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Hi! I'm Melissa. I'm a twenty-something at-home mom with four boys seven and under. I'm LDS, I homeschool, and I knit, crochet, sew, cook, draw, write, and generally hold down the fort while my husband pursues dreams filled with motorcycles. We're either genuinely insane or the sanest people you'll ever meet. Stick around and find out which it is!

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Mailing Christmas Packages

Published Monday, December 3, 2012 By Melissa. Under Other Projects

(I wrote this post last year, but I decided it would be more useful to publish it in early December. Hello from 2011, everybody!)

So this year I wanted to mail packages out to family, but I had a couple of roadblocks. 1: We are poor. 2: I hate going to the post office, and 3: Even if I wanted to go to the post office, I don’t have the car right now. So what to do?

Well, first off, I bought a bunch of these adorable tins from the Dollar Tree for (you guessed it) $1 apiece.

Cute little tins

Next, the boys and I made gingerbread cookies, using only our tiniest cookie cutters. We packed them in the tins, layering the cookies with brown paper which I obtained by cutting up lunch bags.

Mmm. I need to make more gingerbread.

Then I added a Christmas ornament I had previously ordered from Artscow.com. (I’ll tell you what I tell everybody: if you order from them when things are regular price, then the cost + shipping will be ridiculous. If you sign up for their mailing list, though, you’ll get great coupons and discounts from them often, and I think the photo ornaments only cost me about $2 apiece, including shipping.)

Bubble wrap - for safety.

Then I took some shipping tape and another brown paper bag and wrapped it up. (That’s the reason I chose the rectangular tins! Easy wrapping!)

Brown paper packages, tied up with...uh... tape.

Next up: did you know that you can send anything 13 ounces or less First Class Mail, through your mailbox, with stamps? I can pick up stamps when I go through the grocery checkout, so this is very convenient for mailing light packages…like a tin full of tiny cookies and a Christmas ornament.

Off they go, into the mailbox!

Seven stamps did the job for these; just over $3 to ship each package. If you have a kitchen scale you can weigh your packages at home and calculate the postage online – just don’t forget to click the First Class Mail option on the last page to get the cheaper shipping option!

So: $1 tins + $2 ornaments + cookies made from supplies on hand + $3 shipping = fun presents for $6 each, delivered. Not bad!