In: from the USA

I received an envelope, whose sender seemed to be 'Lost Kingdom Station' in Tulsa, USA. Curious to know how this Lost Station would know my name and address I opened the envelope. And... Inside an other envelope, showing these great tiger stamps and wonderful special postmark!

Not send by the Lost Kingdom Station, but via this place by FinnBadger.

He added this great tufted puffin card, from the National Geographic Museum.



Thank you very much, FinnBadger!

Postcards for the weekend: Books, reading, authors

This weekend the theme of Postcards for the Weekend is a favourite of mine, too: Books, reading, authors!
Also a favourite theme of many postcard lovers, and a lot of postcards have been issued on this theme. See for instance the website of Dutch postcrosser Willemijn, who posted hundreds of postcards on her 'Lezende vrouwen' ('Reading women') site between 2006 and 2012.

The first postcard I like to share here is this illustration by Fiep Westendorp. She became famous by her book illustrations of Jip & Janneke, the children's books by Annie M.G. Schmidt. But Fiep has drawn many other great pictures, among them cartoons about women's lives (in the 50'ies-60'ies and still actual!), and illustrations like this one:



A reading man is shown on this painting. I've sent this card to John in the UK, but alas I forgot to note who the painter and painted are:



From Eva I received this cartoon: 'Compre un libro. Y luego léalo!', in other words: 'Buy a book, and then read it!'
Who of you still has unread books on his/her shelf? (I have..)



To my opinion books preferably should be bought in real bookstores, not online. In order to keep sceneries like this alive:



Painting by Dutch painter Willy Belinfante-Sauerbier (1922-2014). She has made more paintings of reading people and bookstores.


And here a few books I received from Eva, that is, the covers on postcards, not the books itself :-) They are from a serie of Puffin Books postcards:





See more postcards on reading, books and authors at this weekend's Postcards for the Weekend.

Sunday Stamps: Birds

Sunday 2 October it is Sunday Stamps time again!
The theme is 'Birds', and I think our feathered friends always making a nice theme.

I'd like to show you the stamps on my recent 'chaincard', which has been traveling between the Netherlands, Canada, Thailand and Hong Kong (click to enlarge):



On top you can see my card before the sparrow flew out. And below you can see the influence of a journey over three continents. Apart from some postmark ink, the sparrow arrived rather well!



One of the other chaincard fellows will receive these stamps (I love the puffin and crow stamp!),



See more Birds stamps on and via Sunday Stamps.

Sunday stamps: Water birds

This time the Sunday Stamps' theme is 'Water Birds'.
As I love birds this is an other favourite subject of mine!

The first two stamps I love to share with you I've published before, be it not for Sunday Stamps. Thanks to FinnBadger I received these two wonderful sea birds: a Frigatebird and a Tufted Puffin. Both on an awesome envelope, made out of a calendar page showing birds by Charley Harper. The Flamingo of course is a water bird, too.
And - thank you FinnBadger for correcting me - I first thought the Frigatebird had been created by this famous artist, too, but it appears to have been designed by Tyler Lang, who has created many more animals illustrations, which at first sight remind me of Charley Harper's birds, but when you look close their style is so different!



The puffin has been designed by Robert Giusti.

And as puffins belong to my most favourite birds and Harper to one of my favourite artists (he has created a lot of bird pictures) and Tyler Lang's artwork I think inspiring, too, no need to say that FinnBadger's mail made my day :-)

In the Netherlands also various birds have been imaged on stamps.
These two stamp sheets have been issued in 2003 as a tribute to the Dutch wad in the Wadden area. The images have been designed by Eke van Mansvelt.



You can see the 'Scholekster'(Eurasian Oystercatcher), the 'Lepelaar' (Spoonbill), two kinds of Geese, the 'Grote Mantelmeeuw' (Great black-backed gull, I guess - there are a lot of kinds of sea gulls), the 'Wulp' (Eurasian curlew), some non-bird animals
and on the sheet itself the 'Visdief' (Common Tern), 'Plevieren' (Plovers).



The Wadden is a part of the north Sea, south of the so-called Wadden Islands. Since 2009 it is a UNESCO world heritage site, nevertheless the area is threatened, by pollution, by business plans etcetera, so I hope (and in fact expect) the area will continue to be protected.

By the way, the postage has increased a lot since 2003. In that year we had to pay € 0,39 for national mail and € 0.59 for international mail (all up to 20 grams). Anno 2016 it is € 0.73 for national mail and € 1.25 for international mail..

See more Sea Birds - and Charley Harper stamps! - at and via the links under this Sunday's Sunday Stamps blog!

In: from the USA

Already since my childhood the puffin ('papegaaiduiker' in Dutch, which literally means 'parrot diver') is one of my most favourite birds. I always had thought that there only was one species of puffins, but last year I learnt that the one I knew is named the Atlantic puffin and that there are two more puffins.

So I was very pleased with this recent postcard, which FinnBadger has sent me from the USA (yay, FinnBadger, I jumped another hole in the air :-) ), and to which he had added a stamp of the Tufted puffin (and a Frigatebird, the only one of the three who I have seen in real - an intriguing bird, too).
The picture above has been designed by famous American artist Charley Harper.



The card came in an envelope, made of a Charley Harper calendar page. I've posted the beautiful envelope somewhere else on the world wide web, but the first bird - tiny in an edge of the envelope - which immediately attracted my sight I'll show below. It is... a puffin :-)



Thank you very much, FinnBadger!

In: from Morocco

Zaterdag 13 september is de 98e geboortedag van Roald Dahl. Een paar dagen ervoor kwam dankzij Eva deze kaart in de brievenbus, met daarop een boekomslag van 'De Reuzenperzik' uit 1980. De oorspronkelijke uitgave is uit 1961, en het is geïllustreerd door Nancy Ekhom Burkert.

Saturday 13th of September is the 98th birthday of Roald Dahl. A few days before this postcard arrived in my mailbox, thanks to Eva, showing the book cover of "James and the Giant Peach". Originally issued in 1960; this Puffin book dates from 1980. The cover illustration has been made by Nancy Ekhom Burkert.



Thank you very much, Eva!

In: from Iceland

Een van mijn (vele) lievelingsdieren, deze papegaaiduiker (wel zielig voor de visjes) uit IJsland. Eigenlijk is 't een vakantiekaart, van een Nederlandse vriendin. Aan de poststempel kun je zien dat deze kaart uit het pre-postcrossing-tijdperk stamt.

One of my (many) favourite animals, this puffin (though a pity for these little fish), sent from Iceland. In fact it's a holiday-postcard, which I received from a Dutch friend. The cancelling stamp reveals the fact that this was in the pre-Postcrossing era.

In: from Spain

Nog zo'n leuke kaart met boekomslag uit de Puffin-serie.

Another nice postcard showing a cover from the Puffin books serie. Thank you very much, Eva!

In: from Spain

Kijk ze eens mooi bij elkaar, de Uil en de Papegaaiduiker - 'samen met u onder de paraplu' - op deze ansichtkaart. Oorspronkelijk een boekomslag uit 1966, geïllustreerd door Jill McDonald voor Puffin Books. Meer werk van Jill McDonals (1927-1982) vind je hier.
Hartelijk dank, Eva!

Look them standing together cosy, the Owl and the Puffin - 'together with you under the umbrella' - on this postcard! Originally a book cover, made in 1966 by Jill McDonald for Puffin Books.
More work by Jill McDonald (1927-1982) you can find here.
Thank you very much, Eva!