UPDATE: Upon further investigation, it appears that USPS changed their APIs and was not returning all of the appropriate rates (namely the least expensive ones). We've fixed the issue and you can now get cheap shipping again!
There's a couple questions in here, so I'll address them each:
Yes, it really does cost this much. All our shipping prices are calculated automatically by USPS and Fedex. Our system tells them the shipping zip code, the destination address and the weight of the package, and their system feeds back the price.
As for the free shipping: If you have a discount code that brings your total down to $0, then an option for free shipping is available in the dropdown. It is NOT selected by default, but you can select it if you click the dropdown menu. When free shipping is selected, we ship it by standard international first class mail.
As for why the price changed, I can't tell you that without knowing exactly when you got each quote. The system was, for a brief time, incorrectly charging too little for shipping (which has since been corrected). It's also possible that USPS changed their prices.