MeFi Card Club appreciation

April 28, 2018 10:14 AM

Hi y'all! Comments are closed on the MeFi Card Club announcement post, and now that we're a couple months in, I thought it'd be nice to give folks a place to share their appreciation for cards they've received and/or check in about cards they've sent. Big thanks to Fig for organizing & running the exchange, and to everyone else who has helped this along!
posted by duffell to MetaFilter Gatherings at 10:14 AM (53 comments total)

Hey this looks really fun. Since it's a rolling every month thing, is it a thing that can be joined or are sign-ups closed?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 12:04 PM on April 28, 2018 [1 favorite]

My card month hasn't happened yet so I haven't yet received any, but I've been having a great time sending out cards. It's also a great excuse to buy silly stickers at the art store. Thanks, Fig, for making it happen!
posted by moonmilk at 2:16 PM on April 28, 2018 [3 favorites]

My “would like to receive cards” months haven’t occurred yet but I’m having fun choosing and sending! And yes, big thanks to Fig for organizing!
posted by bookmammal at 2:19 PM on April 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

I just picked out cards to send for May this morning, and it was the most fun of my errands! I also haven't been a recipient in this swap yet, but I'm sure that part is a blast as well. Yay Fig!
posted by the primroses were over at 2:26 PM on April 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

I've been having fun sending out cards.
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:36 PM on April 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

I’ve only sent two so far- just got my May assignments and I’m looking forward to just flagrant abuse of stickers. My receiving months haven’t occurred yet- but I’m sure I’ll love everything I get. My only disappointment is this month I said I could send three and I only got orders to send two! Sad! I have so many stickers and Italian stationary to give! Love this idea so much.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 3:33 PM on April 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

I love this project, and Fig is great for her behind-the-scenes work! I, too, have only sent and not yet received, but I really enjoy the sending and the way it makes me feel more connected to MeFi in general.

I also enjoy the instagram #meficardclub posts -- there aren't that many yet, but they are fun to look at and to see the different card styles!
posted by danabanana at 4:03 PM on April 28, 2018 [1 favorite]

You guys are all so welcome!

Homo neanderthalensis -- I am so sorry, that was a goof up on my behalf. I'll send you another assignment tomorrow to get you to three.

If only I had a penguin... -- it's a rolling thing, you sign up once to let me know when you want to get cards, then each month I send out an email asking how many cards you want to send out each month. A few weeks after that, I match up senders with recipients, and send you the info of people to send cards to. Email me at [e-mail] and I'll set you up.
posted by Fig at 7:55 PM on April 28, 2018 [3 favorites]

The system works!
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 9:53 PM on April 28, 2018 [2 favorites]

I got great cards (and even a couple letters!) for April, thanks so much, and have been enjoying making and sending cards, too!
This is fun!
posted by Mister Moofoo at 10:19 PM on April 28, 2018 [3 favorites]

duffell—I was wondering the same thing! I’d love to know how many people are signed up in total, and the average number of folks who have asked to receive cards each month.

And—if you haven’t joined yet and you like getting/sending “real mail”—what are you waiting for?!?! Fig has made it so easy to join and participate!
posted by bookmammal at 5:41 AM on April 29, 2018 [3 favorites]

I have been having fun making and sending cards.
posted by bjgeiger at 8:10 AM on April 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

This is a wonderful thing! I love seeing names from the mail exchange pop up in comments, too. Makes the whole experience here that much friendlier.

Cheers to Fig!
posted by mochapickle at 10:40 AM on April 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

I have to look when I'm at home for the average # of cards asked for per month. Off the top of my head, it's 7ish. You are prodigious card senders (which is amazing!!), so far it's been 150++ cards sent per month, so each person should get like 15ish +.

For May, there were 10 people asking for cards for various occasions, and a total of 179 cards (180 now, thanks H.N.!) coming from 52 different people.
posted by Fig at 10:48 AM on April 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Thank you again for doing this, Fig. April was my birthday month and I got a stack of cards, some pretty and some funny and some both; some from people who are already familiar conversation partners on the site, some from usernames I know but have never interacted with, some from names I think I heard from the first time. I really like the sense of increased connections being made in all directions.
(Haven't signed up to send for May due to too much running-in-all-directionsness but hope to get back to sending very soon!)
posted by huimangm at 3:45 PM on April 29, 2018 [4 favorites]

I really like the sense of increased connections being made in all directions.

Yes! This is the part I love about card club!

I appreciate Fig being so organised and getting the assignments out in plenty of time, because delivery from Japan to the US takes about a week.
posted by Juso No Thankyou at 5:36 PM on April 29, 2018 [6 favorites]

I'm really enjoying MeFi Card Club! Similarly, my months to receive haven't rolled around yet, but I've enjoyed sending out post cards, and I might try something that's a little more of an art project for May. And yes, the #meficardclubstuff I've seen on instagram is great, and if I do anything worth sharing I'll be sure to post it there! After a slight delay so as to not ruin the surprise for the recipients, of course.
posted by Secretariat at 7:51 PM on April 29, 2018 [2 favorites]

As someone who signed up to receive cards in March, I have to say (again), it was awesome. I was expecting maybe three or four or five cards, and instead they just kept coming. And people were so creative with them. And regardless of how personalized the card was, it was just so spectacular to receive so many cards. And I echo the previous sentiments that I now feel very much more attached to the people who sent them. Yay, MeFi card exchange! Community is good, and I thank Fig once again for fostering community.
posted by lazuli at 8:32 PM on April 29, 2018 [5 favorites]

Ok! I was way off on my estimate of card requests per month. 8 (August, December, January) is the smallest number of card requests, 17 (July) is the biggest. The average is 12.

I don't keep the data of cards sent from month-to-month, but it's about 15-17 cards per person, so somewhere in the 150ish range?
posted by Fig at 3:16 AM on April 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

This has been so much fun to send cards. I am excited about May card sending as well!
posted by needlegrrl at 7:18 AM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

Hit post too quickly - meant to add - Fig, you're awesome for organizing. :)
posted by needlegrrl at 7:18 AM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

Note to self: Sign up to send 10 cards in July.

Last month was a receive cards month for me and it was lovely to get so many birthday wishes! Thank you to everyone who sent a card!

I've also been really enjoying sending them. Thank you for organizing, Fig! You're the best!
posted by elsietheeel at 8:08 AM on April 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

No one should feel put off at the notion of needing to hand-make or decorate the cards, by the way! This can and should be a low-barrier source of fun. I got birthday cards in March, and my cat Pipsqueak got her birthday cards in April, and we each got a mix of handmade and completely ready-to-wear cards and ALL of them are GREAT! I've been sending ready-made cards because the next alternative is not sending cards, and I don't feel bad about it.
posted by janell at 10:00 AM on April 30, 2018 [8 favorites]

seconding janell above--I love receiving handmade cards IF AND ONLY IF that's your thing, but the main thing is that I just enjoy getting "real mail" and I absolutely welcome receiving purchased cards!

I'm not personally artistic at all, so the cards I send are store-bought. Please don't feel hesitant to sign up if you are not a "make your own card" type of person!
posted by bookmammal at 10:45 AM on April 30, 2018 [3 favorites]

Yes, as Janell noted, I got a total mix of different cards and they were all fun in their own way. Making your own cards is something I'm doing because I had decided to take up card making as a hobby right around the time the card club was announced. And usually, that means "I had decided to buy a bunch of stuff that I will use to do one half-assed project and then never touch again" because my actual hobby is buying craft supplies, but since I now have this excuse every month, I have actually been using up those craft supplies.
posted by jacquilynne at 11:01 AM on April 30, 2018 [6 favorites]

So I'm signing up and thinking about when I'd like to receive cards and I found this list of wacky holidays that others might also find useful.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 1:09 PM on April 30, 2018 [2 favorites]

I've treasured every card I've received from all you wonderful MeFites. I had a low-key birthday this year and your cards made me feel so special.

It's also a great way to get to know other MeFites. Especially for lurkers and near lurkers like myself.

The cards I've sent out have been a mixed bag. For one very special compelling occasion. I went out and looked for specific appropriate cards. I also have a stash of cards I previously purchased and cards gifted me by one of my old lady friends. So some of the cards I've sent have been from this stash. On occasion, I have done some very homemade looking illustrations. Probably not Instagram worthy IMHO but it is the thought that counts, right?

I also have a stash of picture postcards I'd love start using. Would y'all be up for receiving a postcard?
I'm tempted to send one out on occasion. Some of these are antiques, purchased by my namesake great-aunt on her grand European tour. Others I picked up on various vacations and visits to àrt museums. And some are just totally random.

I think it's important to emphasize that the number one most very special aspect of this is sending and receiving written mail. It doesn't have to be expensive. It doesn't have to be pretty. It doesn't even have to be spelled well or grammatically. Just the fact you got something in your mailbox makes it exceptional.
posted by LeftMyHeartInSanFrancisco at 5:31 PM on April 30, 2018 [7 favorites]

I LOVE unique and/or vintage postcards! If you get my name for any month, feel free to send one my way!
posted by bookmammal at 6:14 PM on April 30, 2018

ooh, postcards! I buy old Japanese postcards to send my mom, and the store has, like, THOUSANDS, maybe ten thousands of postcards in stock from before the war (from ordinary tourist scenes to "we built a new school, isn't it pretty?"). I'd love to send them to anyone interested. Glad to receive postcards too.
posted by huimangm at 12:38 AM on May 1, 2018 [5 favorites]

For what it's worth, I am very pro-postcard, and would be happy to receive them. Maybe half the cards I've sent so far have been postcards. I hope no one has felt shorted - I just really like postcards.
posted by the primroses were over at 4:09 PM on May 1, 2018 [4 favorites]

I'm the sort of silly-billy who years ago bought many nice things of Italian and Japanese stationary because I was determining to write letters to people and it never happened. SO so far I've not had to buy a thing but stamps! I also have many many very nice postcard books, including one of dogs, one of natural history prints and one of the impressionists. Also... bought... during a period... where I thought I'd write a lot... and I didn't. OOPS. I sent two in April, I've just mailed out 3 this month, and I'm going to sign up for ten in June. So far it's all been fancy stationary but postcards! I have those too! I also have some watercolor paint-your-own cards but I don't have the time now. hmm... maybe in July.... XD XD XD
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 9:15 PM on May 2, 2018 [2 favorites]

I also want to DEEPLY apologize to fluttering hellfire who even mentioned that they liked dogs in their little comment section and I swear I found the lovely artsy dog photograph postcard book like literally the day after I mailed my May letters. SO SORRY!
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 10:04 PM on May 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

If I'd known the way to spread happiness among MeFites was to make them send cards to me, I would have signed up for card-receiving occasions every month!
posted by drlith at 5:32 AM on May 3, 2018 [6 favorites]

Once we're already signed up is there a way that we can add on some card receiving occasions?
posted by elsietheeel at 7:17 AM on May 3, 2018 [2 favorites]

I got a few postcards among my birthday cards, and I was perfectly happy to receive them. I will note that the one that was written on an advertising postcard for a business almost got bundled up and recycled with the rest of the junkmail, until I knocked it off the table and saw the birthday message on the back, but once I knew it was birthday greetings then it was still fun to have received!
posted by jacquilynne at 7:20 AM on May 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

Once we're already signed up is there a way that we can add on some card receiving occasions?

Yeah, absolutely! On the monthly opt-ins, use the "do you need to make any changes?" etc part of the form to let me know what to add. Or if you want to take occasions out. Or if you want to send something to everybody, even though the max # on the opt-ins is 10. Or anything, really. That's the best place to do it.



(As long as I'm talking about it, I want to note that a LOT of you use that space to say thanks, and although I don't reply I do see them and get warm fuzzies and really appreciate it. So, thanks for the thanks! It is a lot of fun facilitating something that connects people and brings joy to others, and the profuse appreciation I get from you all is icing on the cake)
posted by Fig at 8:25 AM on May 3, 2018 [7 favorites]

Oh, and -- I'll be sending out the opt-ins for June this weekend, so watch your email inboxes. The assigning will be somewhere around May 19-20. I'll probably codify that and add that to the opt-in email for this month too.

Something like Opt-Ins for sending to recipients in the next month will be sent the first weekend of the month, and the assignments will be sent two weeks after, so the third weekend of the month. So! you have 2 weeks to reply on whether you want to send a card or not/how many, and then at least a week to get a card out to people celebrating in the first few days of the following month, more time if their thing isn't until later.

Joining is on a rolling basis and can be done at any time.
posted by Fig at 8:32 AM on May 3, 2018 [3 favorites]

It was a joy to make and send my first batch. Thank you Fig and thank you participants!
posted by maya at 11:12 PM on May 4, 2018 [2 favorites]

Guys, my toddler has so many brightly coloured birthday cards!
I let her open one of them, it had stickers! She was delighted! I was delighted!
The others she has to keep until her actual birthday at the end of the week.
Thanks! lovely card sending folks.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 3:29 AM on May 9, 2018 [4 favorites]

Sending a card to her was one of the delights of my May card assignments! I hope more MeFites sign their little kids up. What's more fun than being 4 years old and getting mail? (Maybe being the one who gets to send the mail!)
posted by elsietheeel at 7:56 AM on May 9, 2018 [5 favorites]

Can I change my registration to "will send 2 cards per month to grown-ups, plus send me all the little kids who are signed up?"
posted by jacquilynne at 8:25 AM on May 9, 2018 [3 favorites]

I've just received word that the new notecards I ordered have shipped. I can't wait to send out some cards! This is taking way too long!*

But how does this work? Do people typically sign their mefi username? Their real name or both? And do which do you get for the people you're sending to? I mean I imagine it's nice to look through people's basic history (in a non-creepy way) to figure out what to write, which would make username useful, but I could also see that people might not want to link their username to their real address?

* This is an expression of my eagerness and not a criticism of Fig's process or her fabulous work.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 5:18 PM on May 9, 2018

I’ve gotten cards signed with the user name only, and cards signed with both user name and real name. And all the addresses I’ve received to send cards to have included both the user name and their real name.

I don’t think there are any hard and fast rules here, other than to send a card to each name you receive—and to have fun doing it!!!!
posted by bookmammal at 5:31 PM on May 9, 2018 [5 favorites]

My card month of April was absolutely fabulous! Thank you, everyone, for making my birthday month so very special. I truly adored every card (each was so original and nifty) and the warm wishes within. I've saved them all and really appreciate the lovely thoughtfulness of my card-givers. You all rock!

I've enjoyed sending cards, and look forward to dropping another batch in the mail tomorrow or Sat. It's such fun finding the right card. Thanks for setting this up, Fig! It's a total hoot.
posted by but no cigar at 3:33 PM on May 10, 2018 [3 favorites]

heya! I just finished sending out the assignments for June, and thought y'all would like some numbers.

50 Mefites are sending 225 cards to 15 recipients. (The numbers didn't work out that evenly organically, I step in to fill any card-sending gaps so that everyone gets the same amount of cards. Although last month it was an even divide!)

4 out of those 50 picked the new "send cards to everybody this month!" option, which is extra awesome. About half of the senders choose to send either 2 or 3 cards.

A handful (4-5 or so) are requesting to send to US-only addresses, so I may make that an option on the next opt-in form. And again, I do appreciate all of the thanks that get sent my way - this is a fun little project to do!
posted by Fig at 8:11 PM on May 20, 2018 [6 favorites]

I got a bunch of birthdays in June's assignments, which hasn't really happened in previous months, so I can finally get through some of my birthday card stash!

Also I would love a US addresses-only option for months when cash is tight.

Thank you again Fig! I love card club!
posted by elsietheeel at 10:29 AM on May 21, 2018 [3 favorites]

Just fyi I kind of screwed up on my ask for a card this month. I meant I was graduating the semester- not graduated as a whole. whoops. that wont be till December- But the blurb on my card makes it seem like I'm graduating the whole kit and caboodle. Should be fun to get a bunch of cards congratulating me on something that hasn't happened yet XD my bad!
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 2:19 PM on May 23, 2018 [2 favorites]

I totally forgot that I signed up for this month until I got some cards in the mail. Hannibal says thank you!
posted by elsietheeel at 2:31 PM on June 7, 2018

*tugs collar* I just realized that I need more than one forever stamp on my international cards and therefore all the nice letters I have sent until now that were out of the USA prob never got there I am SO SO Sorry! situation will be rectified going forward, I focused so hard on writing the addresses right I forgot the stamp situation! my deepest apologies!
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 10:00 PM on July 2, 2018 [1 favorite]

Oh, there is an appreciation thread and it is still open! I've just emailed Fig my appreciation, but let me also post here. I've made a bunch of new online / Twitter / email friends and have had such joy sending and receiving cards (my month was May and it was awesome). Getting a happy message from a recipient is almost the best part of all this. :)
posted by ClarissaWAM at 11:39 AM on August 14, 2018 [2 favorites]

I just had a fantastic month of cards arriving every week, and that was pretty great. Y’all are a creative bunch.
posted by GenjiandProust at 12:41 PM on August 14, 2018 [2 favorites]

Really enjoying participating in the card exchange. Thanks, all!
posted by readinghippo at 1:18 PM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]

I have received so many wonderful, thoughtful cards and various other surprises over the past couple of months and EVERYTHING I’ve received has been such a great mood booster for me.
I appreciate everyone who is participating and am also grateful to Fig, our Fabulous Facilitator!
posted by bookmammal at 3:28 PM on August 21, 2018 [3 favorites]