Envelope Addressing with Pointed Pen Calligraphy

Hi Everyone! Kristina here. Welcome to another video at my YouTube channel and blog. Today I'm resurrecting that card you can see on screen and I'll have a link up to it in the top corner of this video if you want to see how that card was made. I'm going to be creating an envelope for this card. I'm going to address it using some calligraphy and I'm also going to do another envelope as well, but I'll talk about that when we get there. So this envelope is actually a metallic bronze envelope from Simon Says Stamp and I'm going to be using some Dr. Ph Martin's Pen White to address this envelope to my friend Jessica. When you use pen white ink with a calligraphy pen or a nib or anything like that you do want to dilute it just a little bit. This ink tends to be a little bit on the thicker side, so I find that just putting in a couple drops of water, like the water I have in this blue bottle here, is the perfect amount just to dilute it a little bit. Because I don't have some special stirrer on hand I just used my Tim Holtz Craft Pick just to stir up that ink with the water until I got it to a consistency that worked. I can just use a baby wipe or a paper towel to clean off that Craft Pick. So like I said before I'm going to do a little bit of calligraphy on this envelope and because I don't want any of my writing to interfere with where the postage stamps will be I've just put a little strip of white Post-It tape that will mark off the area. I'm using this pointed pen nib to do the calligraphy today and I'll have the exact one that I'm using linked down in the video description as well as in the supply section of my blog. I'm using an oblique pen holder as well. When it's an oblique pen holder that means it has kind of like that bend where the nib is attached. I find that I really prefer using this over a straight handled pen holder, because just the angle of it gets my writing and my hand or whatever out of the way. So I can see what I'm doing a little bit more. So I really do prefer to use an oblique pen holder for this. I'm just going to go ahead and address this envelope to my friend Jessica. I've met Jessica I think once or twice in person and I love her to death. She actually responded to a question over at my Facebook page. I asked a bunch of you if you had any PO Box addresses or mailing addresses or any address that you would feel comfortable sharing online. If you had one to leave it in a comment, because I was looking for some addresses to use for videos. For videos and Instagram posts and things like that. I just really wanted to use real addresses for these envelopes, because I want to send it off. I want to mail it out. I didn't want to use any fake names or addresses anymore. I've done that a couple times in the past and it just seems useless, because then there's nothing I can do with that envelope. It's not a real address. So a bunch of you responded and thank you guys so much for including all of those different addresses. I was blown away. There are so many. If you want to include yours, you can still go over to my Facebook page and add your address to the list of comments. Basically I'm just going to go through and randomly pick some addresses. They could be U.S. addresses or international, it doesn't matter. When I need an address, I'll go and look at that list and pick something out and then I'll mail it off. So thank you guys so, so much for including your addresses on that Facebook post. It's really going to help me out as I share more of these envelopes in the coming up months and years or whatever. So thank you guys so much for that. So I've had a couple questions about mailing envelopes like this that have more of a fancy writing on them. Will they be delivered to their destination? Will they get there? Does it cost extra postage? Things like that. And some people have said, there's no way that my post office will deliver that. Well, the truth is, I would say 99% of post offices or international mail carriers, they will deliver addresses like this or envelopes like this. You just have to make sure that the address is clearly written. If it's a little bit obscure or it's hard to read, that's when you might have the envelope returned to you. And you also need to make sure that you include extra postage. There are a few things that make an envelope non-machinable. And non-machinable means that it cannot go through those machines that detect or read like the zip code and the address or things like that. Because it's non-machinable, they cost a little bit more to send because an actual person has to look at the zip code and the address and make sure that envelope goes in the right direction. So there are a few things you have to do when they're non-machinable. And the U.S. post office, I can't speak for other countries, I just know the U.S. post office in particular, the U.S. post office they actually have stamps that are specifically for non-machinable envelopes. And they consider non-machinable to be anything that's oddly sized or if it's square. Because if you think about it, if it's square, those envelopes, they won't be able to go into the machine because it could turn the wrong direction. So if it's square, oversized, anything like that. Also some things in particular when it comes to doing calligraphy or mail art, if the address is written at an angle, and you'll see that in a minute here, I'm going to do one at an angle. If the address is written at an angle that makes it non-machinable, because it can't read it. Also if it's white letters or type on a dark background, for example here, that makes it non-machinable. Also if it's just not enough contrast between the envelope color and the writing. So in the second example today I'm using kind of like a medium to pale blue envelope with white writing. So that contrast wouldn't be enough to be machinable even if it wasn't already non-machinable for having white writing. And also at an angle. So there are a few things that make things non-machinable, but just because it's non-machinable doesn't mean that it won't arrive at the destination. As long as you have the correct amount of postage on the envelope, it will get there. Or at least it should. And if it doesn't, it will be returned to you and then you can put it into another envelope and just put a regular address on the outside. I've done that I think just twice over the years when I've sent envelopes like this. I've only had that happen twice. So when I looked at the envelope I was like, okay yeah that was kind of a sketchy one to begin with. So I could kind of see why they wouldn't be able to read it and they might send it back. So you just have to be careful, make sure everything is legible and put enough postage on your envelope. Another reason, before I forget, why you would need extra postage is if you have a particularly thick card or letter inside your envelope. Because if it's too thick it won't be able to go through those machines either. So if you have a really thick card, maybe you've put an Action Wobbler on it or you've got lots of foam tape or things like that, if it's a little bit on the thicker side and you're kind of questioning is this going to be too thick, just err on the safe side and put more postage on your envelope. Then that will ensure that it gets there. So Ginger is another viewer or subscriber who replied to my Facebook post. So she included her address and I'm not sure if she's a college student or not. Maybe it kind of looks like it might be a college address. So I think that would be kind of fun to send that off to someone's dorm. But anyway, just thought I would include this envelope as well. I did do a third envelope today with an international address, but I don't have it on video. Anyway, so my return address I generally always put those on the back flap, because there's a little bit more room and the post office and mail carriers will look there for a return address. Just make sure you have the postage stamp on the right side. So I'm going to be using some fun postage stamps on these envelopes. Another question I got in last week's video was why would you need so much postage? Why would you put so many stamps? Well, like I mentioned earlier, because these are non-machinable they do need more postage. Also I like to use some unused vintage stamps. Just to add more character and a little more color to the envelopes. So I technically didn't need this butterfly stamp on both of these envelopes. I put the butterfly stamp on both. I didn't really need them, but I just love how it looked and how it brought a little pop of color to those corners. So those are my two envelopes for today. I'm going to go ahead and write messages inside and then put them inside the envelopes. I love how this one turned out. That metallic bronze envelope from Simon Says Stamp is beautiful. The blue envelope is actually an Audrey Blue envelope from Simon Says Stamp as well. They both have these little peel off strips, so you can peel off and then stick the flap down. Thanks so much for watching today's video. I will be back very soon with another card video. Thanks for watching.