Here’s a great craft project for those of you who collect postcards.

Check out the hanging postcard collage!

Here’s a great thing to do with those bills you get in the mail!

Check out Design Sponge’s tutorial on how to turn junk mail security envelopes into something really groovy!

Thanks, PostMuse for pointing this one out for me…

She mentioned in a comment to one of my posts that she knew of a small book made from five envelopes. It’s cute and handy! Not only highly useful, but could make great mini gifts! And it looks like they could be made in a very short amount of time with very little material.

Go check it out: Mini Envelope Book

For all your crafty types, here is a fantastic tutorial on how to create a BEAUTIFUL 5-pocket portfolio that is great for many things. This one was designed with the theme of travel, but the pockets are such that you hold a lot of great correspondence items in it.

This would also make a great low-cost gift for a lucky pen pal!

Natty at Get Scatty has a very simple video tutorial on how to make an easy, nearly-instant envelope that will work with just about any size card.

Try it out next time you need a quick “jacket” to dress your note in. You can do lots of variations with this — fancy papers and more. Get creative!

Is this adorable or what? Click the picture below to go to Laura of Lupin’s postage stamp gift wrap tutorial.

Click to See Laura's Gift Wrap Tutorial

I ran across this web site recently: Printable Paper

This is a great web site if you’re looking for something new and interesting to write on. It has 450 different types of lined papers that you can print for free. They have the traditional lined paper and graph paper. They have weird log paper that I have NO idea what it’s used for… maybe mathematics or geometry? Polar graph papers (write in circles)! Hexagons! Octagons! Isometric! Music papers, dot papers! Penmanship paper! (We use this for our son who is learning to write.)

One of my favorites is the “story paper” which is the penmanship paper with blank spots. Your kids can draw in the blank space and write on the lines at the bottom. My son has a journal like this and he draws and I write in his words for him at the bottom.

Another neat one is the Cornell Note Paper which has lines in one section and then a blank column and blank bar at the bottom which would be really fun for doodling.

So, go check it out and treat yourself to some fun and free printable papers!

My family gets Netflix and love it. The only really aggravating thing about Netflix is this little flap of paper you have to tear off and throw away leaving a reusable envelope you return your movie in. First of all, I have to say, “Yay, Netflix” for not double-enveloping in the first place. However, wouldn’t it be cool if there were something you could do to completely utilize ALL the pieces?

Sure you can recycle that extra piece of paper, but why not turn it into an envelope? You help save the environment and you can buy less envelopes to send your mail in.

My hat goes off to the clever folks at Netflix Origami! They’ll show you how to make the envelope I’m talking about. The next batch of movies we get in… you know what I’ll be doing!

Len from Celebrating Life’s Memories has created a great tutorial for a sweet letter box that she uses in her family to continue a tradition of swapping letters between family members. She’s got pictures and instructions that make it easy. Go check it out, crafty people!

Letter Box by Len

I guess I’m on a roll with mail art this week. Recently I read an interview with a mail artist and thought it was interesting. He makes mail art out of junk mail. I don’t know about you, but I have a gazillion pieces of junk mail and hate it. He has a great solution for it!

So, go check out the interview with Artist Rev K over at the Bearded Bunny Blog.

Also, on the same topic I’d like to recommend the book Creative Correspondence. They have a great section about how to creatively repurpose junk mail.