Thinking about cards and shall we have a card swap?

I’ve been thinking a bit about sending letters and cards and things recently, after reading this post by The Gingerbread Lady and finding this blog (whose author is going to send me a letter! Isn’t that kind?), and I do think it is nice to get something handwritten occasionally, which is one of the reasons I like sending cards at Christmas (I know everyone moans about sending cards, but I like it! I like to keep in touch with people! I am a hideous Pollyanna/ Martha Stewart hybrid!).

The other time, obviously, that people used to tend to send cards was when they went on holiday, although now we can all text each other and a text does have a fighting chance of getting home before you do. I dug out my old postcard collection earlier from when I was very little, and it is nice to look back and see the kinds of things I was sent. Looking back with cynicism, it does strike me that I was perhaps encouraged to have a postcard collection by the fact that they were cheap and easy to store in a box. No wonder my diamond and mountain goat collections never got off the ground, then.

I'm not sure why this was the postcard of choice from my grandparents to me as a small child but I want you to know I am ok now, although I wish I had seen the one on the bottom left after we had done the bathroom, not before

It was a different world in which you either sent someone a postcard of an unattractive man being made faintly anxious by a scantily-clad nymphette, or you had to send them a postcard of a donkey or a parade of shops in Ingoldmells.

You might need to identify a lugworm one day. You'll thank me then

I think a gun was held to my cousin Richard’s head, or dodgem priviledges were withdrawn until he had produced a postcard to send me. (‘Draw Sue a picture, Rich! It’ll be quicker!’).

I think we visited Skegness while they were there. You'll be relieved to know the site was perfectly acceptable

These are from my grandparents on both sides. What kind of holiday would it be without a pint and a game on the slots? No kind of holiday at all. And I am glad to see the caravan site was quite clean, although I think there is a world of meaning contained in that ‘quite’, and no doubt it was expanded on when they got home. Meanwhile, Nana Mollie is roaming the streets of Oxford eating buns and causing trouble.

Anyway, you see, I have kept my postcards for years, even the ones from my mother’s French penpal who tells my mother off for not writing often enough and the ones from Grandad’s next door neighbours, Les and Lucy Lomas. It is not as easy to keep emails, so sometimes an actual physical artefact is nice. Which brings me back to Christmas cards! I was thinking it might be quite a nice idea to do a handmade Christmas card swap later this year. Would anyone be up for that? I would organise, and you know, we’re starting early so we would all have plenty of time to get something made (I am not very good at making cards so I might just be sticking a few sequins to a bit of cardboard. Bad news for my potential swap partner, I know, but good news in terms of, don’t be intimidated by standards). Let me know if that’s something you’d be interested in, and if I have any takers at all I will think about it more and do a proper sign-up post.

(Random fact of the day: bathroom fitters hate mosaic tiles. They hate them. They make them suck their teeth. Back to perusing the tile catalogue).