365 Photo-A-Day Challenge: Week 4

Another week of pictures! I really am proud of myself that I've been able to keep up with this New Years Resolution so far. I know taking a photo and uploading it every day doesn't seem like it would be too much of a hassle, but I've been enjoying the challenge of having to think up a subject for each prompt and not letting myself forget to take a picture for that day. All in all, this is a hobby I'm really beginning to enjoy!

Day 22: A Passion

Even though I haven't really been able to indulge on this blog about how much I've enjoyed vlogging and filming videos, I hope that I'll be able to change that at some point. One of my resolutions was to keep up with my vlogging, and I haven't done that thus far. But I recently shot a fun tag video with my now-boyfriend and once I'm done combing through the footage (there was a LOT of it), I'll be able to edit and upload the video! And I've already got a script written for my first vlog of February, and I'm hoping to be able to send it soon.

Day 23: Bump

It was extremely difficult to figure out what to take a picture of for this prompt. I remember saying "Bump? Seriously? What am I supposed to make of that?!"

But then I remembered that my dog loves to burrow under blankets and covers, and there is always a bump showing where she is hiding, so that nobody accidentally sits on her. Just pull back the covers, and there she is!

Day 24: Drops

For this picture, I could only think of two things that were drops: Gumdrops, the candy, and eye drops, the thing I managed to sweet talk my optometrist into not giving me when I was younger. I would fake-cry and everything, and it always worked.

So technically this is not a picture of gum drops, bu JuJubes. And my answer to that fact is this: They didn't have any gumdrops on sale at Wal-Mart that day, get off my case! XDD

 Day 25: Upside Down

Now, for the record, I was upside down when I took this picture, just to be in keeping with the theme. But my phone, of course, has an auto-rotate feature, and so the picture came out rightside-up. Of course that wouldn't do. I flipped the picture using the photo setting on my phone, and BOOM!.

For those that are curious what this picture actually is, it is from a poster on the wall in my boyfriend's room. The top line reads something around the lines of "You may ask, why is Charles Darwin riding a dinosaur in outer space?" and the bottom line says, "Because Science Is Fucking Awesome!" - Pretty great poster if I do say so myself.

Day 26: Connected

I'm not sure whether or not I took a photo of these before and posted them on here, but in case I didn't, I'll tell you what these are. I found these cards listed at 75% off at my school's bookstore. I love searching around in there and finding treasures, it happens fairly often. Anyway, these cards all had pictures involving women and some sort of informative caption. When I found them, I realized that four of these cards each suited my 4 best friends perfectly!

As I wrote about in a previous post, I want to send something to my friends through the mail in the near future. I want to tell them things that I can only truly tell them in writing (all of them good things, of course). I haven't gotten around to writing in these cards and sending them off yet, because I really want to take my time with the messages in these cards; I don't want to rush anything. Either way, these cards will be a reason I will continue to stay connected to my friends, and that's why I chose these as my subject.

Day 27: Too Much

If I recall correctly, I wasn't in the best mood on this day, and I'm sure that was partly because of the mess in my room. My mother helped me gut it out and clean it on a Saturday not too long ago, and already things are piling up and getting messy again because I haven't had time to really and truly organize everything, especially my desk. So this was my way of showing how it all feels like Too Much right now, with everything, quite literally, piling up all around me.

Day 28: Pulling

For most of this day I was stuck for what picture I could take that would constitute "pulling." The first thing that popped into my head was the expression "pulling at my heart strings", so I searched my campus for something really cute or positively adorable to take a picture of. When I got home at the end of that day I realized; I hadn't found anything to take a picture of!

That`s when the idea hit me. I called out, "Nikki! Come here girl!" and, like clockwork, my little half-Chihuahua half-Pomeranian came trotting over, her nails on the hardwood making these adorable 'click, click, click' noises.

Let me tell you, it took a while to get her to stay still long enough for me to get a decent picture of her. Just as I would get my shot focused, she'd start sniffing and turn her head, then the picture was ruined. Eventually, of course, I got the shot, and there it is before you :)

Already hard at work with my pictures for week 5, and I can't wait to show you guys. 

28/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 3 Items!

Items 1 & 2: Postcrossing Postcards from the Ukraine & Denmark!

So typically for me, Tuesdays are my days brought to me from hell - or at least a university's student's version of hell. I have a bunch of seminars and lectures clumped together with no breaks in between and I don't end up getting home until late when I left the house to head for classes at noon. Compared to others who have 9-5 jobs that they have to slug through 5 days a week or looking at students that have more than 4 courses that they're trying to keep up with right now, I really shouldn't complain - but of course, it's in my nature to complain, so why stop now? :P

This particular Tuesday wasn't so bad, and that probably had a lot to do with the caffeine in my system and the fact that instead of paying attention in my classes I spent most of the time working on roleplay posts. I think I may have very well found the trick to beating the slog of Tuesdays!

Either way, when I got home, it was still an absolute delight to see three things waiting for me from the mailbox when I returned home in the evening. The first thing I saw are were these two postcards, one big and colourful and the other with a very beautiful (and artistic, in my opinion) photograph.

Item #3: Happy New Year card from Fellow Vlogger Rebecca!

When I looked at the envelope sitting among the two postcards that I received on Tuesday, it took me a moment to decipher the return address and figure out who it was from. The first thing that caught my eye was the city. 

"Chevy Chase . . ." I mused to myself. "Chevy Chase . . . I know I've sent things to this address before, it's one of the vlogging iggles, but which one?!"

Then it hit me, just around the time I was able to decipher the name above the return address, or at least the first initial, R. She wrote R and then her last name, and then I was grinning even more than I had been beforehand at the idea of getting mail.

I haven't directly thanked Rebecca for this card yet, but I intend to shortly. Truth be told I had purchased some cards in 2013 with the hopes of sending them out around New Years, but I only had time to send one, to my roleplay partner Chandler/zona. More than likely I'll be saving those cards and sending them out to vlogging iggles around the time of our 1 year anniversary in April. That's going to be an exciting month.

I'm looking forward to April, and not just because hopefully by then all the crappy snow falling on our heads will have melted completely and be replaced with warm breezes. While my courses this term are a bit of a handful, they all have one glorious thing in common; no exams! Which means that by April 11th, I will be free of the confines of classrooms!

Well, at least until May, when I'll be taking one course over the Spring term so that I can graduate next year. But one course compared to four is definitely still a vacation!

That's all the mail for now! I'll be keeping you posted.

27/01/14

Going Out In My Mailbag Today: 2 Items!

 

Items #1 & #2 - Postcrossing Postcards to Taiwan & Finland

So this week I got to break out my new Impossible Project postcards for the first time instead of using my free Brock University cards I picked up at the school store.

When most Postcrossers upload the images of the postcards they send or receive, more often than not they use a scanner to upload the images onto their computer. I chose to start doing the same with my new postcards. As to why the two of them scanned so differently, with the Polaroid border looking darker on the left picture as opposed to the right, I have no idea. Truthfully both pictures look a little odd in the way they've scanned, but it's nothing that's all that bothersome, so really, what does it matter?

The person from Taiwan that I'm sending a card to asked Postcrossers on her profile to tell her their favorite song. I wrote down two that are my favorites at the moment, which are "Back and Forth" by Operator Please (which has been a favorite of mine since the Spring, it seems) as well as "Sugar in The Snow" by Newton Faulkner (the song is a seasonal favorite, but Newton Faulkner's music will always have a special place in my heart).

On the secondary postcard, I picked that image because of the recipient's love of flowers, according to her  profile. Within the message I didn't write anything new; just talked about how I'm a 21 English & Writing student in university, and that I like to read as well as keep up a blog about snail mail (*waves*) and that I also enjoy making vlogs and posting them on YouTube. Again, nothing special by usual postcard standards. Even so, I enjoy sharing a little piece of myself with so many different people around the globe. Even if it's sharing a small, basic something, it's always special.

Inside My Mailbox Today: 1 Item!

Item #1: Package from chapters.indigo.ca!

Within this package, and the picture, are 2 volumes of manga and 1 box of note cards.

Anybody that knows me well enough will know that the volumes of manga belong to me. I've been collecting manga since the 8th grade, and as on today I own 300+ volumes, and I take care of all of the specimens that I own. This particular series, A Devil and Her Love Song, is actually very well written compared to a lot of other Shojo series that I have come into contact with over the years, which is why I am still invested with the series up to volumes 11 and 12. If anybody that enjoys reading manga is looking for a new shojo series that isn't entirely shallow and is unlike other high school series on the marker, I recommend picking up the first volume of this ShojoBeat series.

As for the note cards, they are not for me. This box of Polaroid note cards is intended for my pen pal Diana as part of her big birthday package that I am still putting together. I have a similar box of note cards that I own, only they are dubbed Pretty Polaroid cards as opposed to just Polaroid cards, which only means that the images included in the box are different than in the original collection.

I'm excited to get her birthday package out to her. Think all I have left to pick up is a couple jewelry pieces from Ardene and I'll be all set!

Until then, I'll keep you guys posted.

24/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 1 Item!

Item #1: Postcrossing Postcard from The Netherlands

I've got to be honest, this card made me genuinely laugh out loud when I read it, in a true-to-the-acronym LOL fashion.

The sender of this card happened to have a unique name, one so unique that I felt compelled to comment on it when I sent her a thank you message upon registering the card to Postcrossing. Her name is Anook, and what that immediately happened to remind me of was a dog that I knew in my childhood that belonged to a good friend of my dad, so good a friend that I grew up calling him Uncle Willy. This dog was also named Anook and was a Husky and is probably the reason that I love the Husky breed and have considered getting one at some point in the future.

The back of this card was also decorated with cute pink stickers as well, which are probably made readily available thanks to the time of the year. Truth be told, I didn't get to see these stickers or anything about this card until Saturday, which is when I returned home from my boyfriend's house.

Yes, things have changed since my last mail-related post, where I referred to a card I sent to "the guy I'm currently dating" as opposed to my boyfriend. Things have been made official, and I'm feeling pretty optimistic. The reason I'm even mentioning this is to add to my conclusion about the time we are now facing; love is in the air, and Valentine's Day is just around the corner.

I recommend that anybody that has any notions towards snail mail or even crafting would be wise to keep a keen eye out while mulling about town. This is the optimal time to find great - as well as cute - items to benefit crafts and letters.

I myself recently picked up 4 packs of stickers, all of which are adorable and are all scratch and sniff stickers in their own right. Two are vanilla-scented, one is strawberry, and another is candy-scented. I haven't used any yet, but I'm sure I will soon, like with my current project.

With Valentine's Day right around the corner, I will be working towards putting together some handmade V-Day cards. What I've decided to do is send out handmade cards to the 8 or so people that I will be exchanging cards with in the IGGPPC V-Day Card Swap, and I have a book or pretty vintage Valentines that I will be handing out, or sending out, to everybody else that I know.

I'll be making these cards with my mother's help, using her beloved Cricut machine that she uses to make her own cards and scrapbook layouts. Of course I'll be adding pictures of what these cards will look like on here once I'm able to send them out. I'm looking to get them sent out soon. While the majority of people that have approached me are from Canada and will receive the cards I send fairly quickly, at least one is going out to the US and a couple are intended for the UK. I'm hoping that everything I send out will arrive in time for Valentine's day.

Can't wait to show you guys what goodies I'll be sending out for Valentine's Day! I'll be keeping you posted.

365 Photo-A-Day Challenge: Week 3

And here is a whole other week of photos that I've taken. It seems that the prompts are getting more and more interesting, and it's been a unique challenge to find subjects for different photos each day. But here is what I came up with:

Day 15: Dessert

These would be watermelon slices, and they happen to be one of my favorite candies at the moments. I used to be able to buy them in a little gourmet bag at the bookstore where I work, but nowadays I can find even larger quantities of them at the convenience store by my university. They are cheaper there too, and just as delicious, if not more so!

Day 16: Where I Live

I have taken many a picture looking out towards the front yard from the big window in my living room, so this one wasn't difficult to do. The filter I chose I think helps to bring out just how cold it was out there the day I took this picture. Of course since then it's only gotten colder and the snow has gotten heavier, with no end in sight. I certainly can't wait for spring . . .

Day 17: Listed

I was actually stuck for an idea for this prompt a day after the 17th had passed. But then as I was scrolling through the photos I had taken the day before, when I was taking photographs to use in my board game review of Settlers of Catan, I saw this photo. My friend had made this structure while our friend Blair was explaining the rules of the game. According to Blair, that was the fastest he had ever seen somebody begin to fiddle with the pieces and attempt to build something. Si I posted it to Instagram with the caption "Love It or List It?"

Day 18: Magical

Let me ask you, is there anything more Magical in the world than thermal nail polish? No? I didn't think so. If you'll remember from a previous post, I received two extra bottles of thermal nail polish as a gift from the store owner behind Black Sheep Lacquer, and once I received them I made quick work with painting my mails in preparation for the cold, Canadian weather. The colours that my nails change to continue to entertain me to this day.

Day 19: A Plate

Normally when I have Aunt Jemimah mini-pancakes for breakfast I make 4 instead of 3, mainly because the box comes with 12 pancakes and making 4 at a time allows there to be an equal a number each time you want pancakes for breakfast. Not to mention they're very small pancakes, about half the size of a regular pancake you would receive at a restaurant or diner. I like dipping my pancakes in syrup instead of just drenching them, so that's why there's syrup to dip in within the middle of the plate.

Day 20: A Cup of - - -

Obviously the photo itself is very simplistic, where I decided to photograph a cup with the same pattern on it as the plate for whatever reason. The place where I decided to get creative was with the caption: "A Cup Of Contemplation. Is it half-empty? Half full? Guess it depends on your philosophical vent."

Day 21: Precious

Again, I was stuck for an idea for this prompt. But when I was putting together fellow vlogiggle Ashley's belated birthday gift I decided to photograph the box of Thank You cards that I had purchased strictly for myself! And they are precious, aren't they? Ever since first becoming interested in anime & manga, I've been fascinated by Asian culture, specifically with China and Japan, so I fell in love with this design as soon as I saw it in Winners.

I'll be back with another round of photos next week.

23/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 1 Item!

Item #1: Vinyl Stickers from RedBubble!

Not sure if I've said it before, but you've got to love this site!

RedBubble is a site where you can order various t-shirts, prints, and even iPhone cases. The big focus of RedBubble is all the products on the site have art made by original artists. The main reason I visit the site so regularly is not only because of the many geek-themed products that are to be found, but I tend to order their high-quality vinyl stickers. Because of what they're made of, you can put these stickers on the back of your laptop, the windows of your car, on furniture and even directly on walls without risk of damage. Even better yet, when you buy 6 or more stickers, you'll get all of them for 50% off!

More often than not, because of this deal, I buy at least 6 stickers whenever I place an order. Foer this particular order, only one of the stickers is actually intended for me, and that would be the beautiful typewriter sticker with all the coloured swirls surrounding it, which you can see on  the right-middle panel in the image above.

Along with that, two of the stickers are intended for my mom's boyfriend's birthday gift, and those would be the 2 Saints Row themed stickers you can see in the bottom-left image. The other two images on the right, the three-headed unicorn and the cute bunny are gifts that I've intended to send along to the two vloggers I plan on writing to, as I have discussed in an earlier post.

The one on the left is but one part of a large package I am putting together for my pen pal's birthday gift. For my past birthday in August she positively spoiled me with gifts. Well, two can play at the Birthday game, and it is now my turn! I'm not sure if her gifts will arrive on time, but I'm only awaiting one more part of her gift to arrive, then I can put everything together and send it out!

Going Out In My Mailbag Today: 2 Items!

Item #1: Belated Birthday Gift to Fellow Vlogiggle Ashley!

Ashley lives in Hong Kong, and her birthday was January 1st. Needless to say, this gift will be arriving very late.

Nevertheless, I put together what I hope will be a nice gift for her, finding an awesome birthday card and including a box of pretty Thank You cards in the package. I wrote in her card that a good way to use these cards would be to write inside of them "Thank You . . . For Being Awesome!" That way she'll get a lot of use out of them. Fellow vlogiggle Emy has a birthday coming up soon as well, and I have a similar gift prepared to send to her.

Item #2: Wit&Whistle Card to The Guy I'm Dating!

Maybe to some it might seem off that I'm writing to somebody that I see in person on a semi-regular basis, but I have legitimate, non-clingy reasons why I decided to send a card to the guy I like. And it very much goes along with the entire notion of this blog.

So many people in 2014 have forgotten about the simple pleasure of receiving something in the mail that isn't some sort of bill that needs to be paid. The guy in question is very much in the same boat. When I asked him about the last time he got something in the mail that wasn't bill related, he had a hard time remembering an exact moment, thinking that it could possibly have been many years ago. Since things have been going so well between us for the month or so that we've been seeing each other, I decided to take the leap and send him a card, where I wrote a simple enough message. I also decorated the envelope with a few stamps, but nothing too girly or obnoxious.

That's about it for now! I'll be sure to keep you guys posted.

22/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 2 Items!

Item #1: Postcrissing Postcard from Russia!

It must take a lot longer to send and receive mail from Russia. I think the longest time for anybody receiving a postcard from me on Postcrossing was about 32 days, and it was a card I sent to Russia when I first joined the site.

Either way, this card is amazing! The sender wrote to me that she tried to find a card that was both nerdy and somehow connected to the UK. The card's picture is from St. John's College Old Library, West Side. I'm assuming that's the West Side of London or somewhere in the UK. After all, I always hear about the "West End", which is London's version of Broadway.

Anyway, you want to guess what my first thought was when I looked at the photo on this postcard? Well, maybe second thought, since my very first thought was undoubtedly, "Ooh, pretty!" I'm pretty sure the second thing that I would have thought about this card was that it looks just like the library at Hogwarts!

Oh yeah. Hufflepuff for life :D

Item #2: Postcrossing Postcard from Portugal.

Truth be told I couldn't tell just by looking at the picture where this card was from. With the red bridge, I thought it might be from San Francisco or somewhere like that. Americans might laugh at me, but the only real windows where we get to see and learn about American landmarks are through movies, and there aren't as many movies set in San Francisco as there are set in New York City.

This card's image is from Almada, although the sender is from an area called Porto, where she has lived for 8 years while she has worked towards two college degrees. She expressed her wish to have been able to send me a card of Porto, but she wasn't able to get access to one with how busy she's been. She's studying for finals now, poor girl. Her name is Diana actually, which I share because it's the same name as my pen pal :)

I meant to send out a package today, but I didn't get the chance. Truth be told I was a little distracted with the visit of the guy I'm currently seeing :) But it's all ready to go and I hope to take it to the post office tomorrow before I go to school.

Until then, I'll always keep you posted.

20/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 1 Item!

Item #1: Box of Postcards from Amazon.ca!

I figured it was time to stop sending every person I get assigned on Postcrossing the same card of Brock University. So here is a whole new supply of original post cards! 100 of them to be exact!

The cards are from this group called The Impossible Project, which I read about a bit before I ordered the postcards. The group seems really interesting :) Take a look at the website if you want to learn more about this photography project. It's nothing like my 365 Photo-A-Day Challenge, but it was still very interesting to read about.

I've always had a thing about liking colours. My favorite colour is orange, but I'm very big into things with a rainbow pattern on them as well. I have a winter scarf that I wear all the time, not only is it a rainbow pattern but it's not a straight scarf; the scarf itself was made in a wavy shape, and it's amazing and unique. When my friend from Brock gave it to me, I was so happy, and I hugged her and thanked her a hundred times. In fact, I'm still not done thanking her!

These cards are really going to come in handy. I've noticed that a lot of the people on Postcrossing have listed colours that they really like in their request space. One lady really liked purple cards, and she was one of the people I had to send a Brock card to, because that was all I had :( Now I feel like I'll be able to appease more people, and I'm really happy!

I learned about this box of cards from a Postcrossing blog post, which you can look at here if you need some information about boxed postcards that you can buy. Maybe you live somewhere like I do and you have trouble finding postcards that don't already have pre-paid postage to your own country on them!

That's it for now! Promise to keep you posted.

17/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 1 Item!

Item #1: Postcrossing Postcard from Belgium!

I actually didn't notice that I'd received this postcard until this morning, when my mother playfully waved it in front of my face, knowing how much I love getting mail. Yesterday I'd been pretty occupied with my typical Friday morning errands, and relaxing (and playing on my 3DS) when I got home before I had some friends over. For whatever reason it didn't occur to me to check the mailbox, and the couple of times I did peer outside it must have been before the mailman had arrived.

Still, since I got to look over this card on a Saturday, when we typically don't receive anything in the mailbox aside from the newspaper, it was a very pleasant surprise :)

Yesterday was one of those rare days where I was too occupied by actual human interaction to think about what might be sitting inside of my mailbox, and in case you might be wondering, it didn't have anything to do with a boy. Okay, a boy was involved, but so were three girls. Alright, now I'll explain.

Recently I was assigned a unique article topic from my PaperDroids editor. After submitting my last assignment on Snail Mail & Letter Writing, I emailed her and asked if she could assign me something unique, something that I didn't have to think up myself, so that I could challenge myself by writing something different. What she asked me to do was some sort of board game or toy review, since nobody had written anything like that for PaperDroids before. I jumped at the idea of writing a board game review. I love board games even if I don't own a great deal of them and I haven't been able to play them as much as I would like to.

I decided that I should write my review on Settlers of Catan, because it's been established by so many as a Gateway Board Game (bet you anything that'll be the title of my article). I contacted my guy friend from Brock that owns the game, and my 3 best girlfriends that live in Welland, and I had them all over last night to play.

This was my first time playing Catan, as it was for my girlfriends - I've watched it played at Brock numerous times, but I'd never actually participated before. And it was really fun! We were all joking around (it is impossible not to make various "wood" jokes while playing this game) and torturing each other with the Thief of the game (because we rolled 7 so many freaking times!), and it was a great night. There was also a lot of sugary junk food and Pizza Hut take-out to be had, and by the end of the night I felt pretty sick, but it was entirely worth it.

Once we finished up with Catan, it turned out that my Brock friend was smart enough to bring along his copy of Cards Against Humanity. I have never known a group of people straight-laced enough to turn down this game, so of course we played, and we kept playing until we were out of black cards. It wasn't too late at night by that point, only 11 o'clock or so, but my friends and I were all feeling pretty drained. All in all we had a great time, and I got to catch up with everybody, especially the girls. It made me feel even  more certain about sending each of my girlfriends something particular in the mail, and that's my top priority mailing project for the next little bit.

That's about it for my Friday! Haven't written the Catan review yet, but I'll include a link on here once it's been published. I'll be sure to keep you guys posted!

15/01/14

Items In My Mailbox Today: 1 Item!

Item #1: Postcrossing Post Card from Finland!

I really do wish that I knew for the life of me what that turtle was thinking . . . in fact I'd probably be interested in knowing what all turtles are thinking . . . aside from snapping turtles that are just about to bite you, their thoughts are pretty self-explanatory.

There was another image of the turtle on the back. The sender also used a really cool Angry Birds stamp, which had an image of that yellow, triangular bird sailing through the air on a purple background. It was adorable, and I complimented her on her stamp choice when I left my Thank You message on Postcrossing.

Going Out In My Mailbag: 5 Items!

Items 1-5: Postcrossing Post Cards!

I'd gotten a bit behind on sending out some post cards, so I decided that I would do a batch at once.

Now it's probably painfully obvious that all the cards have the same image on the front. I haven't sent out cards with the same picture on them before, but I'm currently not in a financial position to purchase a batch of any really nice, unique post cards online.

As to where I got these, the short (and also obvious) answer would be Brock University, which is my school, but I didn't actually have to buy these. I found out first year that the store typically keeps a stack of free post cards by cash that they offer to students. Remembering this, I had one more book to pick up at the store, and when I was up at cash I asked if there were any post cards around. The lady at the next cash register said to me that she had a stack of free ones, and how many did I want. My answer, meekly enough, was, "How many am I allowed to have?"

In response, she gave me the entire stack! I now no longer have any shortage of post cards with an image of Arthur Schmon Tower. Even so, I do feel kind of cheap with sending out the same stock cards to everybody even if the messages on the back of the cards are always unique. I shall be looking into getting some new cards fairly soon.

This batch of Postcrossing cards was actually a little different from the rest because I was being assigned some unique people from all over the world to send cards to. The first one that caught my eye was a 26 year-old woman who enjoys crafting in her spare time. Immediately my thoughts went to the IGGPPC, and I wondered whether or not she was a member. So I attached an IGGPPC sticker to her post card after I asked her about it in the message I wrote for her. I had to trim the sticker down a bit so it would fit, but I made sure the title and the link were still there.

Also, I was assigned to send a post card to a girl in the US, which is always one. The best part was that it showed in her Postcrossing profile that she has a snail mail blog just like I do :) I told her about mine and asked if she could take a look at it and tell me what she thinks of it. It's really cool to hear of somebody that is doing something similar to what I am trying to do here!

Oh, one more thing! I had some free space on some of the cards that I sent out, so I decided to get some use on my brand new, super amazing Snail Mail stamp!

That's it for mail-related writings. I'll keep you guys posted.

365 Photo-A-Day Challenge: Week 2

I actually had a lot of fun with the prompts for this week's photos. It seemed to always work out well - if I didn't have a single clue what I was going to take a picture of for that day, something would randomly pop into my mind and I'd be golden. When that happened to me, I got my best photos, whether it was first thing in the morning or right before I went to bed at night.

Day #8: Game

This game has been something of an addiction of mine since I received it this past Christmas. I also got Pokemon Y as well, which I was so sure would become an addiction because I'd finished Pokemon White and I needed something else to play, and the trailers for Pokemon Y had looked pretty great.

I do love Pokemon Y, but this game has become much more addicting for me, not to mention much more fun. For those that aren't familiar with the Rune Factory series, it's basically a fantasy version of Harvest Moon - seriously, it's even made by the same company. Among the things you can do there's still farming, growing crops, making friends with the people in your community and working towards finding a partner and raising a family. But in the Rune Factory games, instead of your typical livestock there are various monsters outside the parameters of your town/village that you can fight or even tame and bring back with you to your farm. This game has a compelling story line as well, so when you're done your daily chores you always have a goal that you're striving towards while you continue to level up.

Day #9: Peaceful

Maybe this is just my personal opinion, but I think there is nothing more peaceful than a Christmas tree after all the hustling and the chaos of Christmas and all the holidays has long since reached its end.

Day #10: Stacked

Those would be the school books I had just picked up from the Brock University bookstore that day when I was done with class. The sad thing is, all of the books that I'm supposed to read this term are in there XP Think I have a total of 17-18 books for this semester, only 3 of them being anthologies where I'm only reading excerpts and not the entire thing.

Day #11: Stem

I had trouble for a while trying to think of something to take a picture of for this prompt.When I thought of "stem" I immediately pictured some sort of plant, which is an increasingly difficult thing to photograph in the middle of January in Canada of all places. Then my mother happened to give me this idea: the stem of her wine glass.

Day #12: Stripes

You can probably guess where I was sitting when the idea for this photo hit me, so I'm not gonna go into detail XD If it makes you feel any better, I was standing, not sitting, when this photograph was taken. I think the curved metal towel rack kind of helped to make this picture look a bit nicer than it would have otherwise.

Day #13: Glow

Now there's a very specific reason why there are two photos up for this day.

The idea for "glow" came to me while I was pondering over it, as I was walking to school early Monday morning to get to my bus to take me to class. I happened to look up at the sky, and the beautiful sunrise, the idea hit me, along with the caption, "Just before the Glow . . ."

The first photo is the one I actually tagged for the Photo-A-Day challenge. It was taken from the sidewalk looking towards the Target of the Welland Seaway Mall. I used a filter to bring out all the colours that could be seen. I had to really zoom with my cell phone camera to get a good shot which is why it looks a bit odd. The picture would've been taken around 7:05 or so.

When I got to school it was about 7:35 or something like that. And right before me was another beautiful view of the sunset, only after some time had passed from the first picture. I took the picture, and I didn't even need to add any sort of filter; it came out perfectly all on its own.

Day #14: Modern Convenience

Let me tell you, I had so much trouble coming up with something for this picture. I came close to taking a picture of my dirty dishes and adding a caption where I was wishing for some sort of robot to do them for me, which doesn't really make sense or fit with the prompt pretty well. Plus nobody wants to see a photo of your dirty dishes, not even with a nice Instagram filter.

Then I thought to myself, "What has been my favorite innovation since sliced bread, aside from my smart phone (because I will NOT take a mirror selfie, I will not do it!)?" Then it hit me; my favorite thing to have for breakfast every morning!

These pancakes are great. Maybe pre-made pancakes seems a little gross, but trust me, they're only gross if you try to make them in the microwave. I always heat mine up using my convection oven, and with a little butter and syrup, they are absolutely delicious, not to mention they take no time to make. It's much better than the peanut butter bagel that used to be my only breakfast item for a while . . .

That's all my photos for week 2! Looking forward to showing you guys what my week 3 photos will look like.

14/01/14

Going Out In My Mailbag Today: 2 Items!

Items #1 & #2: Letters For My Pen Pal Diana & My Friend Tory

Yep, I finally managed to get these letters done and in the mail today!

I actually finished Diana's letter first, but then the day I finished it was when I received Tory's letter in the mail and I decided I could hold off on sending it for a little bit and get them both in the mail on the same day.

I had a little fun with a new Air Mail stamp that I swiped from my mother to use on the back of the envelopes, and those stickers there are scented, the left one being Pizza and the one on the right being Bubblegum. I have a whole slew of scented stickers and love finding any excuse to use them

One of these days I might focus an entire post around how I decorate things when I send them off, like with stickers and the countless stamps and inks I have at my disposal. For Tory's card that I stuck her letter in, I just used my scented stickers along with a stamp set I received for my birthday and a type of Distress Ink called Peeled Paint, which is a nice shade of green.

I like using stickers and stamps every time I send out a letter (since I can't really use them on my Postcrossing post cards), but I unfortunately don't always have time. I might've done more with these two cards if I hadn't started about an hour before I had to go catch my bus for school. I guess one thing I can say if you're going to be sending out something more personal like a letter or a note card is to make sure you have time to invest to really put the right amount of effort in that you want to. Don't rush it.

Items In My Mailbox Today: 2 Items!

Item #1: Postcrossing Post Card from Germany.

My favorite thing about this card is that it's not just a card with images from the country or a major city, but it's all images from the sender's hometown. I appreciate this card so much, because it's so personal, to come directly from a smaller hometown, much like another card I received not too long ago with an illustration from another sender's hometown. I don't exactly know what all the titles underneath each picture translate to in English, but I might ask vlogging iggle Licia, since she knows German and was living there when I first "met" her.

Item #2: Stamp & Greeting Cards from Wit & Whistle.

I ordered these items off Etsy, and I was so ecstatic to see this package in the mail just before I grabbed the bus for school!

Ever since I first saw that Snail Mail stamp on Etsy, I've been in love with it and wanted it. As a matter of fact, for my birthday that passed in August, instead of giving any sort of wish list to my friends that were coming over for my birthday party, I simply directed them to my Etsy favorites list, with much, much emphasis on that stamp.

Apparently it was unavailable around the time of my birthday, at least according to my mother. That or it wouldn't have arrived in time. Either way, I am now the proud owner of it :) It felt oddly surreal, taking the stamp out of its cloth bag and physically getting to hold it in my hand as opposed to looking at a picture of it on my computer screen.

Jeez, you'd think I was talking about holding onto a precious gemstone, not a wood & rubber stamp XDD

But the reason that I wanted it so much was because I could so easily picture using this stamp on the front of each and every envelope that I get a chance to send out. It's like I'll be able to better emphasize the whole concept - Snail Mail. I am writing something for you and sealing it into an envelope and stamping it and taking the time to make sure it's delivered right to your door - not to your inbox - and am patient regarding the fact that it will take some time for these words to reach you.

The greeting cards that I ordered express this ideal as well. In case it's difficult to read the design on the front because of the lighting at my school and because of the protective plastic over the cards, the cards say, "Be Honest. This is Much More Exciting Than Getting An E-Mail." I ordered and received 3 of them.

What I've decided to do is that these are the cards I'm going to be sending to a couple YouTube vloggers that inspire me, that being Superwoman in Canada and Zoella in the UK. I mentioned this little project in a previous blog post, and I had them in mind when I ordered these cards.

I won't be sending them out right away though. I happened to order a few stickers off RedBubble, and I plan on sending one to each vlogger. I have one of those intended for my pen pal as well, and will be sending it to her once I get it. In case you're curious who the 3rd greeting card is intended for, I was hoping to send that to a guy I'm currently seeing who can't remember the last time since he received something in the mail that wasn't a call phone bill.

In a way, those are the sorts of people I always hope to send things to: People who have forgotten about the joys of letter writing, those who will appreciate the thought put into everything in the sealed envelope addressed to them, and hopefully even those that will take the initiative and send something off in the mail themselves. In a way I guess sending things out in the mail can be seen as a way to Pay It Forward.

That's all for now. I'll let you guys know when the RedBubble package comes in, and when I get something in the mail next. Plus I'm excited to send something where I'll get to use my new Snail mail stamp :) I'll be sure to keep you all posted.