Postcards for the Weekend

This weekend the theme of Postcards for the Weekend is 'anything you wish'.

Coincidentally I received two cards from Eva this weekend (well, one on Friday and the other yesterday, Saturday), which is a good reason to post them now!



This postcard shows a flying object and I am not sure if it is a hot air balloon or zeppelin. Eva bought it in Amiens, France, the city where Jules Vernes has lived for many years.
I love the combination of the design of the flying object and the map - and stamps on top and airmail stripes on the right (wondering why most airmail envelopes have red and blue lines/chevrons?).

On the back side Eva added wonderful stamps, among them a clear hot air balloon:



Some other creatures who even knew how to fly long before Jules Verne was thinking about it, appear on this postcard:



The postcard is titled 'Reality', from a book named 'ABC Photography', and the photo itself is titled 'Sustenance 114', made by Neeta Madahar in 2003.

On the back side an other wonderful stamp, showing a rooster and a hen in a stained glass window. They represent the legend of the Miracle of Santo Domingo de la Calzada.



Thank you very much, Eva!


Find more Postcards for this Weekend at this weekend's Connections to the World.

Postcards for the Weekend: Books, authors

This weekend the theme of Postcards for the Weekend is 'Books / reading / authors'.

Two weeks ago I received this pretty postcard from Eva, showing the cover of one of the many books written by Jules Verne, published by Hetzel. She had bought it at the Maison de Jules Verne in Amiens, the house where this famous writer has been living during 18 years.



On the back a matching stamp, of an other French writer: Joseph Peyré:



Find more postcards about this theme at and via Postcards for the Weekend!

Sunday Stamps: 'L' is for lezen, luchtballon and libelle

Today the Sunday Stamps' theme is the letter 'L'.

In Dutch, reading means 'lezen'. Conjugated: ik (I) lees, jij (you) leest, hij of zij (he or she) leest, wij/jullie/zij (we/you/we) lezen.

One can read a book:



Or read from a computer screen:



And how nice it is to read, laying warmly under a blanket:




The 'hot air balloon' in Dutch usually is 'air balloon' only: luchtballon. There are many stamps showing balloons. However, so far I only received this one, from Russia:



Dutch PostNL issued a serie of international stamp sheets on aviation in 2015. Most of them showed airplanes, a few helicopters and there was this stamp in honour of the Montgolfier brothers, the inventors of the luchtballon:



A luchtballon also appears on the selvage of this stamp sheet, in honour of the city of Roermond:




Finally I'd like to share some insect with you. This insect somehow makes us think of helicopters. The English word 'dragonfly' we literally would translate into 'draak vlieg', but we don't. Instead we name the insect 'libelle'. Some thinner species we name 'waterjuffer' (water-young-lady, damselflies), but the order, Odonata in English, in Dutch also is names libelle.

From the John I received this beautiful stamp:



And from Eva this beautiful shaped stamp arrived:




See more stamps on the letter 'L' at and via today's Sunday Stamps.