always wanted to write a letter to a particular someone but haven’t, for whatever reason?

Is there something you want to tell another person but it’s a delicate topic, and you’re not sure how they’ll react? A topic so delicate that only a letter will do?

I’m testing a potential new show for ABC Radio National that needs letters like these.

To participate, all you have to do is:

1. Write that special letter and post it to the address below.

2. Include your name and contact details.*

As part of the test run, I’ll select the most compelling letters. Then I’ll track down the intended recipient for each letter and deliver it to them. They’ll read the letter for the first time on the show.

The address to write to, and all the other details (including the fact that you can remain anonymous if you prefer it) are on Julie's website, right here. But be quick: this is a trial program and will only go ahead if there are enough good letters and connections to make.

The deadline for the first round of letters is next Friday, 4 November, so if you want to write, especially if your letter is coming from outside of Australia, maybe drop her an email just to let her know it's on its way.

I am going to try to find the words to reach out to my best friend from high school. For years I felt like I had failed her, but I also loved her dearly, and I've wanted to reach out for a long time. I've tried in the past to reach out to her, but with no success. I don't know if she didn't want to hear from me, or if my overtures were never delivered, but they've only met with silence.

Maybe this is my chance to say, at last, "I know I failed you. I tried to be a good friend, and I did love you, but I didn't understand."

How about you? What have you left unsaid? Will you take this opportunity to find the words?

Snail-mail: outgoing lately

I've been quiet on here but loud on life lately. Thanks for sticking around! The photo at the top of this page is of a stack of antique (100 years old or more) birthday-themed postcards I sent out to folks on Instagram, to help celebrate my own birthday last week. Here's some of the other mail I've posted during the past couple of weeks...

∧∧ This great big stack of letters and aerogrammes

∧∧ Putting Australia Post's flower stamps into a vase

∧∧ I was painting King Kong mail and my daughter begged me, "Make him gold?" So.

∧∧ Dear Australia Post: I am probably your biggest fan and definitely one of your biggest customers, but sending parcels overseas is getting ridiculously expensive. Thankfully, pretty stamps for the win. (Personal budget for the loss)

∧∧ Herbal mail-art for an aromatherapist

∧∧ A little bluebird carrying a message to Estonia

∧∧ All those herbs and flowers I've been painting... I thought it was about time to try my hand at some Australian natives

∧∧ This was my attempt at a four-seasons envelope: summer, autumn, winter, spring. Winter was tricky: the white gouache paint I used for the snow-flakes kind of melted into the envelope and turned out more blobby than bright. Onwards and upwards

∧∧ I planted ranunculus corms in my garden in May, and to my delight (and surprise, if I'm honest), they actually grew, and are blooming in abundance

That's all, folks!

Mail art - prehistoric post

We cut our way through a tangle of vines, each one thicker than a man's arm. Heat prickled our skin. The air was humid, tropical, and thick with floral perfume: something like frangipani, with a less-pleasant undertone of... what was that? Sulphur?

When at last we pushed aside the final curtain of vines, we could barely believe the evidence of our eyes. A volcano, forcing its way up out of the ocean, and, around it, a flock of pterodactyls carrying mail bags.

We had discovered it at last: the lost island of the Prehistoric Post Offie.

The Postman's Knock

This made me laugh this morning. I think I need to watch this movie!

Also, a question: does anyone know the origins of the "Postman's Knock" game? I know it started in England at least 100 years ago, but I'm trying to find a rough date and not having any luck...

UPDATE: Apparently the trailer above can't be seen on some browsers. Sorry! If you're having trouble, here is a direct link to watch it (it's Spike Milligan in The Postman's Knock, 1962).

Mail art - prickly post

Yawwwwwn. I was up until 1am last night making mail-art gifts for some friends. Those parcels (three of them) are not pictured here, because there wasn't any natural light in which to photograph them once I'd finished, and Mr B took them off to post when he left for work at five o'clock this morning. We are a sleepless family!

After two weeks of viruses rolling through our family, taking us down one at a time and working through each of us and then having the audacity to try and start all over again... after two weeks of being more up at night than down, and washing more sheets and towels and little pyjamas than I ever thought it was possible to wash, this weekend finally offered the hope of a reprieve. Nobody was ill, everybody kept down their meals, and we managed to wash and dry and fold and put away the mountain of laundry that had become so big that at one point we entirely lost sight of our couch.

Free from family sickness (but in my weakened, possibly hallucinatory state haha), I began noticing things around me again, especially in my little garden.

All too often, I have failed to give spring the love it deserves, the love almost the entire rest of the world gives it. It's not spring's fault that it is the harbinger of the harsh Australian summer, that's just the order of things, after all. But this year, for the first time since high school, I have a garden again. And that makes all the difference.

In the minutia of my tiny garden, I watch the seasons come in and out with new eyes and new appreciation. The ancient turning of planets and sun and growth and death, all played out in miniature in my little garden: a living diorama, kept alive by the clockwork mechanics of Nature and Time churning silently but relentlessly outside the four tall walls of my green little oasis.

And I, peering in, stepping in, and watching.

* The sage bush has grown at least 10 centimetres since last weekend, in the heady potion of warmer weather earlier in the week followed by soaking rains later on

* There was a honeyeater in the Chinese Lantern tree. We never see honeyeaters in the city! Also, on a warm but windy Wednesday, two little doves happily sunbathed on the grass out the front of the children's cubby house

* The coriander that I thought had died last year is once again alive and flourishing and ready to season big bowls of summer guacamole

* All the dormant trees are budding into life. The pomegranate tree is beyond budding - it has exploded into spring green

* Bluebells! Bluebells everywhere!

* One of my original camellia bushes has gone to god

The warm spring-rain was way too persistent for my tiny little cactus-in-a-pot, so I brought it inside, and that's what inspired this round of prickly mail-art. Once I got onto a cactus-and-succulent roll, it was hard to stop. These little guys are just so fun to draw!

Valma's letters

When I was a teenager, an old lady named Valma used to write me the longest letters. Easily 20 pages or more, in scrawling cursive on foolscap paper.

Valma and her husband Bill lived in a two-room hut on a little dirt road called Saddler's Lane, and I came to know them because I would ride by their place on my way to a creek at the bottom of the valley. When she heard the clop-clop of my horse's hooves, Valma would rush towards me to say hello: she got around with a funny swinging motion on two crutches, because her legs didn't work. We'd stand and chat at her old farm gate while my horse grazed nearby.

Valma would never accept my invitations to come tea at our place. She said she was too embarrassed to ever return the hospitality because her house had no floor, just beaten earth, and no water.

Sometimes I would bring her gifts of fruit from our trees, or a slice my mother had made, and hand them to her over the farm gate. After we moved away and I couldn't ride past any more, Valma and I became irregular pen pals for many years, up until she died.

Then a few months ago my parents brought some papers to my place, and Valma's letters were among them. All those memories of our old friendship came flooding back...