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The Teapot Challenge is to use pens or a pen image today! The recipient is a friend of Sabrina's and is recovering from surgery.
Today's question is inspired by the teapot challenge. Have you ever had a pen pal? Do you write actual letters or send/receive a card frequently to one particular person?
We moved ALL the time when I was young and I remember having a pen pal twice. One time was someone I didn't know and I don't know how we started writing to one another. It didn't last long because I am TERRIBLE at keeping up with letter writing and I guess my issues with mailing out things started way back when I was 10! The second Pen Pal was also when I was 10. I was going to try so hard to stay in touch with my dear friend Kathy after we moved for the zillionth time. She was blond and very frail looking and oh so sweet. We wrote back and forth several times but alas....we lost connection probably because of my lousy pen pal skills. As an adult, I have written to a friend's son who was incarcerated for a time. Not as often as I should have but now and then. I currently NEED to send him another letter. He is no longer in jail but still writes and I MUST respond soon!
How about you?
I always thought it would be SO cool to have a pen pal when I was a kid but I never did. Now I've found all of you and I feel like I have a whole bunch of awesome pen pals. It's like a dream come true!
I had several pen pals as a kid. My parents were missionaries & I wrote to other mks (missionary kids) & then also people back in the US. I got to know my mom’s parents by writing letters back & forth. Then when I came back to the US for college, I wrote letters to my parents/brothers. And once Kevin & I started dating, our phone bill was so expensive we would call after 9pm or write letters. :lolo:
I've always liked writing, and have had letter correspondence with assorted people over the years. I taught myself touch-typing when I was about 17, which made it easier when I lived at home. When I worked in the UK I was rarely able to ring DH (we were dating, then engaged), so I used to write to him every week. I used to write to my mother too for years, after she moved to the other side of the country, although we also used to catch up on the phone. It's a different type of relationship...I had an uncle who said a letter wasn't a real letter unless it was handwritten, preferably in fountain pen. I know what he means, but the longer mine get, the more illegible they get if I do handwrite one in work.
I still write every month to someone who was a Teapot Tuesday destination in the past.
I've never had a pen pal who was a stranger, but after my family moved from England to Canada when I was 10, I started writing regularly to my cousin back in England. We are exactly the same age and spent a huge amount of time together in the first 10 years of our lives. All these years later we are still as close as I am with my actual sisters and we visit each other as often as we can (should have been in England visiting her in May but Covid put a stop to that). Nowadays we tend to communicate via email or WhatsApp rather than writing letters.
__________________ Susan
My SCS gallery is here should you care to look! Or please visit my blog, Cardmaker's Garret.
Jennifer, I feel the same way! It's so fun to have a community full of pen pals!
Misti, I didn't realize you were a missionary kid! So interesting!
Sabrina, it's so sweet that you still have a connection with a teapot recipient. My handwriting is eligible as well so I am going to type out my letter!
Aww. Susan, I am sorry you didn't get your trip to see your cousin because of the mean old virus! Hopefully all will be well by next year and you can see her!
I did have pen pals, I used to collect stationary ( pre-card making days) colored ink pens, and what not. ( I still have an old vintage trunk filled with boxes of Hallmark stationary) and somewhere after I started getting OK with email the writing fell by the way side. but, I do write notes in the cards I make so. I guess that is something. ( my penmanship is failing with all the typing I do now I think and I wonder sometimes if people can read what I write)
Stacy, that is interesting. My mom used to say that I had the prettiest penmanship and now she can barely read my writing. I never attributed it to typing but maybe that is it!
I like to make surf with Distress Resist Spray. That is some powerful stuff though and it has clogged two bottles so now I just unscrew the top and splatter the liquid with the spray insert.
Tomorrow is vsn... would love to play in today’s challenge & yesterday’s Watercolor Wed... but I must do some work first.
Thank goodness you mentioned VSN! I am hosting a challenge and need to get my samples posted (if I can remember how to do that - my brain seems to have become very fuzzy during Covid).
__________________ Susan
My SCS gallery is here should you care to look! Or please visit my blog, Cardmaker's Garret.
Susan you are not alone with the Covid fuzzy brain!
I feel like I have my balance back for the most part but then I forget something or I lose my temper over something I wouldn't have before. It's a very strange time!
was their peeks for VSN? ( I am at work so when ever there is a tutorial or a sketch its handy for me to print those things at work haha) and they go live while I am at work too. :mrgreen:
Stacy, the sneak peeks didn't get up before last weekend. Sorry about that. Can I blame this on pandemic stuff?
Kim, absolutely you can blame it on the pandemic - I only just remembered to post a couple of sample cards to my VSN challenge! I call it "fuzzy Covid brain".
__________________ Susan
My SCS gallery is here should you care to look! Or please visit my blog, Cardmaker's Garret.
Cathy was a DD Girl just before me and was the very first person to comment on my first DD upload! Cathy's cards are amazing! She includes stitching on many of her beautifully designed cards. I hope you will join me in celebrating Cathy! A few ways you might celebrate her is to send her a PM, Play along in the challenge and CASE one of her cards, Comment on card(s) in her gallery or leave a message in the challenge thread.
The Technique Challenge is to use rubber bands. The gallery is full of amazing cards. It made me think, when we can do things like this, why buy designer paper?!
Ok, that brings on a question! Have you used rubber bands to create a background yet? If not, do you think you will at some point?
I have not but I would like to. I think I need to go buy some rubber bands first!
Yes, I'd love to try the rubber band challenge! I've been trying to finish the VSN challenges, but hopefully, I can incorporate this into one of my cards! It sounds like fun!
__________________ Judy aka Gracie "Be a rainbow in someone else's cloud." Maya Angelou
I've done rubber band stamping before, but will happily do it again. Hopefully tomorrow, on my day off. Life just seems to get busier and busier, and I'm having trouble keeping up with everything. Tomorrow's list includes doing Karen's TLC, planning and prepping my own TLC for next week and making a sample, and organising July birthday cards in case I need to make any more. Sunday was spent on DH's. I thought I was on top of the ones early in the month, but I see I already missed one that should have been mailed by now .
I've done rubber band stamping before, but will happily do it again. Hopefully tomorrow, on my day off. Life just seems to get busier and busier, and I'm having trouble keeping up with everything. Tomorrow's list includes doing Karen's TLC, planning and prepping my own TLC for next week and making a sample, and organising July birthday cards in case I need to make any more. Sunday was spent on DH's. I thought I was on top of the ones early in the month, but I see I already missed one that should have been mailed by now .
I feel that way too. Trapped at home with less time than ever!
I've done rubber band stamping before, but will happily do it again. Hopefully tomorrow, on my day off. Life just seems to get busier and busier, and I'm having trouble keeping up with everything. Tomorrow's list includes doing Karen's TLC, planning and prepping my own TLC for next week and making a sample, and organising July birthday cards in case I need to make any more. Sunday was spent on DH's. I thought I was on top of the ones early in the month, but I see I already missed one that should have been mailed by now .[/I]
I feel that way too. Trapped at home with less time than ever!
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Haha! Me three! Hubs keeps coming at me w/ his "DIY" projects. I think he totally missed the concept of Do it Yourself. Is it strange that the odd ball parts he asked me about I know what they are & that he can get them at Home Depot? How come I knew he could find a flat piece of rubber gasket there & he didn't? Oh yeah! We like to call those embossing mats, lol.
I think maybe my problem is that I'm not trapped at home , though if I were I'm quite sure that would bring its own set of problems, including the trapped feeling. We're pretty much back to a full working week, I was already on extra hours because of my line manager working from home, and I'm cycling in because the company stipulated no public transport. That's keeping me fit and doesn't really take any longer than the bus journey did, but I'm definitely more tired and I don't have the commute to catch up with things here.
I bought fresh carrots and beets this morning and was able to add two elastic bands to my collection, about to see what I can do with them now. It was a wonderful gallery, I really enjoyed looking through it yesterday evening.
Sabrina, Lydia and Julie, sorry you are feeling so short of time and so busy right now. Life is a constant balancing act. I'm retired and still seem to need more than 24 hours in a day. Hugs and a dose of extra "me" time for you all.
__________________ Judy aka Gracie "Be a rainbow in someone else's cloud." Maya Angelou
