Next Annual Hogswatch Card Swap

This sounds very interesting, but I have a few questions:

1. I have never done a Hogswatch card, do you have an example of them? I wouldn't want to do it wrong.

2. What is an artist stamp? I have never heard of that before. Is it a real stamp? In that case I wouldn't know how to do get the postage on it :D

Thanks in advance!

Great questions! A Hogswatch card is a greetings card designed for Hogswatch -- the movie and the book Hogfather have "traditional" ideas; more ideas can be found on the Discworld Emporium's Printed Ephemera Page, by searching for "Hogswatch Card" under Google -- Images (I see one I received from DuhBe a couple years ago!), or on Sandra Kidby's web site.

I have usually created Hogswatch Greetings based on the annual holiday letters that some families and businesses send out in the US, ie "It has been a good year for cabbage in Quirm -- I think of you in Anhk-Morpork every time one of the hippos passes gas," or "I have been a very good sntjent beink. Culd you bring me anuffer Burleigh&Stronginthearm crossbow wot Detritus sat onnit. Sncerely, Cpl. Nobby Nobbs" sort of thing. I am not sure that you can go wrong if you base what you do on what you know about Discworld and Hogswatch! Many people do choose the Death as Hogfather theme.

Artist stamps are pretend stamps that look at least a tiny bit like the real thing. You can use a carved eraser, draw them (as I do) use computer design and print them out on a printer, etc. The post office doesn't have to cancel them, but it is fun if they do! They could resemble these stamps from the Discworld Emporium -- it has been a very longstanding tradition to make pretend Discworld stamps, and Going Postal was Terry Pratchett's nod to that tradition :)

In general, the swaps I host are pretty much about having fun and not so much about "getting it right" -- I started doing the Hogswatch Swap because I wanted to get some Hogswatch cards in the mail about the same time that my family traditionally read or watched Hogfather every year.

Which reminds me, there are Hogswatch celebrations and dinners around the world now! I think I will finally get around to throwing one this year. Every time I read the book or see the movie I end up sniffling about how wonderful humanity is!

Library of Artistamps

Gina Lotta Post Artistamp blog -- lots of fun examples

...and since I am now dedicated to search for Hogswatch party plans, here is an awesome Hogswatch pinterest page! ... Please feel free to post away, everyone!

A Hogswatch party? That sounds fantastic! We watch The Hogfather every year, but my copy seems to have gone missing. Last year I introduced a whole bunch of new people to it and now I'm going to have to see if they want to do a Hogswatch party - complete with meat pies.

Hooray! I am envisioning a world of Hogswatch parties .... [insert the phrase "in my undergarments" here to bring the ingenuity down to Earth!]