Pocket Letter Newbie

I have officially participated in my very first Pocket Letter swap!!

I first heard about Pocket Letters via Serena Bee's YouTube channel.

I loved how fun and simple it looked, so I started collecting all of the

"ingredients" to begin making my own. But you really do need someone to

swap with to make it official. I happened to be chatting with my dear friend

(in real life), Dani, who stated that she has been trading pocket letters all

over the US and Internationally for a few months. What?! How did I not

know this?! I made sure she was my first PL swap, although I still haven't

received mine yet....

I went with a purple Goth theme which I chose myself. I guess you can

pick a theme between you and your trade partner, but Dani left it up to me

since it was my first time. I know she doesn't "do pink", so I went with

purple. Everyone loves purple, right? Well, they should!

I began by grabbing a stack of trading card sheets from my ATC stash,

and pulled out my ridiculous amount of ATCs that I have made, but never

gave away. I have a lot! What a great way to share them with new friends far and wide.

I was lucky enough to have won some Bugaboo images from a recent LOC challenge,

and really wanted to color them up. I love this spider hanging from the moon.

I colored it with Copics and then clear embossed a spider web over the entire card

before using Distress Inks to color the background. 

Then the fun really begins when you start adding goodies to every pocket. 

I added a bunch of paper punched spiders to this pocket.   

After filling the pockets with ATCs, and blank coordinating papers,

I added rhinestones, bows, glittery border strips, puffy bat ribbon, etc...

Basically, add fun crafty stuff to share. I guess the original idea is

to add a tea bag, a note about yourself, a fun quote, and all kinds of 

ephemera. There is a great introduction to Pocket Letters here,

by the lady who created them. 

This one was fun. I just added some Tim Burton-y paper clips, and

a bunch of punched bats, and teeny neon clips, too.

This image was fun to color and play with. I got a bit over zealous with the 

polka dot background, but it's very fancy now.

Dani loved her Pocket Letter. I am going to the post office to retrieve mine today.

And pay to get it out of hock. Make sure to add the correct postage, and that it's

packaged properly when you do your swaps. I'm sure Dani did as well, but 

apparently my local post office is super persnickety and wants special handling

fees or something.... Of all the swaps Dani has done, both in the US and Internationally,

this is the FIRST one to have issues. And we only live about 10 miles apart.

I am such a unique experience.