Feather3, I chuckled while reading of your packing experience. Thank you for sharing. It is daunting to think of purchasing or repurposing a box to send large quilted items. You've helped make the process simpler.

According to my friend....when she opened the space bag, which was in transit for 6 days....it plumped back up right away. I had told her to lay it out on her bed as son as she got it out of the box/bag. She said it looked great.

My friend lives in Nebraska on a cattle ranch.....true God's country. They only get mail Monday/Wednesday & Friday :).

Yeah we had a ball trying to get it all figured out & in the bag/box. I figured others may want to know how to do this, so they could save on shipping costs.

I agree completely with you juliea, when sending a medium sized box to our daughter in Bulgaria full of craft items for my grandsons to make it cost me over $300 to send about $125.00 worth of things. And then at the post office in Bulgaria they will try to have you pay them to look for your package that they informed you they had! If you don't pay them under the table you will have to wait a couple weeks to a couple of months before they get their package. And here in the USA we thought we had trouble with our Postal service HA!
Jeri

A note about taping over your printed label on the Priority mail boxes: I have been told by the postal clerks NOT to tape over the bar coding, because the shine makes it difficult to read using the hand held tracking devices. Ample taping is a good thing, but not over the code.

I have used those space bags for storing extra quilts, blankets, etc. in the closets. They usually work, but once in awhile it will spring a leak and it will go back to normal size.....as I read your shipping tale, I was thinking....oh I hope it doesn't pop on the way to its destination!
I would be leary to use them for mailing packages.....

I asked about this at the post office & was told you should tape over the bar code too, as the new scanners can now read thru the shiney tape. Also it keeps the label from getting wet & ending up in the dead letter area.