We only got a few hours sleep but wanted to be there when it opened at 10 a.m.. We didn’t know what to expect, as it could be people asking huge prices or only a few stamps. We wheeled into a room to find myself in heaven: Tables everywhere stacked with wood blocked stamps and I couldn’t decide where to wheel to first! Ahhh! What if others got ahead of me? The collecting bug was on me. Cheryl and I went to the first table and I immediately found a Coronado Tiger. We only use about four companies: Coronado (they do animals, large blocks of wood and deep cuts!), PSX (out of print and expensive! One woman there said she paid $75 for a single wood blocked stamp) as they make unique series and images, Hero arts (top quality and deep cut), and Stamp Oasis (out of print as is Our Lady of Rubber and Magenta). There was a Tiger for $5 (if I use it 100 times on postcards, that is only 5 cents a use!). It normally goes for $30. Do I look happy holding it and a PSX complex farm yard that I found for $7?
So I went to each table, finding PSX, Hero Arts, (that was the only Coronado I was to find), and other companies, looking at the stamps and building a stack, then paying and leaving Cheryl to put them in the bag or putting them in my backpack (I got a compliment as someone noticed how cool it looked when I came in!). I hit a table every 2 minutes on average. All Linda said was, “You should have seen her at the book sales”. I got a set of Hero Arts flowers for $4 (that is 4 stamps for $4), I found another set of 4 at another table, and 2 mini's.
These are the kind of Stamps we order five of, and pay $40. It was like a giant boost to the diversity of stamps I have and can send out, one section mostly botanical, and then other was cars and people. Some of the really obscure stuff wasn't there but there was a lot of really good things like borders and a few animals. But yes, after I did the rounds ONCE, Linda came and looked for child appropriate stamps and then I looked at other stamps I had missed.
And so at the end, this is what we got, in terms of ink and stamps. We FINALLY got some dark green (deep forest green) as well as a good purple. Ahhhh, I needed that. I even managed to find a Stamp Oasis Japanese stamp of a Lady doing her hair in her kimono in front of a lacquer table.
Go Stamp Exchange!So, then it was back to matching and after a nap, we started stamping. Well we didn’t start, first we had to choose ONLY a few of the stamps we had bought that day for what turned out to be the 81-84 postcards for the postcard project we were about to stamp. It was hard but of course the TIGER had to come.
(I love that tiger, he looks good in black and white but he looks LOVELY in green for some reason). All the stamps but one are new ones we just got at the stamp exchange. Cool, yes? Linda found the mini monkey stamped in the corner.So we had the stamps then we spent and hour trying them out with different colors to find out what the right color for each stamp was. Because of the neuropathy I can’t paint in the different colors, I have to find one color, or at best two (press on one side with one color and on the other side with the other) to stamp with. Linda can do a few ‘special’ ones with her secret practice, like the cat and chasing the butterfly and I can, after 30 minutes of work, could do the thatched roof farm, with the watering can and lettuce, the greenhouse, the stone wall, the ivy, trees, door and wood bench so it looked somewhat natural – it was hard, hard work.
I also did the red berries, but only once or twice and then my hands couldn't anymore. Also with the different textures, it meant a slick texture postcard came out mushy looking while a different paper might absorb all the color. As has happened here with my lady doing her hair in the Kimono,
but I was still very proud to see these Stamps, from the ‘Exchange’ (our money for their stamps!) in use. It was great to know these postcards were going to New Zealand, Australia, UK, Canada, US, Africa and other islands and hopefully people would like the images (who could not love the tiger?).We didn’t finished until 6:20 a.m. and went to bed and slept. Then it was up and writing for me, writing and writing, all the US and overseas postcards, plus any post stamping stickers. Hour after hour, I sit in a room and think about a person, then write a message, and notes about my life, then on to the next card. 68 postcards went out today (already moving by van and airplane!), and the rest will be ready tomorrow. But after three hours it was time for a break: Squirrels.
The sun was going down but it turned out that there were a FEW squirrels that wanted to see a wheelchair (with peanuts)!
Cheryl met with her disability friendly squirrel who climbed her leg to get the peanut so she didn’t have to bend over and hurt her back.
Here we wait to see if it can figure out to climb.Ahhhh, it found it!
Yes, it turns out with winter coming, the squirrels had overcome the earlier shyness from weeks ago and were up, DETERMINED to have peanuts!
Even Linda who was sitting and taking pictures had squirrels sneaking up on her around the tree to investigate the ‘bag of goodies’ on her lap.
Once it found the ‘Mother Lode of Peanuts’ it was rewarded with a peanut and stayed close by while eating it (Good rule that: once you know the source of food, stay close by!).
Here I am with a squirrel who seemed to recognize me in my lap, it just keep looking at me, with a peanut in the mouth, so I got out another and gave it.
But it still sat there with two peanuts in the mouth. So I pet it, just a little, because, hey, it already has the peanuts, and was hanging around. A very pleasurable break.Then back to the room and to finish the last of the postcards. I hope many people get postcards this week. I tried to find anyone we had forgotten or overlooked for a while. That was my weekend, how about yours?
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