It's weird. I've sent alot of stuff to the states, and recieved afair bit from them. never had any problems. Most things take 4-7 days. With one package at christmas taking 2 weeks and arriving christmas eve.
Also send stuff to canada regularly, again never had any issues.
Well there was the one parcel that got forgotten in a corner of my sisters local post office for a few months - but they owned up to that one.

But I use standard post, not a courier firm. Oh yeah and I always lie on the customs form. No matter what i send I put: 'confectionery and childs toy' on the not unreasonable grounds that it covers everything you can eat or play with :-)
Well you don't want to bother the customs people with unnecessary details do you ? ;-)

I have even managed to send greenery to california !
Yep fresh bayleaves picked from my tree and vacumn packed. And completely illegal :-) was quite proud of that one lol