This week I tackled a small project to get back into the swing of things.

It’s no secret to anyone who knows me that I *love* snail mail. I have 3 pen pals. When I’m really lucky I get the surprise note in the mail from other friends. (And yes, I absolutely reread letters I have received!)

I’m also a postcrosser, which means I send and receive post cards to and from all over the world. Postcrossing is always a surprise. I never know who is going to write, what they are going to say, or what sort of card they will choose to send. (I share some of my favorites from time to time on the blog.)

What this boils down to is I have a lot of stationery and I love collecting more when I can! It was time to tidy up the messy pile strewn about in three places through the house.

My sweet pup, Maggie, decided she was going to be extremely helpful in this task. Here she is posing with a few of my note cards. I tend to prefer letter-style stationery, so I only have a few note cards, though I found at least a couple more sets after taking this picture.

Ahh…. that’s more like it. And yes, that is papyrus. Because why not? Unfortunately it is quite difficult to find letter stationery without it being colored/bordered computer paper, but I do have a few ‘proper’ letter sets not pictured here.

I certainly have no lack of envelopes either. The owner of our local Hallmark retired and deeply discounted everything in the shop’s final days. I got this rainbow stack of envelopes who had lost their cards for only a couple of dollars.

Honestly, finding letter sets that are fun, pretty, and less than a tiny fortune in the United States is so difficult that most of my stationery now comes from Japan, where letters are still popular! Actually I’m not entirely sure how popular letters are there, but the business must be just fine with the sheer number of options available.

Here’s only half of my current letter sets, and these aren’t even the nicer sets I own. I’ve been very lucky in that a friend of mine who lives in Kyoto doesn’t mind stationery shopping for me! I have learned that trusting her judgement always serves me well. She has yet to pick anything I don’t like. (I don’t know what I’m going to do when she leaves Japan next year!)

At last, when all was said and done though, I have everything nicely organized! No more unwieldy stacks of paper-stuffs!

And now I’m off to go write a letter…

Other ‘Quest to Tidy’ posts:
– Introduction
– Week One: Diving Into the Mountain
– Week Two: On Pots and Pans and Wedding Gifts
– Week Three: Hitting a Low
– Week Four: The Importance of Things
– Weeks Five – Ten: When Time Takes Over