Friday, October 12, 2012

A Pile Of Postage Stamps



As a little girl, I went through a phase where I loved collecting stamps.  I can still picture that first stamp album of mine, a bright purple covered book, inside which I allocated several pages to Australian stamps as well as different pages for international ones.  I used to love cutting stamps off old envelopes, waiting patiently as they soaked before taking great care to arrange them neatly.

For as long as I remember, my Nanna always collected stamps.  She would buy a set of each new Australian design that came out and a stamp bulletin would arrive in her letterbox every month.  I used to love when she let me carefully browse through her collection. 

Over the years, my passion for this hobby disappeared and so too did that old purple stamp album of mine.  My Mum did however keep most of my old Australia stamps, and so recently, when I asked if she still had them for me to give Grace, she was able to pass on a nice little bundle to her.  Grace has been using them for some craft activities.  Some she glues into a little notebook I’ve given her, sorting and categorising them into pages of ‘bird stamps’ and ‘flower stamps’ and ‘Queen stamps’.  Others have become part of her play at letter writing and playing 'postie'.  

I’ve even kept a little bundle of these stamps aside myself, with the possibility of using some on a little craft project of my own.  I’m keen to try and cover a box with them decoupage-style or to even attempt something like the postage stamp artworks I've seen on Etsy by Butterfly Mind Vintage and Stamposaurus.



As for those albums of my Nanna’s, several years ago, they made their way to our home and into my possession.  I dragged them out again the other day for the first time since I’d been given them and let Grace sit with me as I looked over each page.  We picked out our favourite stamps and talked about all the designs and pictures.  This is one of the things I love about being a Mum – being able to share in past hobbies and passions with my girls and reliving those special moments from my own childhood.

Who knew something as simple as an old pile of postage stamps could bring so much joy to a three year old?

17 comments:

  1. Grace looks like she's having so much fun looking through that old stamp album. You are making such wonderful memories! :-)

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  2. That is so wonderful, I love that photo of her pouring through the album. Stamp sorting sounds like a great activity for little fingers as well, I bet she is having a ball using them all.

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  3. OH this is gold Amanda. How special that something you did and loved as a kid can be passed onto Miss Grace. Very cool.
    Love that photo of her looking through your Grandmother's album.
    It' always the things we least expect our kids to love, that end up bringing them the most joy.
    xx
    P.S. Again, THANK YOU for the lovely package this week. You are so amazing!

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  4. I love the simplicity of these activities. It's what life is all about really......
    I really love your coastal cushion and throw too. So purdy ;O)
    Tania xx

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  5. Oh I too loved looking at my dad's stamp collection and my brother and I started our own. Last year at school we had Australia post come out and talk to our year fours about stamp collecting...it's alive and well!

    Such lovely photos and a special time shared with your daughter....beautiful!

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  6. Stamps are tiny pieces of art and i love looking at them too..old and new.

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    1. I agree, there are some stunning designs amongst them all :)

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  7. Hi Amanda,what a beautiful pic of Grace.x

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  8. Ahhh memories! I loved collecting stamps. I don't think my Mum kept mine though. X

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  9. I collected stamps when I was little. My sister and I had albums each, full of old, used stamps and the new ones that Mum bought for us. They were so beautiful!
    It's such a lovely pastime for Grace and making craft from old stamps is a lovely thing to do too.
    xx

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  10. oh my dad and I used to have such a lovely time with our stamps - we had all those first day covers etc too - no idea what happened to them all :-(

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  11. Ohh I used to love collecting stamps too, and my Nan would always get me a set of the special event stamps to add to my collection. I still actually have them, hundreds of them, some that my Pa collected maybe over 50 years ago. I don't know what to do with them or how to sort them out really...they are currently all loose in a box but I would love to display them nicely in a book, but have never found a stamp album big enough. I still love stamps and sometimes buy a set of the designs I like haha!!

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  12. Just gorgeous, Grace looks like she really enjoyed the album & was ever so careful too! Yes stamp collecting does bring back fond memories. My brothers & I all collected them, I remember how exciting it was at Christmas time, all those Christmas stamps with the delivery of Christmas Cards each day! More to share between 3 kids!! I had a look through our albums last year (they are still at my Mum & Dad's house) It was funny as I was flicking through, I could remember the order of some of the pages! It felt like it was only just yesterday, you know if yesterday was a few decades ago!!

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  13. Oh I used to collect and play with stamps too when I was little. How great that you still have all of yours, and your daughter can enjoy them.
    Kylie

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  14. Amanda this is a beautiful story and I can see how much joy Grace is getting looking through the stamp album:) I collected a few stamps and my dad gave me one that I still have kept away but my big collection was erasers and it seems that Miss 8 loves to collect them too. When I was working I remember going to the post office and buying a packet of used stamps for a small amount of money, the students loved choosing what stamp they would use. I just thought I would mention it just in case you run out of stamps to use if Grace likes to create with them a lot:) xx

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  15. The American Topical Association has some free, printable album pages for children. There are all sorts of categories to choose from- cats, trains, flowers, flags, etc. You just print what you want. They can be viewed at their website.

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