I’m not looking to start organising till tomorrow! At present I lack the ability to breath without yawning 
so inbox me your address and I’ll add it to the list (tomorrow)
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will make my way down to disney on those weekends to say hello and give mountie support
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I celebrate the santa and more…pagan sides of christmas. I mean i even have a “Young Santa” outfit and i produce wonders for those i care about. no joke. i go all out on christmas.
Unfortunately, i wont be able to do that this year, as i just started a new job, and it pays significantly less than my old one. I’m now a teacher.
My interests include gaming, (both of the tabletop and video variety), movies, books, and really any sort of media. I live for absorbing that stuff. I’m a huge pokemon, power rangers, and harry potter fanboy, and love a good story.
stylewise…i’m in florida. so i flit between hipster/indie clothing (plaid button downs, jeans, converse) and more…beachy clothing (flip flops, shorts, tanks, and open button downs.) I’m also big on the more dressy type of style too.love things like pendants and rings, as they help me connect back to my oddly spiritual beliefs (can you say all the gods are present? and natural magiq everywhere? I connect back to the celtic, norse, and greco-roman pantheons). (shirt size large or xl due to my…longer frame.)
Favorite colors are red, blue, green, and most neutral colors.
Always down for some new or interesting music. as well.
Im also a big fan of podcasts like Lore, MBMBAM/The adventure zone and of groups like rooster teeth, game theory, the completionist/normal boots, and achievement hunter.
I enjoy giving, especially in this time of year.
so im all for whatever comes my way, and im ready to send off that which i can!
SUPER EXCITE
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Oh yeah, I should probably do one of these.
So I’m Rev, and I’m a computer scientist-turned-theatre technician. Currently in undergrad, but I’m hoping to get accepted into a grad school and eventually establish a solid career in costume design. I guess you could say I’ve sold my soul to the theatre. But yeah, it’s what I’m passionate about. I love making art and especially designing for the theatre.
As far as what I celebrate, I ‘celebrate’ Christmas because my parents do. Now I’m kind of trying to figure out what I want to celebrate, something that fits into my actual spiritual beliefs? But I’m mostly neutral about the whole thing, except for Christmas creep ruining my favorite holiday, Halloween. 
Hobbies and things I like… Well it’s probably not a surprise that I like painting and sketching. Mostly I stick to pencil, ink, and watercolor, but sometimes I branch out. I like telling stories in general, though doing so via writing is tricky for me, time consuming. Beyond this, I’m a pretty crafty person, I like doing paper crafts and I’m a bit of a stationery nerd. Oh, and I like playing video games, though I try not to play too much. I love point and click adventures, rpgs, and visual novels. I have a PS4 and the older 3DS.
Favorite colors - neutral tones, red, and gold. Favorite animal is a shark. I dress pretty comfortably, a lot of t-shirts and jeans. But I like to dress up in a punk/goth hybrid style when I get the inclination. I’m a men’s size large in t shirts, if that’s applicable. I also love beanies, and knitted things. Y’all know I’m a stationery nut, I love fancy paper and unique pens, unlined journals. I’m real into antique-y stuff too, like the Book of Briars is totally my aesthetic. Worn books, old boxes, ancient knick knacks, I love 'em. I also dig it when people get crafty, like knitted scarves, collage art, handmade jewelry, etc. Oh, and I might be the human incarnate of a crow, because I enjoy shiny things, like crystals. 
There’s probably more stuff about me floating around in the pen pals thread, and in some of my initiatives. I’m an open book. 
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Alright, since I’m super new to this forum and don’t really know anyone yet, I’ll try and write quite a bit, because otherwise it would be super hard to get me anything.
I’m Annemarie, 25 and I am Dutch. I studied Japanese language and culture in University and once I graduated moved to Japan, where I have now been living for about 2,5 years. My main goal was to get better at Japanese (as we basically only learned a little Japanese in Uni, my specialty was Antropology). I currently work as an assistant language teacher, which means I teach English at Kindergarten and Elementary school and assist the English teachers are Junior High School. I go to a total of 12 different schools, some of them with barely any students (my smallest elementary school was 19 students, total) and others more regular sized. (They’re going to fuse some elementary schools and the junior high schools together soon, though). I live in a lovely coastal village, but it’s quite small and there’s not much here, because most of the town is still in the process of getting rebuild after the Tsunami of 2011, which destroyed pretty much everything. I moved here to improve my Japanese (and that definitely happened, seeing as no one here speaks English) but I also really enjoy my job right now, my students are lovely, and I truly love languages, although I’m not necessarily good at them. (I struggled so much with French, German, Latin and Old Greek during junior high, although I liked them).
I love reading, writing (both fiction, and I have a daily life kind of blog) and have recently been getting into art as well. At the moment I usually do pencil drawings and watercolours. In terms of books I mostly read fantasy, classics and young adult, though in terms of Japanese books I usually read crime/detectives. Not sure why that is. I also enjoy sports, my favourites being horse riding and archery, both of which I can’t do in the village I live in, so that’s kind of a pity. (They barely have any horses in Japan somehow). I now play soft-volleyball twice a week, and also recently joined a futsal team. Another hobby of mine is translating/ making subtitles for Japanese dramas and variety shows. In terms of music, I’m currently kind of obsessed with Japanese music, mostly groups from an agency called Johnny’s my favourites being Arashi, Hey! Say! JUMP, Kanjani8 and Johnny’s WEST (yes they are boybands) and I also really like Ieiri Leo.
In terms of Christmas, it always was my favourite holiday, I loved having all my family together and eating good food, as well as exchanging presents, but moving across the world kind of makes it impossible (which is one of the reasons I’m excited about this exchange to be honest.) Japan doesn’t really do much with Christmas at all, so I’ll be working. (I could take the day of, but all my friends will be working, so that’s even more lonely.) My family and friends from the Netherlands will be sending me gifts as well, and I’ll skype with them on the day itself, so don’t worry I won’t be that lonely.
In terms of colours, I like blues, purples and pastels, and my style is mostly comfortable. I like both cool styles and cute styles, though I don’t really have the confidence to wear stuff that really stands out. Also, living in the country side means that anything revealing/short is out of the question. I get enough stares as it is for being a foreigner. My shirt size would be a female M, or a male S.
I love tea, don’t drink coffee. Things like sweaters/blankets are always welcome, since Japan doesn’t have this thing called central heating (I’m working with a kerosene heater here).
Some other stuff I love: learning new stuff/letters/books/things related to paganism/harry potter/pokemon/crystals/tarot/runes/mythology (especially norse/greek/roman)/traveling/nature photography/dancing and I’m probably forgetting a bunch of important stuff, but this has already become pretty long, so I’ll just stop here 
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I guess I should maybe do one of these as well…I have some stuff on my profile bio from when I first did penpals…but it definitely wasn’t as detailed as people are getting here, so:
I’m a third year graduate student studying mechanical engineering, but I’m also very much into the arts. I trained in Shakespearean acting in middle and high school, and have been a dancer since I was a smol. And I play the violin, particularly Irish Fiddle style.
I also do all sorts of crafts - I crochet and sew (lots of renaissance faire costumes and some semi formal wear sprinkled into my repertoire). I also enjoy watercolors, but I’m not like…good at drawing at all, so it’s often difficult to motivate myself to practice. I can do a little bit of jewelry-making, and I’ve tried my hand at lasercutting a bit. I also tend to pick up weird craft techniques sometimes…like bookbinding and chain maille making.
I also like to read a lot, mostly urban fantasy/magical realism/high fantasy. My favorite book has been “The Night Circus” for a while now, but I’ve always got a place in my heart for HP (Gryffindor for life). And I’ve recently fallen in love with the Grishaverse books.
I love to travel - I studied abroad in China in undergrad and I’m literally never gonna stop talking about it. I speak Chinese and am learning French…slowly but surely.
I do celebrate Christmas and am really in love with the vintage Christmas style.
Uh…what else. Favorite color is probably a cobalt-y sort of blue or an eggplant purple (and black…lots of black). I’m also rather fond of rose gold because I’m trash. I’m open to pretty much any genre of music, but I tend to listen to hipster/indie music and my old punk standbys. I don’t watch a TON of tv, but I love a good cheesy RomCom. And I’m a sucker for a Robin Hood adaptation.
Honestly, I’m really just excited to get to know more of the Mounties. That’s what I love about the penpals stuff…it’s cool to hear from people offline and I love putting together little bits and bobs for people.
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Hey, just wondering when the names were being drawn? Realising I’m going home next week and that my local post office there is closed, so trying to send an international parcel will be a pain in the backside, so if I can get it sent before I leave it’ll be awesome.
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I’ve sent them off to a friend to do. You should hear something soon
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So, did this friend have a particular time frame for sending out by?
I recall there being talk about navigating the holiday shipping nightmare.
Was it officially decided that we’d try to get things out by the 14th? (I went thread-digging to see what was last mentioned)
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It’s not already sitting in your inbox???
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Oh I have the St. Auggie message, I was just double-checking about the existence of the send-by date.
(And now that I read that back, I’m thinking of college because brevity 
)
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Oooooh ummm… well how about we agree on a open by date rather than a send by date, that way all the internationals gifts have time to rock up
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In that case… do we want to wait for everyone’s things to arrive before opening, or just open as they come in?
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Um… open by date might not be a good idea. I know some sometimes stuff takes 2 weeks to get over the pond, sometimes a month. I’d say maybe just try and get them out by Xmas?
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That seems fair to me. Maybe folks can sound off here by the end of December so we know everything’s accounted for? 
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Sounding off! All sent and now I just have to hope it arrives in one piece 
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Despite some issues, all sent, with some Mountie help!
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ill make my way to the post office tomorrow. god knows if it’ll arrive in time, but hopefully it’ll make it in time.
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I’ll have to pick up some more stuff and hopefully I’ll be able to go to the post office this Friday.
Edit: I was able to pick up the last items I needed yesterday and have dropped the parcel off at the post office, so I hope it will arrive on time~ (It’s going to be close, but it was the best I could do ><)
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Shipped as of yesterday!~
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