For the past few weeks, every time I open the mailbox, it's been a bit depressing. Bills. Junk mail. Offers to switch to faster internet and cheaper phones. More TV channels. And even a free hearing aide consultation. Twice, in the past two weeks, I've had days without ANY mail.

There is rarely, if ever, the personal note.

When we lived on my grandmother's farm, and shared the same mailbox, I was always struck that she received a personal note from someone almost daily. Sometimes even two or three in a day.

But if you knew my grandmother, you'd know that she impacted many, many people's lives. And oftentimes, people wrote her letters to tell her so. But the other thing about my grandmother is that you could always find her in the back living room, sitting at her desk, balancing her checkbook or writing personal letters.

She'd drop you a note, say hello, send a clipping from the newspaper, remember your birthday or anniversary. And people often returned her kindness.

Letter writing is a dying art. Can you imagine if just half of the personal emails you received in a day, showed up in your mailbox as note?

Though I'm still failing miserably at letter-writing, I am determined to carry my grandmother's torch and keep this meaningful and timeless form of communication alive and well in my family.

With this in mind, I decided that I wanted to create my own stationery, hoping it would inspire me to begin to write.

When it comes to stationery, I prefer notecards versus folded cards and these are very small--only about 3 inches by 5 inches. I'm not out to write a novel, but just a small note to say "hello, I'm thinking of you." They are printed on cover stock with kraft brown recycled envelopes to go with them.

Now all I need is a good pen. Kidding. (though I do have a thing about pens!)

I thought it would be nice, in the spirit of keeping this tradition alive and to inspire some of you to write a few notes, to give two sets away. Each set will include eight notecards and eight envelopes.

I toyed with the idea of putting a few up in my neglected etsy shop, since I have printed myself a lifetime's supply, but for today, until I get my act together, I'd love to giveaway two sets here. It's fun to giveaway some of my own work for a change.

Just leave your own 'hello' on this post....I'll pick two "winners" soon.

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I would be remiss in writing this post without mentioning how I printed these cards. They were printed at home with my Epson R1900. It is a dream printer. The quality and true-ness to color, is remarkable. When my cards were coming out of the printer, I found myself running my hands over the designs, because they almost had the quality of a letterpress. The printer can print wide formats (13 inches) and long (up to 44 inches). You can even outfit it with a roll of paper to print panoramas. If you ever had any hopes of doing some serious designing and printing at home, or printing your own photographs in larger formats, scrapbooking pages, or other creative projects, this printer would be an amazing investment. And I can't wait to see all the great ideas we'll come up with to use it with homeschooling this year as well. I had to tell you, because I love it so! :)

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Happy Weekend, friends and happy old-fashioned letter writing.