Stamps

I've been writing letters and postcards for a long time, in Japan it was really easy and fun to find nice stamps. You could find a whole variety of stamps and change it up and make the correct values. Since returning to the UK it's been a lot harder. The Royal Mail release new stamps a lot less frequently compared to JP post. Recently I have made greater efforts to improve this by buying stamps on eBay.

The eBey buying was thanks to @weepingwillow84 it was her suggestion. I've been buying mint presentations packs. They are slightly more expensive but a lot more interesting. It makes me a real difference to my mail rather than the normal Queens head. But I must admit that some of the stamps that have been released by Royal Mail this year have been rather nice. There has been Star Wars, Animail, the Queens 90th and Beatrix potter as well as the Shakespeare quotes but the eBay stamps are a good addition.

Annoyingly the new stamps tend to come in the same denomination first class, or higher values but sometimes £1.05 which are good for international postcards. The presentation pack prices are a bit random ranging form anything from 5p to 39p but it's fun to try and make up the right value. It also makes mail look far more interesting and adds to your mail art.

I am also currently taking part in my first chain card and have started my own Olympic themed one. Though I find them long and tedious the end result is worth it for the postcard full of stamps. A chain card is just as it sounds everyone sends a post card adding their own stamps and sending it to the next person in the chain until you receive your original postcard back with stamps from everyone that took part. Chain cards are another good reason to start buying old used stamps.

I have to admit that I have become slightly addicted and have a bit pf a surplus at the moment. But they will get used and do make a difference to my mail.