Slow mail.

It seems that mail has been unusually slow during and even after the holidays. I've barely gotten any mail the last two days - no official or pen friend postcards. Also, it seems to be taking my official postcards an awful long time to reach their destinations. I love writing out postcards so this makes me sad. I sent a few messages on the forum out to some people that want postcard pals. Then I logged into my second account. I haven't used it for months because I really only want to concentrate on my main official account. I figured it would be ok to send a few postcards out to people from that account. I have it set on inactive so I won't receive postcards on that account. I just wanted to send some postcards out today! I actually drove them up to the drive up mailbox at the post office on my way to pick my husband up at the ferry. I hope they make people smile. It made me feel better. I hope that when I wake up tomorrow some of my official postcards have been registered so I can send more.

Oh and I bought more postcards from zazzle.com today and my order that I placed last week showed up today. I'm very pleased with my new postcards. What can I say? I'm addicted.

Buying more postcards... what else am I going to do with my money?

I can't resist going to zazzle.com to see if they have any sales because of course if they have sales, I'll be tempted to buy more postcards. Are they having a sale? Yes. 50% off postcards. Could I resist? NOPE. I ordered 10 different designs, four of which were ones that I had uploaded. Some of the ones I designed I'll send to pen friends, some I'll use as official postcards. It'll be interesting to see how they are when I get them. I'm tempted to buy more since it's such a great deal and the sale ends on Thursday.

Speaking of my pen friends, I think I need to buy some postcards specifically for them. I hate using the cards I bought for official postcards to send to them. I know it probably sounds stupid, but I want separate postcards for officials and for my pen friends. I'll probably start working on that next month when I can hit some stores again.

Hopefully tomorrow I will have the energy to post some of the postcards I've received for my private collection.

Where are my postcards?

While I do prefer sending postcards to receiving them, I still do like to receive postcards. For whatever reason, I do not seem to be getting a lot of postcards and the difference between my sent and received postcards is growing. I now have 398 sent postcards and only 372 received postcards. I know it's normal to have a few more sent than received, but a difference of 26 postcards is a lot. I have no idea what is going on. I hope people's postcards aren't getting lost on their way to me.

I also seem to be running into the problem of expired postcards. Right now I have six expired postcards. I had seven expired postcards earlier this week, but my replacement card made it to the user and was registered after 86 days of traveling. Two of the users seem to have stopped using postcrossing altogether, I have a replacement postcard sent out to another user and the three are all in China so I'm waiting until it's been at least 80 days before I sent replacement postcards. It's frustrating. It seems like I keep getting users who sign up and then only participate for a little bit before quitting and don't delete their profile or anything. I understand that postcrossing isn't for everyone or that other things may come up preventing a user from participating, but please don't ruin it for everyone else, you know?

On a happier note, I ordered another batch of postcards from Zazzle.com and I was much happier with the result. I ordered nine different designs and only didn't like one of them. I just wish that when I requested a new address, it would be for a user who wants a Christmas postcard! Waiting until December to send these pretty postcards out is driving me crazy. I just hope they make people smile.

My Ordered Postcards Arrived....

Today, both my Amazon.com and Zazzle.com order arrived and to be honest, I wasn't 100% happy with the results. The book of postcards I ordered from Amazon.com were ok. I think they'll still make people happy when I send them out and I do think they're interesting. I won't be buying this book of postcards again though. The Zazzle.com order really disappointed me. I ordered four different designs (eight prints of each design) and was not happy with how one of the Christmas ones came out. I think whoever took the picture and uploaded it must not have been very good with focusing and using their flash because it seems blurry to me. However, the cat one is super great and the other two Christmas designs are good too. I will be ordering different designs next time. I have lots to choose off of my favorites list on their site so hopefully it'll work out better next time.

I did it again....

I ended up ordering more postcards over the weekend. I couldn't help myself. I had to order James (my husband) a book for school from Amazon.com so I ordered a book of postcards for myself too. That was on Saturday. On Sunday, I was browsing sites looking for cute cat cards and Christmas cards and ended up going on Zazzle.com. I've ordered there before and the cards are fantastic quality, but are super expensive so I try not to order from there unless I don't have a choice. Well.... Yeah, I ended up ordering some Christmas postcards and some cat postcards. I couldn't help myself. There are more I want to order, but I am going to try and hold off until next month. They should be shipping my postcards in the next day or so. I'm excited... and of course I want to buy more!

Yesterday, I came home to six new postcards so that was nice after a long day at school. One of them was a cute Christmas postcard that I will have to post in here after I scan it in.

I love postcards and postcrossing!

Postcards and adventures

When I went to buy stamps on Tuesday, there ended up being a huge line at the post office so I decided to order them online instead. I think they'll be here today, but it's not a big deal if they're not.

After that, I went to my favorite drug store on the island. They sell so many wonderful postcards. (I actually went there for something else, but who can resist postcards?) I stocked up on some favorites that I was almost out of and bought some new ones that I couldn't resist because I thought they were either cool, interesting or funny. I can't wait to send them out!

When I got back from my errands, my husband suggested that we go out on an adventure since I start school again next week. We bundled our daughter up and headed out to the Olympic Peninsula. So beautiful. We ended up going out to the Hoh Rain Forest since neither of us had ever been there before. Wow. Amazing. That area is just so awe inspiring. We found this great store called Peak 6. They sell hiking and camping gear as well as souvenirs. I found some awesome Native American postcards for my private collection (I would have bought some to send on postcrossing, but they were 75 cents a piece!) and one that featured the wild cats of Washington so I bought those since I hadn't seen that postcard before. My husband and I ended up with new winter jackets, Native American jewelry and our daughter chose a stuffed husky for herself.

Today, I need to head out to see if I can find a specific postcard that a user wants in a trade. I think I know where I can find it, but we'll see. There are only three stores in could be in and two of them are within minutes of where I live.

Back from vacation!

I was on vacation from September 5th to September 11th. I bought soooooo many postcards while I was down there. I couldn't help myself. There were so many beautiful ones to chose from. I was able to use the Postcrossing website from my phone so I actually sent some users directly from where we were. It made me happy to send postcards while I was on vacation. I have extras to send to other users now too.

Anyway, that's all I have. I'll hopefully have some new postcards to post soon. I need to buy some more USA postcard stamps too. I'll hopefully be able to do that tomorrow.

Postcards, postcards, postcards

This week, I bought postcards on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday. Like I said, obsessed much? I definitely buy way more postcards than I can ever send out. There's something about postcards that I've always loved. I like them better than letters because you get a picture and a short note from wherever the person is. I used to buy them on trips all the time, but stopped after awhile. Now that I have a purpose for cards, I have to buy them wherever I go. I send some to friends and family when I travel, but I reserve most for postcrossing.

I finally scanned in and uploaded my received postcards. I had 40 of them to scan in. Yikes. I usually don't wait that long, but I just got really far behind with school and everything.

I also scanned in the postcards I bought. I only do that for cards I buy in bulk because I know it's nice for users who can't scan their cards in.