We just wanted to let everyone know that we are beginning the process of transitioning this site to our new leadership structure.
Due to this, the page will not be reliably available in the upcoming months, as we deal with the Domain name and hosting, security, etc. We will also likely be turning off features on the site during this time.
Perhaps one of my favorite books written in a letter writing style is the Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Anne Barrows and Mary Anne Shaffer. It was a very pleasant book to read, although the topic was not so charming, the German occupation of the Island of Guernsey during World War II.
I understand it was made into a movie. To date, I have never seen the movie. Sometimes when a book is much enjoyed the movie does not always live up to the written word.
We wanted to take a moment to thank our wonderful volunteers and donors. With one week remaining in the month, we have nearly reached our GoFundMe goal of $1,000.
Thank you for those who have already donated to Keep LetterMo.com Up and Running for 2024, your contribution is greatly appreciated.
The $1,000 goal post will let us keep the site going for 2024. If we are able to exceed this goal, we will be able to reimburse the founder of the site for part of the 2023 expenses, which was paid from their personal funds.
We are also excited to welcome more members to the Volunteer Admin team for 2024. Welcome!
If you’d like to get involved, see the “How do I help?” below. There is a link to the original post, which contains more detailed information, at the bottom of this post.
So, how do I help?
Support the site financially at our GoFundMe campaign. The aim is to raise enough money to keep the site up and running through 2024, which will give us time to come up with a more permanent solution: https://tinyurl.com/LetterMo-2023-GoFundMe
The ideal pen pal would be a great friend who gets as excited about receiving a letter as I do. They would be open and thoughtful and a joy to write back and forth with.
catholicamanda
My ideal pen pal would share my love of fantasy stories and our letters would be a joined creation of a story and a universe, with everybody playing their character.
Toucan
My ideal pen pal is patient. I have a difficult time (especially lately) with making prompt replies. They would also have some interests that overlap with mine, and some that are different. Someone who likes sending and receiving inserts, found objects, tea, etc.
I am big geek and as such I go to conventions in steampunk costumes. It is great fun to meet people there. And some steampunks take a liking to penmanship as well. So for a couple of years I had a pen pal in Sweden and we used to write each other in our steampunk persona. We talked about our adventures and made sure to include outdated vocabulary and old cards to keep up the façade of two ladies in the 1880s writing to each other. It was the best and I still think about it from time to time.
Toucan
When I was about 10 we went to see David Copperfield perform magic at our local civic center. Afterwards I was waiting in line with my mom, clutching a purchased 8.5″ x 11″ head shot for him to sign. As we got closer to the magician himself, I realized he was signing things, and taking pictures with people, but he was not getting anything in return.
Dismayed, I asked my mom for a pen and paper, and being the woman she was, she was able to provide a small notebook and pen from her purse (a good habit I have taken up). I wrote a quick note to Mr. Copperfield, signing it with flourish.
Heart pounding, I waited while my glossy was signed, then handed him my note. I think I told him it was because he wasn’t getting anything. I no longer have the picture, but I do have a great story.
I usually write my letters at the very desk I work at ( I am working from home) for two very simple reasons – the light is the best and I have my washi tape and stamps right next to me.
It’s a whole different deal with reading: if it’s government letters or invoices, I read them directly in the staircase – and the same is true for postcards. Letter on my couch, with a hot beverage to really dive in.
Toucan
I love to write letters sitting at my desk or the kitchen counter. I write most often with my fountain pens, so I do need a flat surface and some space to set my things out.
As for reading letters, I’ll read letters anywhere but I love to sit down with a cup of tea and my cat purring in my lap when I open letters from new and old friends.
Hello, My favorite place to write letters is oddly enough at my kitchen table.
The reason being is I have a great view of my window to see all the birds at my feeders and boy do I get alot of birds! So i love sitting there at the table with my stickers, my stationery, or my plain ole notebook paper, my variety of pens, my cards, my washi tape and just write away! Very relaxing and peaceful and enjoyable! It’s just incredible to see all the birds at the feeders while I write.
If it’s night time…. and I am a night owl….I still love writing at the table but also will write on the couch with my stickers etc around me.
Alaina
I love to sit in an armchair with a cup of my favorite tea and read my letters with a direct view of the trees in front of my window. When writing I prefer my desk cause I can’t concentrate on the letter fully otherwise. Although in the last years I learnt how to write on trains cause I spent a damn lot time in trains thanks to a long distance relationship.
Fabi
Want to submit for a collaborative blog post?
Tell us about a letter you received / sent that has special meaning to you.
My pen pal who is the farthest away from me? Mhm…I guess from Germany it would be Uruguay that is the furthest away. And we just started writing like a year ago, so not too much to tell. It is interesting to see the different kinds of cultures though.
Fabi
From Florida, the pen pal who is furthest away from me is from Australia. I met her here, through the LetterMo.com site. I find it interesting to realize that when I’m suffering from a cold winter, she is deep in summer, and vice versa.
Christy S.
Want to submit for a collaborative blog post?
Where is your favorite place to write letters? To read them?
We like getting letters. We like sending letters. And we really like the community here on LetterMo.com
And, we bet that if you found yourself here, you like doing those things, too.
But here’s the thing, maintaining the LetterMo.com website is not without cost. Both in time and actual, fiscal cost.
And so we, the current Admins of LetterMo, are considering what the future of this fine project looks like, and what kind of help we need to get there.
TL;DR: In order to keep the LetterMo.com site alive, we need support in both time and money. If we don’t get the support, LetterMo may continue, but in a different, yet to be determined, format.
Olga, from NSW Australia, was my first pen friend. I met her through the pen pal exchange at the New York World’s Fair in 1964, and we corresponded for a few years, both of us using aerogrammes. As I recall, we both loved dogs, and would write about our own and others we knew. Our main bond, though, was Peter O’Toole, courtesy of “Lawrence of Arabia.” Those blue eyes! That intelligence! That story(which I know now was highly … shaded …)! I’m sorry we lost touch after 3 years or so, but I think of her often.
(2nd pen pal, not as much, because all she ever seemed to write was “it’s raining in Tavistock” … )
Melanie W
My first pen pal was a friend I met on a holiday trip. We were crying so hard on our last day that our parents exchanged addresses and we started writing each other for 10 years. I still think of her sometimes.
Fabi
It was in first or second grade when our class had a partner class (like a sister-city) in the UK. I am a bit fuzzy on the details, honestly. We each received a letter from a student at that school, distributed from our teacher. All them them had a generic “hello” since pairs weren’t assigned until the letters arrived to Florida. I wrote back the boy who was assigned to me.
And yeah, that’s it. I guess my first real exchange of letters beyond that first awkward “Hi, this is who I am” was in High School, when a friend who attended a different school told me about a boy she thought I’d like. She acted as a go-between and we passed notes across town to each other that way. I have a few gifts from when he went on vacation in Europe. I never actually met him, despite living in the same city, but I have fond memories.
