Summer offers windows for snail mail, crafts

While spending time outside tops most people's summertime activity lists - sometimes you have to stay in due to rain showers or limit your time under the harsh eye of the sun. Beyond knocking out cleaning, organizing and other productive tasks that line to-do lists, there remains time for creative and low-cost endeavors that are fun but often productive in their own right. One example? Designing snail-mail correspondence with paper scraps and old-school glue. To let her boyfriend back in Ames, Iowa, know she was thinking of him during her time in Phoenix, my sister put together this lovely little paper gem. The card's simplicity seduces, and its design and color palette communicate a sense of place. No doubt it'll brighten up that Iowa mailbox...