You've Got Mail

Yes, I realize this is a bit late for Valentine’s Day posts, since it’s the day after next, but what’s a girl to do when she has 8 shirts, a sling, a towel, and a wrap to embroider along with 2 tag blankets to make?! I’ll tell you what, wait until the last possible minute to make the Valentine prizes for her daughter's classmates, make an emergency trip to the fabric store at 8:53pm for more white felt, and stay up entirely too late to get them finished! Hopefully the kids will think it’s worth it.

I found these cutesy little tin mail boxes about a month ago at Target in the $1 section and knew they would be perfect for Elle’s friends at “school”. I later found this tutorial for felt mail. While we’re on the subject of felt, this was the first time I’ve used wool felt. Until this project, I had always just used that super fuzzy and not very thick kind that comes on the huge bolts. I’ll never use the fuzzy thin stuff again! Wool felt is completely different, so much nicer, and easier to work with… definitely worth the extra expense in my opinion! Okay, so back to the mail, I used the dimensions from the tutorial, but sewed on the Velcro instead of hot gluing it, embroidered the addresses, and made the stamps Velcroable (yes that’s a word!) too. I also put a Valentine-y spin on it with the “I {heart} U” postcard and heart stamp.

I made the post card by creating a template of the design, tracing it onto the white felt, cutting it out and sewing it to the back of the pink. I embroidered the address and return address labels with the kid’s names and even made a set for Elle with her real address on it (it didn’t cross my mind until this project that she doesn’t know her address). Oh, I also discovered a new notion… gotta love that… iron-on rick rack! I used one with a shiny/glossy finish for the “writing” on the letter and postcard.

If it hadn’t taken me until nearly 2am to finish these I would’ve used rub on letters to add the child’s name to the mailbox, and maybe tied a ribbon or two around the flag.

It was a fun little project and I don’t feel too bad about posting it so close to Valentines Day because you could do this without a Valentine-y spin any time. In fact, it would be fun to “deliver” more mail to add to their collection throughout the year at each holiday… although that will eventually necessitate a bigger mail box to hold it all. Hmmmm, do you have an idea for how to craft a mailbox or other means to store lots of felt mail?