Yuleswaps 2017: SIGN-UPS ARE OPEN. Stop, Drop, and Swap!

[kindness_says]

Hello, sweet swappers! As promised, SWAPS ARE HERE. SWAPS ARE SWAPPENING.

If you are new to swaps, or to Yuletide, and curious about what the heck I'm talking about, our brand-new 2017 FAQ is here! If you are old to swaps, read on!

SCHEDULE:

+ Sign-up forms are open now and will close on Monday, October 23, 2017 at 9:00 PM PDT. Click here for a countdown, as always! Extensions will be unlikely this year, because I was bad about starting us early. So tell your friends, tell your enemies, and sign up on time!

+ Match-ups will go out between October 26 and October 30, we hope. Unless something catastrophic occurs either technologically or personally. as soon as we possibly can send them, guys! Sorry!! Please bear with us. <3

+ Our SENDING DEADLINE this year is MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2017. I’m not sure we’ve ever had a Monday sending deadline before! Exciting. Also, I might change it in the event that match-ups go out later than planned. But hopefully not.

(It will be about a two-week sending period, as always, concentrated in early November, so before signing up, please do a reality check to make sure you will have the money and time!)

REMINDERS:

+ Swaps Central: our all-in-one check-in form! You remember it. Please don’t forget that our VERY FIRST CHECK-IN will be immediately following match-up emails, so that we can make sure everyone got theirs!

+ In addition, to make sure you receive all communications, we strongly suggest tracking the appropriate tags on LJ/DW (omnomnom | who likes books | nice cuppa) and whitelisting our email (yuleswaps at gmail dot com), if you haven’t done so already!

+ Signing up: PLEASE TYPE CAREFULLY. Make sure all your usernames and emails are correctly spelled, are consistently capitalized, and have no extra spaces!!!!

+ After signing up: please keep an eye on your various spam/promotions/whatever folders for the email you signed up with! Also, be aware that at least one DW/LJ post will appear under the requisite tags when match-ups begin to go out. Be on the lookout beginning 3 days after sign-ups close, in case your email isn’t working!

+ If anything untoward should happen to you at ANY POINT in the swapping process, please don’t disappear. Just tell us, and we’ll work it out! Promise. We are very nice.

SIGN-UPS: CLOSED

Stop, Drop, and Swap… Candy! Books! Drinks!

Questions? Comments? First check out the FAQ, and then, if that doesn’t sort you, feel free to comment either here or there, or email us at yuleswaps at gmail!

<3 K

Comments

[wanderlustlover]

Best news to wake up to ever! I'm getting on this right now! You all are the best!

[kindness_says]

Hahahaha. We do have an enthusiastic crowd... Several people signed up IMMEDIATELY after I posted/emailed.

I enjoy your icon, by the way. <3

[lovepeaceohana]

YAY YAY YAY I missed Yuletide signups this year so I'm pretty stoked that I haven't missed this one! :D

[kindness_says]

Lol, I'm glad it worked out well for you that I was insufficiently on top of things. I meant to open these sign-ups during YT sign-ups and close them yesterday, butttt I clearly did not.

I actually just answered a question in the other post, where someone was being like, technically I can't sign up if I'm not signed up for Yuletide, but can I? and I referenced situations like yours (which have happened before), lol. I think with YT sign-ups increasingly SUPER EARLY, people are often accidentally missing them. I myself accidentally missed noms last year due to miscalculating time zones, hahahaha.

Anyway, I'm happy for you. :)

[snarkasaurus]

YAY SWAPS

[kindness_says]

:D

[stasia]

I am so here for this omg!!! I haven't done Yuletide itself in years (I can't do it and the other holiday stuff I've got going on), but this I make time for.

[kindness_says]

...Lol, I'm just going to pretend I didn't read this. :P

When did you last do actual!Yuletide? I was trawling through my old letters a while back and recalling that I might've had a couple years where I couldn't handle the writing + the swaps, or I maybe only did pinch-hits.

ETA: Curious how many people actually are not signed up for Yuletide in a given year... If I have an extra moment (LOL), I might actually check our membership against the sign-up summary.

[stasia]

Huh - you can't edit comments after someone's responded. I was going to, uh, line out the distressing part. I had entirely forgotten that one is supposed to be in the story exchange to be involved in the candy/books/drinks exchanges.

I do know when was the last time I was in Yuletide (Uh, I can link you the last story I received and tell you the story behind it, if you like, or we could move to email?)

I certainly missed signups this year. Every year I look at the fandoms nominated and usually have a hard time finding ones I'm super invested in... I should look harder or participate in the fandom nomination process, I guess.

[kindness_says]

Oh, I was just curious.

Yeah, I mean, I considered screening your comment, lol, but it's fine. We use our discretion, and you are "a member of the Yuletide community" and have a very good swaps track record.

You should nominate, though! :)

[stasia]

I'm the recipient of Texts from Cephalopods (and I love it SO FUCKING MUCH). I'm glad I saved it to my computer before the images came down, though. *sadface*

As for nominating, I keep thinking of fandoms to nominate during the year, then missing when the nomination period is.

[elf]

I could help you with that!

I have a locked DW post where I collect potential fandoms throughout the year, future-dated to around the time nominations start. By the time YT rolls around, I always have a list of things to nominate, even if they're all weird "omg this is not actually a fandom" things.

... I may also pester you for hand-holding; I'm signing up for candy swap this year, and that's new for me.

[stasia]

Sure, I'd love to plan fun candy swapping together! You know how to get ahold of me, right? (Same as it's always been.)

As for the future-dated post, that's such a great idea, I'll go set it up right now. (When is YT nomination season? I'll have to go look ata the main com, I guess.)

[kindness_says]

Oh, that IS a good idea. I just keep a Note throughout the year (starting after the previous year's nominations) on my phone/computer. And rely on more-on-top-of-it friends to alert me that YT season is starting. Yes! Get a buddy! :)

And so sad that the pics are gone! Glad the writer foresaw this, though.

[schlitzie_ramone]

WOOHOO! Glad to be back - Drinkswap, here I come! <3

[kindness_says]

:D

[floranna]

And again I am surprised to see Finland as a separate option in Candyswap... =D But I didn't receive any check-in email for candy or bookswap, or did I misunderstand something?

[kindness_says]

What do you mean check-in email?

I sent one email to everyone who has participated in the past, announcing that sign-ups are open. Did you receive that?

[floranna]

Ooh, I received that, I just understood that you meant we would receive an email AFTER we filled that form. ^^'

[refu]

I suppose the Swaps Central all-in-one check-in form will be linked somewhere once assignments have gone out? Either that or I need new glasses cause I just checked the new and old FAQ and didn't see any link. And - boohoo - I don't remember it from whenever-it-was-I-last-did-a-yuleswap. *sniff*

[kindness_says]

Yes, it will! It's all ready to go, but there isn't anything to check in about yet. I don't need any overenthusiastic premature check-ins, as charming as I'm sure they'd be, lolol.

Also, I'm not sure when you last swapped (could check later but can't be bothered at 1:21 AM, lol), but I just took a quick glance and I created Swaps Central, under that name, for the first time in 2013. In 2012, it appears I had separate candy/bookswap check-in Google forms (2013 must've been the year we added drinkswap), and before that...idk. Maybe we were still doing LJ check-ins? WHO CAN REMEMBER.

;)

[refu]

I swapped books once - and it was... aeons a good while back. But you still had my email saved somewhere! And here I am, ready to share some book-love this year.

Charming premature check-ins sound lovely, though. LOL I'm just glad I wasn't too stupid to find a link. I felt a little clueless. *wipes sweat off brow*

[kindness_says]

Haha, yes, people are often very cute. Like in the excited comments on this post! But sometimes just practically I lean towards "I have no time for these non-informational/logistical comments" lolol

[minoanmiss]

YAY! Thank you for once again running this this year!

[kindness_says]

You're very welcome. We love/hate doing it. ;) Presumably more love than hate, since we haven't stopped!!!!

[bobcatmoran]

FYI, if you are a person sending from non-US to US who is worried about whether your stuff will be seized by customs, and you are willing to wade through some rather complex tables, the USDA has their manuals for what you can/can't send publicly available.

Of particular interest might be the Fruits and Vegetables Import Requirements if you wanna send like, an entire cantaloupe or something and the Miscellaneous and Processed Products Manual if you're sending anything…er…processed. Or you can shoot me a PM, as I actually do this stuff for a living. "Inspect and Release" means you're good.

[kindness_says]

Ooooo, this could be helpful! I will try to remember this and announce it to the populace... Although I don't think anyone will be sending cantaloupes, lol.

[silverflight8]

man it's been a long time since I've done this! so excited!

[kindness_says]

:)

[floranna]

Have the assignments been sent yet? (just worried that I missed them ^^')

[(Anonymous)]

Me too! But reassuring to see I’m not the only one.

[kindness_says]

Nope. Running behind due to (totally non-emergent and fine) personal life and general time-crunch issues, unfortunately. :/ Don't worry! I'll make a post on the communities when they do.

[floranna]

Absolutely no problem, I was just worried if my email had eaten them. =D

[stasia]

Good to know I'm not the only person worried my email had sent my Super Important Email to purgatory.

[trialia]

I was too- glad to know I didn't miss anything!

[refu]

As assignments are coming out delayed - will there be an extension of the sending deadline? Asking because it's highly likely I'll have to order something to swap online and having it shipped here takes time. *worried puppy eyes* I had hoped to browse through a local bookshop while I was on my long weekend, but not knowing what I'd have to send... :-/

[kindness_says]

Haha, yes, don't worry. I'm not sure yet how many days I'm extending it by (I'm out of town Nov. 20-26, and also worried about the speed of holiday mail/a lot of swappers being kind of MIA over American Thanksgiving), but I'm thinking either:

- I'll extend it by a full week and just let people know I might not be able to be super on top of it right away.
- I'll extend it by a couple of days but make clear that anyone in a situation like yours can ask for a couple more days without guilt or penalty.

About to make a post about match-ups (so that I can link to it in the match-up email), but not sure when they will actually go out, because depends when sleeps is available to send them.