My Happy Snail Mail for St. Patrick’s Day was a set of watercolors for my younger niece and nephew (10 and 5), and a box of Skittles for my older niece (15).
I added a shamrock sticker that said, “Sending you a little rainbow for St. Patrick’s Day” on each of them, and “Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud. ~Maya Angelou” on the Skittles.
I made sure to cover the barcode on the paints, and tape the case shut with clear packing tape. Slapped on a little leprechaun shipping label and off to the post office I went, super excited to send these off.
When I got there the lady took one look and was like, “Um, where’s the box?” I explained I wanted to ship them like that. She shook her head. My heart dropped. I honest to God whined, “But people do this all the time, it’s so fun!” I didn’t go on to cite the numerous websites I’ve seen with proof that this happens, but I wanted to. LOL She proceeded to explain that they would be shipped with heavy boxes and no doubt would be crushed along the way.
Sigh…
I was quite disappointed, I had been looking forward to this for weeks. I thanked her and left, fully intending to put my own postage on them and dropping them off at the other post office. But then the more I thought about it I realized how terrible it would be if the kids DID get damaged goods. That would spoil the whole surprise, and this was about the kids, not me.
In order to get these packages to the kids in time for St. Patty’s Day they HAD to be mailed out TODAY, and I had several errands to run. How could I work through this problem? My creative wheels spun out of control.
A walk through my workshop (+ a quick trip to the store for candy) and I found the PERFECT solution…even better than my original idea of sending them without a box. Check it out:
I happened to have the perfect sized boxes and a bunch of tissue paper on hand. I quickly stuffed the paints and Skittles in the box, cut and crunched up different colored tissued paper and put them in the traditional ROY G BIV order, tossed some Rolos on top, and voila! Rainbow in a box!
I really wanted to decorate the outside of the box, but didn’t have the time. =( Instead I cut a quick shamrock with “Lucky You!” in the center and taped them down. Good enough!
The additional packaging really didn’t add much to the postage or overall costs, and now I know everything will arrive safely and unbroken. At about $3 in postage shipping these goodies cost more than the goodies themselves, but just think of how fun it is to receive something like this in the mail, right?! Totally worth it. =)
Of course my girls saw me putting them together and wondered where theirs were. I told them they must be patient, it wasn’t St. Patrick’s Day yet. Plus, I had an idea…both girls still talk about Twinkle, our Elf on the Shelf, and my little one even wrote him a note the other day. So, the next day when they woke up the note was missing, but Twinkle left them a response…he “pranked” me by taking the gifts I had set aside to give to the girls on St. Patty’s Day and gave it to them early! They thought it was HILARIOUS! =)
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