February is a busy month in the mail calendar, and so it’s time for your yearly heads-up to make sure you have time to prepare!
We love a good mail challenge around here, and since February is the Month of Letters, it is time to dust off all that special stationery and put pen to paper! It’s the perfect opportunity for reconnecting with family and friends, sending a Valentine card to your special someone, saying thank you to the helpful people in your life… or simply surprising strangers across the world with postcards! 😉
The rules of the Month of Letters challenge are simple:
- 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… anything goes!
- Write back to everyone who writes to you. This can count as one of your mailed items.
That’s it! The challenge started back in 2012, after American writer Mary Robinette Kowal decided it was time for a break from the internet. She spent a month offline, and asked her friends to communicate with her through letters. The results were relaxing and intimate, so she decided to invite others to join, sparking a yearly flurry of correspondence.
If you’re planning to join this year, you’re welcome to share your progress with other participants on this forum topic.
Another happy mail-related event coming up is Mail Carrier Appreciation Day, which happens every year on February 4th. This is the day to celebrate our trusty mail carriers, who make it possible for this hobby to exist by delivering all our postcards!
The date falls on a Tuesday this year, so be sure to prepare something nice for your mail carrier the day before — for instance, pour your gratitude into a thank you note that you’ll deliver (or affix to your mailbox) for them to discover on their rounds. I’m sure it’ll be the highlight of their day week!
If you can, take a photo of what you did to celebrate this special day, and share a link to it in the comments! 😊
41 comments so far
Sounds great! February 4th actually falls on Tuesday this year :-)
I'm thinking of balloons and streamers to decorate our mailbox, with a small gift maybe. Possibly knitted handwarmers? And a postcard saying thank you.
@Felice1959 I make this mistake every year 🙈 Thank you for letting me know!
I will be sending many letters and postcards in February, more than usual! I love it!
Hi! What a good idea for communication! Write me an email, please! I will answer everyone! Thanks ❤ Svetlana,
📝📮💓
Oooh! Love this! I will check out the challenge on the forum. I also need to plan something cool for my mailman, as "Magic Mike" (as we call him) is THE BEST! I think I'll also surprise the post office clerks, as I am truly lucky that they are fabulous as well.
This will be my fourth year. As a result of my first letter month, which I used to call InCoWriMo, I have a couple of very close penpals now. It's also a great time to send Postcrossing cards. My postcard inventory is no problem. That's always up-to-date but I do check my stamp inventory to make sure I've got what I need for the February on slot. But whose bright idea was it to make April National Letter Month in the US? Why right on the heels of Month of Letters? June or July would've seemed better timed
Extra ! Voilà de quoi bien commencer le postcrossing avec mon fils de 7 ans 😀
This post is really good, because besides enjoying sending and receiving postcards, I also enjoy establishing sincere friendships around the world. Given this, I am looking forward to receiving some friendship proposals (penpals) from people in Eastern Europe, Russia, and Latin America.
I did this faithfully last year, but was greatly disappointed that no one responded in kind. I barely got any acknowledgments.
And this year due to USA election results I can’t afford any more let downs. I will acknowledge my mail carrier on the 4th though.
The world is at your feet this way, it's great to get to know each other's culture. Enough misery from those abusers of power, dictators who destroy the earth.
Let us give a friendly example of how it SHOULD be done.
I'll pick up my pen and dance over the sheet of paper.
Good luck with letter writers
I always give my carrier a treat on this day!
Yessss!! I love this!! I will definitely give my mail carrier a treat on 4 Feb! What would we do without them?!
Good idea to send Valentine's this year to everyone that got missed at Christmas due to the Canadian postal strike!
With the price for a letter up to 20 grams and postcard now being the same in Germany I can send letters instead for the whole of February
Thanks for the reminder. 🙂 The LetterMo blog has a great post on getting started: https://lettermo.com/handy-hints-from-previous-posts/
I live in a big city with multiple mail carriers, plus my mailbox is a tiny hole in the wall haha. Anyone have any ideas for how to send my appreciation? I’m never home when they come!!
Mail carrier appreciation day, is this an event started by postcrossing?
We are hosting a LetterMo/ Thank Your Mail Carrier Postcrossing Meetup event on February 2, 2025 in Portland Oregon. We even got approval to use the LetterMo logo. Exciting!
What a great way to celebrate the written word!
Great! I was born on mail carrier day! :)
It's a nice day worth celebrating!
Hip hip Hurray for #MCAD4February #MailCarrierAppreciationDay
xoxo
I was a Letter Carrier for 25 years. It was a great job.....retired now and I miss all my customers. Hurray for MailCarrierAppreciationDay
Also u can send me postcard in busy post month. Pyatigorsk Stavropol krai RUSSIA 357503/
I like this, when I will participed, is a new account necessary? Or do you write to the contacts you already have by Postcrossing?
Thank you for the reminders....
I want to participate in the event in February, how can I participate?
Thank you for the beautiful post. I am a postman myself. I love my job. Please send written letters and postcards.
Oh, I will be very glad to find those with whom I can correspond! I'll leave a couple of postcards for this day!Anyone can write to me, I will be glad!
Canadian posties could use a nice acknowledgement of their efforts to keep us connected with the world! I plan to surprise the staff at our little local post office with a nice treat on February 4th. And, I will again join in the Month of Letters challenge. I save a lot of the days for people I haven't written to in a long while ... it's always a nice exercise to reconnect by post, and it feels good to surprise them, too!
You ALL have inspired me! I will do it!!
That's great! I love building genuine friendships around the world!
Wow, cool! I've never heard about this day before...
nice
🤩 wowwwww!!!! Cool !
Thanks for the reminder. It will be a nice day worth celebrating.
I've been a participating in LetterMo since the 2nd year. It's my letter writing new year. It really jump starts my year. If you're participating too message me. Let's meet at the mailbox.
Love the month of letters - I have gained quite a few lovely penfriends in past februaries - being also my birthday month.
Some have dropped out after a while, but most have been going strong over the years. I treasure every one of them.
If you like to swap a letter this month (or start a penfriendship), please send a message. I'll reply every one.
I sent more postcards than usual today, on Mail Carrier Appreciation Day! I wrote on some of the postcards "Danke Postbot*in" (it's "Thank you postman /-woman" in English or "Merci beaucoup au facteur" in French).
Also I talked more to the cashier woman at the postal office counter.
This is also an update on the previous comment. I had yet to participate in lettermo back then but my experiences with it weren't as good as expected, so I continue to be a postcrosser instead!
Hi, I didn't know about the holiday of postmen before.But this year I waited for my mailman and gave him a bottle of wine on Tuesday 4th February. Ooh! She was surprised and it was so nice and touching, I now have a new friend in the street where I have been living more than 30 years ...
I would make an acorn elf birdwatching, but of course the bird would be giant compared to him or her. maybe a hummingbird for the irony.
These are so fun and clever. Thanks for the intro!!! Best luck to Petr!
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