Tuesday, November 12, 2013

National Postal Museum, Mail Art, and more

 On Sunday, I took the train up to Washington, DC, a lovely 2.5 hour ride during which I got to visit with some friends heading to NYC.

I was going there to meet up with some Mail friends. One I'd met before but not the other two. This was very exciting to me. I'd "known" these people for many years through correspondence.

One is PostMuse, the other is Missive Maven, and the other is my friend Juli.

We met at Union Station, had lunch, then headed over to the National Postal Museum. The new Stamp gallery is AMAZING! We were, of course, like kids in a candy shop!

PostMuse had all of her fabulous pens with her and Juli got to try out quite a few and I came away thinking that I needed to increase my collection of pens. Neither Missive Maven or I carry our pens with us. I'm always afraid that I'll lose one of my favorites. Do you have a favorite pen? Do you carry it with you?

We got to take home stamps from a whole bunch that were on a table just waiting for us to play with, as you can see above. We were even provided with cool envelopes to take them home in.

There were lots of postcards for us to take home as souvenirs and we did! Like I need more postcards, right? Here's what I took home. You'll see these in the coming days, altered, as Mail Art.

Later in the day, Melissa of Craftgasm met up with us. I'd met in her NYC several years ago at a huge craft fair. She now has a shop: ANALOG, stop in if you're nearby. It's full of vintage goodies and mail related items. 
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Now to Mail Art -  I've decided to add Victorian scraps to commercial postcards again. I love that a new narrative is created with the addition of one item.
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This card was created while at the National Postal Museum using stamps provided there. I was at Mecca, as Juli noted when posting on fb.

Here's Bizoo interrupting my work the other day. He now covers my entire keyboard. I should put up a comparison photo from a few months ago. This cat is HUGE!

  I was quite delighted to come up on this bicycle and it's sweet shadow.



What more can I say about my trip to D.C. except that is was like a wonderful dream, to get to spend time face-to-face with people I've corresponded with for years. I felt like I was with old friends, and I was. 

6 comments:

Margie said...

Aw man, what a wonderful little trip! I feel like you and I would feel he same way if we met in person. The bike shadow is extra sweet, and Bizoo is a biggin!

I don't do mail art , but I'd still have a fit over all those stamps and postcards!

mim said...

Right, one doesn't need to be a Mail Artist to love stamps, and pens, and paper, and all things MAIL!

The Missive Maven said...

So true, Mim - it WAS like old friends meeting for the first time! Wonderful post. I am tickled that you got a great little image of my splinted thumb, but even more tickled by the fabulous Bizoo sprawled across your laptop.

Juli said...

What a great day and visit. I'm so glad we were all able to meet up to share the day together. It was swell!

Juli said...

What a great day! I'm so glad we got to spend it together.

PostMuse said...

I'm behind on my blog reading (though I hate to admit it, I miss Google Reader very much ... feedly is just not working for me) so I'm just seeing this now.

It was so much fun meeting up with everyone. Old friends meeting for the first time, indeed! Thank you, Mim, for capturing the moment.

How did I get into this?

I was asked when I started doing Mailart. Good question. Like many artists, I was making and mailing art without even knowing it had a name ...