manders2280

Updated March 18, 2020

Because my Swap-bot profile is public, visible to everyone on the internet, I'm deleting most everything. It's a bit like latching the barn door after the horse is gone, but friends who are security experts tell me every little bit helps.

I'll leave a little information for swaps and wishes. Send me a pm if you want to know more about my preferences. If you're a member of Postcrossing, you can see my Postcrossing profile for more information.

I swap for blank postcards in envelopes. I send the postcards I receive to family and friends and people on Postcrossing. I don't mind gently bent corners; I lop them off with a corner rounder.

No thank you: Postcards to color, postcards for Christian holidays and legends, and Zazzle postcards won't get hearts from me. Most others will. I have many Pomegranate postcards because I buy their remaindered postcard books at Half Price Books for $3.

My favorite kawaii has a face. I love food with faces and anchovies with legs and animals in an unlikely milieu like cat servers at Starbucks.

I enjoy most characters, especially San-X. My favorite characters at the moment are Corocoro Coronya, gudetama lazy (or depressed or fatigued?) egg yolk, Kogepan Burnt Bread, Sentimental Circus and Sumikko Gurashi.

I'm looking for kawaii books with faces. And puffins. How could all the kawaii artists have never thought to draw puffins?

I throw away too much plastic. This is a list of plastic that I receive in swaps and would like to avoid. And perhaps this list of preferences will add another tick mark to the online statistics of people who want to change the world.

• Metallic, iridescent or holographic plastic bows, glitter, shreds, and wrapping tissue.
• Plastic ziplock bags, especially tiny ones. I can't open the tiny ones so I cut off the top to open them and then throw them out.
• Deco tape and plastic shipping tape. I'm using up what I have on hand and won't buy more.
• Bubble wrap padded envelopes. I try to reuse these.

Instead use:

• Paper bows, shreds, and wrapping paper.
• Furoshiki: Japanese wrapping cloth, made from any piece of cloth. Google how to wrap Furoshiki for directions. Reuse the furoshiki you receive to wrap another swap or a present, or for your next quilt.
• Reuse small envelopes and packing materials, bags, boxes and bubble mailing envelopes. Many people reuse the cellophane wrapper from stickers sacks. Pattie reuses small envelopes from bag swaps when she's the Send it home to....
• Reuse ziplock bags.
• Fold a nice piece of paper around tiny kawaii to make an informal envelope and seal it with washi tape. Or fold it the same way you'd fold parchment paper around fish to bake it.
• Paper tape. We all love washi tape. Kraft paper shipping tape is widely available now. U-Haul sells self-sticking paper tape.
• Use 100% recycled padded mailers or reuse plastic bubble mailers. In fact, reuse any padded mailer to ship a swap.