Postcrossing Blog

Today our spotlight features lucymonty (aka Lucy). She’s a big animal lover and a keen crafter who runs her own small jewellery business. Here is what she had to say:

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

I read about Postcrossing in a newspaper in 2009. I’ve always thought there’s something romantic and ‘olde worlde’ about writing letters. I imagine the characters in Jane Austen novels sending love letters!

Although I travelled quite a lot with my family when I was younger I’ve not been able to go abroad in recent years so Postcrossing is my window to the wider world. I can also get ideas for trips I’d like to take in the future…

Like so many Postcrossers I was instantly hooked- I love seeing what cards have arrived when the post comes!

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I’m a non-stop crafter- I make jewellery, cushions, trinket boxes and more and *try to* sell them through my Etsy shop. I also love photography, particularly local nature and animals (often my pets!) and I have some printed to send as postcards. This one shows the local beach at sunset:

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

Outside the local shop that also has a little Post Office at the back.

Inside, at the Post Office desk, there is often a queue!

I store all my received postcards in these two boxes, and arrange them by country or region. I’m a bit of a geek when it comes to organising things! I have a feeling I may need to move some into a third box pretty soon…

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

Even though I limited myself to choosing only from ‘official’ Postcrossing cards and not direct swaps, I couldn’t pick just one favourite card! Here are five that stand out:

Clockwise from top left:

• A beautiful flying squirrel card from Marja in Finland- it’s such an unusual animal!
• The ‘I Love My Planet’ card from Keijo in Finland- it’s just so ‘me’!
• The black and white dog card from Renate in Austria- the image is great but it’s the lovely message on the back that makes it extra special.
• The cats illustration card from Anna in Russia- this was ‘the beginning of a beautiful friendship’ to quote Humphrey Bogart, we’ve been exchanging cards ever since.
• The sunset card from Debby in Taiwan- I just love this stunning sky!

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

Of course I love receiving postcards but my favourite part is when I get a new address to send to and I do my best to find something from that person’s wish list or something that would mean something to them. I really want all the cards I send to become one of the recipient’s favourites! I also enjoy looking up the place I’ve sent to/received from in our atlas.

Have you been surprised by any place that you have received a postcard from or sent a postcard to?

I was very lucky to be one of the people who received a card from Tuvalu to mark Earth Day in 2010!

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

I’m passionate about animal rights and conservation. As a result I’m vegetarian and have something of a menagerie at home- a cat called Monty, 3 tortoises called Puffy, Diddy and Clemmy and 2 chickens (rescued ex-battery hens) called Jack and Tony!

martinha (aka Marta) is a very active member on the forum's Portuguese community. Like many of us, she likes UNESCO images and other historical places on her postcards. Here is what she had to say:

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

Back in 2006 a friend send me a text message with the site. He read about it on a magazine. I thought it was one of his silly messages but as i was working in front of the computer i decided to check the site. This sentence caught my attention “It’s a project that allows anyone to receive postcards (real ones, not electronic) from random places in the world.” After a bit of reading I registered, a few days later I sent the first cards and started doing some private trades. That was in September and in November I discovered the forum and then it got serious. Since then I’ve been receiving cards almost everyday.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

Apart of collecting cards, I love to take pictures and travelling. These three hobbies are closely related to each other. My last travels were truly influenced by Postcrossing and by the lovely people I got to know these last years due to postcard exchanges.

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

I have 4 or 5 post offices in my city but this one is the biggest and the one I use the most. Some of the workers already know me, some call me the “stamp girl”; they don’t need to ask want I want, just how many stamps do I need.

This is my not so pretty mailbox but it sure makes me happy every time I find nice cards inside it.

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

I’ve got more than 4000 postcards, choosing a favourite card is impossible, I have too many favorite cards. As you can see on the picture, i truly enjoy beautiful landscapes and architecture. Every time I travel I try to visit historical places with wonderful architecture or breathtaking landscapes. The world is too big and I won’t be able to visit a lot of places; getting cards from places like that is the best and cheapest way to see the world.

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

I love the excitement of opening my mailbox and finding cards; getting an address, reading the profile and finding the perfect card to that person and most of all getting in touch with people around the world. Thanks to Postcrossing I’ve met great friends.

Have you met any other members in real life?

I’ve met a lot of postcrossers from different countries and I know the most active members in the Portuguese community. We’re a great group of friends now and we often have meetings or travel together.
I’ve been to 2 big international meetings, the international one in Zurich last year and the Köln meeting last April. Both were wonderful opportunities to meet postcrossers and make great friends. I’ve also met a few postcrossers that were visiting Portugal.

Today’s spotlight comes from Evanscrew, a family of four from Cape Cod, Massachusetts. They like hiking and have an unusual hobby called Letterboxing. Intrigued? Find out all about it on this week’s spotlight!

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

We are a family of four and I love finding activities that are fun for us all, but also activities that we can both learn from and give back to. We participate in a hobby called Letterboxing (see next question) and there is a discussion board on one of the websites for that hobby that is all about Postcrossing. That is how I learned of Postcrossing.
What got me hooked was how educational it is—not only do we receive interesting postcards, but we also enjoy the great notes that most postcrossers include on the cards. I share the cards with my children, we put a pin in our world map if the card comes from a new place, and we learn about the place on the card.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

We love to read, go hiking and biking, and explore new places. One of the best hobbies we have found that combines many of our loves is called Letterboxing. Clues may be found on the internet that lead you to plastic boxes containing a rubber stamp (often hand-carved) and a logbook. As letterboxers, we carry a logbook and family stamp representing our trail name. When we find a box, we stamp our stamp into the box’s logbook and the box’s stamp into our logbook then carefully close and rehide the box for its next finders. We love to find and also plant these boxes. It is very important to be careful when letterboxing—both to maintain the natural elements around the boxes as well as to keep the letterboxes themselves safe. People intending to try this hobby should read up on the generally accepted etiquette for finding boxes and teach their children (if there are any) as well!

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

This is the Main Post Office in Falmouth. There are several smaller post offices in Falmouth that we sometimes use as well. Several postal employees automatically take out the stamp for hand-cancelling the cards when they see me coming!

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

We love all of our cards!! We are active in the forum as well, and love seeing what people choose for us!
This is of the World Map we have hanging in our home where the children put pins to mark where our postcards come from.

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

Honestly, it gives me a thrill to choose cards and stamps that I think a person will enjoy based on their profiles. And what fun—that is all we know about that person—what is in the profile—yet for a moment in time we are connected to someone in another part of the world as we prepare the card, knowing it will travel a great distance and hopefully bring a smile! Receiving cards that have obviously been chosen based on our interests is a thrill as well—that someone we don’t know in a place we may never visit has taken time to think of us—how cool is that!

Kristin (aka Volvomom) is a schoolteacher in Massachussetts, USA who shares Postcrossing with her sixth graders. Here is what she had to say to our spotlight questions:

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

I found out about Postcrossing in the US magazine ReadyMade. I was hooked from the start! As a child I started off with pen pals, which evolved into hosting foreign exchange students. My family has hosted from France, Bulgaria, Russia, and Norway, to name a few. Postcrossing seemed like yet another way to make the world smaller.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

My main hobby is my eleven year old twin sons. They are the light of my life! Each card I send has two smiles, which represent my sons.
Of course, my username indicated my other hobby – Volvo cars. I’m passionate about Volvos. I currently am on Volvo #5. It’s at 131,000 miles, but I swear it will hit one million miles someday!

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

I have to give a big shout out to the staff at the Chelmsford Post Office. They’re great with the volume of mail I receive! I also have to thank my dad and mom, who pick up my mail when I’m not home!

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

I have two postcards that are my favorites, out of so many, it was hard to choose.

The first is from user Thaddee_Calisson. It’s a vintage Volvo ad. I have this card framed and hanging in my home. It’s classic – in French and a Volvo. What more could I ask for?

The second card is an official from Anna in Sweden. What’s unique about this card is it was part of three cards. The other two cards went as officials to other users – one in China and one in Finland. I loved that I was part of a world puzzle!

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

I love meeting people from all parts of the globe and hearing their unique stories. Each time I receive a postcard I am reminded of the human experience.

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

I am passionate about education. I am a Spanish teacher to middle school students. Next year I will be teaching a World Cultures class once a week, so if there are any other teachers in the Postcrossing world who would be interested in working with me on this project, please let me know! I strive to teach my students tolerance and understanding, as it is a necessity in today’s world. Postcrossing is helping me do that with them. Thank you for that opportunity!

This week on the spotlight, we feature Jamie1972 (or Alex), from Switzerland. As a mother of 2 small (and really cute!) children, Alex is understandably passionate about children’s rights. Here is what she had to say:

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

My dear penfriend from Poland told me about Postcrossing and curious as I am I had to check out the page. I started slowly with just sending out few cards and had a longer break then because of a difficult pregnancy.

When I got back to Postcrossing I also discovered the Forum more and more and then it started to be real fun. Suddenly you know a bit about the person you write too – which is fun.

These days it is funny – there are weeks I only write “officials” – then are weeks I feel only writing to forum members – both are a lot of fun.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I am a mother of two little children, Billy who is 5 and Sarah who is 2 years old. So I am a bit busy.

We also have two dogs and I love to go out with them for walks. I usually take my camera with me then – wich leads to my other great passion – photography. I love to take pictures of everything and I have now two external harddiscs just to save them!

I write a lot – not only letters and postcards but sometimes also short stories or I wrote a children’s book for my children about a little pirate. During my studies I did a children’s book with illustrations together with three collegues – and we printed it too – it was such a great experience.

I love to read a lot – but usually I can only do it in bed before going to sleep – and I start to buy only paperbacks because I wake up regularly because my book has fallen on my head because I fell asleep during reading.

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

My son Billy at my favourite mailbox where I usually mail my postcards, and little Sarah signing cards at the Bielefeld meeting:

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

To choose special cards is so difficult – there are just too many! I have to say that a lot of postcrossers really try to send you something special, which is so great!

One of my favourite subjects: Jip en Janneke

here is a bunch of cards that just came in my hands flipping though my postcards and I love every single one of them!

This one is a very special card – it’s a wooden one from Poland!

This card says: “After the last night with you I am only a shadow of myself”… This card prooved me that my mailwoman is looking at my postcards – I met her before I saw what was in my mailbox – and believe me her look at me was very strange and shocked!

Have you inspired anyone else to join Postcrossing or start collections of their own?

I know that some of my penfriends are postcrossers as well – I usually tell people about it when they see me writing bunches of postcards!

My son Billy started now in the kid’s round robin and he loves it. I guess in about a year or so when he is really able to write on his own he will want to have an account too.

And my little one, Sarah – she is mad about postcards and she loves to look at them. Usually she is really upset when I take them away to register them! It happens a lot that my children sign my postcards too – so if you get a postcard with strange signs of it – this is Sarah’s greetings :-)

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

I love to draw addresses and read the profiles. Often I know then wich card is best to send – and usually really hit the taste of the reciever. I love to choose the “perfect” card for everyone. Something I love too is sending and getting RAS cards. Those are really big surprises!

Have you met any other members in real life?

Yes I did. When the first Swiss meeting was taking place in February 2010 I had some of the foreign postcrossers thew day befire in Lucerne and showed them around. In the evening we were at my place having Fondue and a lot of fun! The meeting itself was fun too – all the three Swiss meetings.

And I went to the big Bielefeld meeting last December – three days in a house with all those crazy postcrossers and it was a very special experience! I am always surprised how open all these people are and usually easy going. There is a great respect for everyone in the group and no one feels left out – at least this is my impression.