Hilary writes:

Inspired by your homemade mailbox, I made one, too! A photo is attached. I made it for a toddler who lives on the other side of the country, and I enlisted several mutual friends to make postcards "from their kids" and send them to me to be laminated.

The hardest part was finding something to use for the actual box. I wanted it to have a slot but also be easy to open. After searching unsuccessfully for an appropriate cardboard box, I went to the craft store and bought one of those paperboard "books." If you turn it on its side it looks sort of like a mailbox! Then I cut a slot in the side and covered the whole thing with some handmade paper I had remaining from another project and mod-podged the whole thing to make it a little sturdier. The lip that holds the cover onto the book got accidentally glued in place and I had to cut it out, which turned out to be a good thing in the end because there's a no way a toddler could have manipulated the cover open and shut the way it was originally constructed. Without the lip, the box stays shut but is easy to open.

The bag is upcycled from a baby blanket. The postcards and letters are laminated with sheets of plastic that I got in a big box at an office supply store many years ago. (While I was at it, I laminated a bunch of those cardboard fake credit cards you get in your junk mail and put them in an old wallet for my son.)

The little red flag is removable, but I realized after the fact that it's probably much too difficult for little hands to get the flag back in.

And they're hard to see, but each piece of mail has a "stamp" that I made in Photoshop with a picture of the recipient on it and a postmark.

Thanks for the fun idea - I had a great time time making my own version!

Thanks for sharing, Hilary. Your mailbox looks great, and we love the idea of the mail from friends! This special touch would make this a great gift for a young child with friends or relatives who are not close at hand.

Have you made a craft project you discovered on Z Recommends? If you do (you can browse our craft projects archive at our previous blog location here), send us a photo and note and we'll share it with other readers!