YOU got mail and it is not bills ~ September Foodie Penpal

I do a lot of blog surfing and one day when I was doing my surfing I came across this picture on their blog:

Want to join then go HERE

I clicked on it and thought it sounded like a good thing to do, but that is all I did ~ Thought.  In August I found some other blogs that had the same button on them, once again I clicked on them, and this time I did something about it.  AND I am glad I did.  Each month you are given someone's name to send a gift to and someone else has your name.  It was fun getting to know both people and corresponding with them.

This was my first month  and I was able to send my parcel to Desi from SteakNPotatoesKindaGurl.  I enjoyed reading her blog and trying to figure out what I could send her.  As she has some African heritage in her, I asked if she would like some spices that I had received from her and she jumped at that suggestions. So that went into the box and to see what I else I sent her please check out her blog at SteakNPotatoesKindaGurl.

I was matched up with Katie from If I Knew You Were Coming I Would Have Baked a Cake.  When I saw the name on her blog I knew she was my kind of girl... A CAKE... I love CAKE.  Her first email asked me a lot of questions of my likes and dislikes and one of the things that I told her was I would appreciate something that was authentic to where she lived.  I was so excited to open the box when I received it and when I did, I thought I HIT PAY DIRT! Wow the stuff that was in it...... but I also felt slightly guilty as I felt I didn't send very much to my penpal.   Here is what I got from Katie....................

Look at all this good stuff!

That first morning after opening up the package
I had Chai Tea with honey.
I did send Katie a message that I am not sure that
I am happy as she now got me hooked on honey in my tea :)

The next day I had a 4.5 hour drive to a conference
so the SomerSaults came with me to keep me company
and on the road... Along with another cup of Chai and honey!

The Mia's Kitchen Bistro Marinara became part of a dish that
I made.......

it was supposed to be eggplant lasagna but
ended up more like a soup or stew...
But was delicious thanks to the Marinara sauce from
California.

The Almond Butter and Chocolate are still waiting for me, but I have at least 2 more weeks or longer to wait for my next penpal box to arrive and I want to saver every morsel of this one... Katie ~~ Thank you so very much for the box of goodies, you are a great penpal and I hope that I can send you something back down the line.

Would you like to be a Foodie Penpal 

Here are the details from Lindsay's blog (The Lean Green Bean):

-On the 5th of the month, you will receive your penpal pairing via email. It will be your responsibility to contact your penpal and get their mailing address and any other information you might need like allergies or dietary restrictions.
-You will have until the 15th of the month to put your box of goodies in the mail. On the last day of the month, you will post about the goodies you received from your penpal!
-The boxes are to be filled with fun foodie things, local food items or even homemade treats! The spending limit is $15. The box must also include something written. This can be anything from a note explaining what’s in the box, to a fun recipe…use your imagination!
-You are responsible for figuring out the best way to ship your items depending on their size and how fragile they are. (Don’t forget about flat rate boxes!)
-Foodie Penpals is open to blog readers as well as bloggers. If you’re a reader and you get paired with a blogger, you can choose to write a short guest post for your penpal to post on their blog about what you received. If two readers are paired together, neither needs to worry about writing a post for that month.
- Foodie Penpals is open to US, Canadian residents & UK residents.  Please note, Canadian Residents will be paired with other Canadians only. We’ve determined things might get too slow and backed up if we’re trying to send foods through customs across the border from US to Canada and vice versa. So, I’m going to keep two separate lists and match US w/ US and Canada w/ Canada!

***If you’re in the UK, please contact Carol Anne from This Is Rock Salt at rocksalt@thisisrocksalt.com to get involved!

Click on the button if you would like to join Foodie Penpals... It is fun!

I am waiting patiently or maybe just a little impatiently for this coming month to both send my box of goodies to someone and receive another box.

til next time <3 <3 <3  Marlys