Alice in Wonderland

I had been eagerly looking forward to this years stamp releases. I was beyond excited when I learnt that the years first release was Alice in Wonderland. There's no way you couldn't like Alice in Wonderland, it's such a classic.

I marked it up in my diary and headed to the post office on the morning of it's release. They are so much more beautiful in person. I bought a First Day Cover which needed to be posted to me so that it could get the official post mark, but I couldn't leave the post office without some of them in my hand so I bought a few extras too.

Aren't they beautiful. The stamps were designed by Grahame Baker-Smith, who illustrated them for the 150th anniversary of the book.

 The post mark is a wonderful thing to behold!

Here are the explanations of all the stamps. This information card comes with the First Day Cover.

I sent a letter to my friend Josie, who loves Alice in Wonderland more than anyone I know. If you head over to her blog, you can see what I sent her.

First First Day Cover

As you may have noticed, I've become a bit obsessed with stamps recently. Since I started to become more interested in them, I spoke to my grandma about it because she said she used to collect them. She showed me her impressive collection of first day covers ranging all the way back to 1961. I was immediately intrigued and also wanted to have a collection like hers. 

I went to the post office and inquired about them and a nice lady gave me a little calender with all the dates of the first releases. So roll on 14th October, a very exciting day for two reasons- Ed Sheeran and the first day release of these UK Prime Minister Stamps. 

A First Day Cover is a purchase of the whole range of released stamps in varying values. They aren't always the same price as sometimes there's a range of different ones. This FDC featured 4 1st class stamps and 4 97p stamps for international mail.

Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister 1979-1990

Harold Wilson, Prime Minister 1964 to 1970, 1974-1976

Clement Attlee, Prime Minister 1945-1951

Sir Winston Churchill, Prime Minister 1940-1945, 1951-1955

William Pitt the Younger, Prime Minister 1783-1801, 1804-1806

Charles Grey, Prime Minister 1830-1834

Sir Rober Peel, Prime Minister 1834-1835, 1841-1846

William Ewart Gladstone, Prime Minister 1968-1974, 1880-1885, 1886-1886, 1892-1894

My grandma told me that you can either buy it and take it away with you just like that or you can address it to yourself. If you address it to yourself, it gets franked with inked stamps like the ones above and below, dating them and saying it's the first day of issue. Apparently in the future, franked stamps will be worth way more than ones which haven't been franked.

Philatelic Stamps: October Faves

The Royal Mail stamps for this week have been so beautiful. Featuring UK beaches and piers, they've been the perfect end to a really good summer. I was so lucky with stamps on my last trip to the post office. Usually they've run out of the picture stamps by the time I go. This time I managed to get my hands on a few different ones. Here are the ones I'm sending out this week. Aren't they lovely? 

Here are some incoming from China. I always love the Chines Stamps and postmarks.

These ones from The Netherlands have captured my heart so much. Nelson Mandela stamps! I will treasure these forever!

These ones are from Canada. I love that Canadian stamps feature the Royal Family a lot of the time. I especially love the stamp of Will and Kate and baby George!

Even though this is a label and not a stamp, they've made an effort in Singapore to still make it look pretty. I am down with this. If our British ones were smaller and had pretty designs on them, I wouldn't dislike them so much.

This last mail is an amazing happy mail that I received! Look out for the next post in which I show you the contents of the letter. You'll want to see it!