Snail Mail Love: Vintage Stamp Postcards

As well as getting back into the rhythm of stitching and designing stuff, I've also been adding lots of lovely vintage bits and bobs to my shop!

I've been selling vintage things for a couple of years now and I absolutely love it. It's such a joy finding gorgeous and interesting items and then sending them off to their new homes - particularly when customers tell me their purchases are going to be a special gift, or are something they've been looking for for years. 

As the months go by, I'm working out what sells and what doesn't and also what I'm most enjoying selling. I blogged a while back about my new-found obsession with vintage tea towels (I love them so much I've set up an Instagram account devoted to them!), and obviously I'm drawn to all kinds of vintage crafty goodness... but one of the other things I'm really into is vintage stamp postcards.

These cards are known by collectors as "PHQ Cards" - PHQ standing for "Postal Headquarters" because they were originally issued by the Post Office here in the UK (more recently they've been issued by the Royal Mail). 

The Post Office (and later Royal Mail) have been publishing them since the early 1970s: a new set of postcards for each new set of stamps. 

 

I've loved postage stamps since I was a kid and I absolutely adore these postcards. 

They're great for anyone interested in stamps, of course, but they also make fab gifts for people born in the year they were issued, or anyone interested in the theme of the featured set. Pretty much whatever you're interested in Royal Mail have produced stamps connected to that theme!

 

I'm selling sets of totally unused postcards, so you can send a lovely bit of snail mail to your friends. The Christmas and winter-themed sets would make great Christmas cards. 

The cards would also look great framed, either individually if there's a particular stamp design you adore, or as a set. Super affordable vintage art!

Visit my shop to see the postcard sets I currently have available, and do give me a shout if there are any designs in particular that you're interested in as I have plenty more to photograph and list!

100 Days of Studio Scenes: Days 11-20

My 100 Day Project to share behind-the-scenes updates from my creative business continues!

Click here to read about days 1-10.

DAY ELEVEN:

"Yesterday I mostly parceled up and posted paper packs! Thank you so much for all your orders, there's just one pack left now (oh my gosh). I am OVERWHELMED and DELIGHTED by how quickly they've sold, and by your enthusiasm for them. I appreciate your support so, so much, I cannot even begin to tell you. Very appropriately, yesterday my big order of postage stamps arrived so I can now send All The Post. Well, I can once I've stopped oohing over the lovely sheets of stamps!!"

DAY TWELVE:

"Here's a peek at one of my current batches of work-in-progress - I find mini trays like this particularly useful for managing my small WIPs! I usually have lots of projects in progress, all in different stages. 

That felt angel is a sample for a tutorial I'd originally hoped to add to my shop back in December - fingers crossed I can finally get it finished sometime soon! The bullfinch pattern has been in progress for even longer, I stitched the embroidery pattern version back in 2018, I think, and am only now finding the time to sew the step by step felt version. Meanwhile, I'm making a start on sewing snowy owls and cardinals. Bit by by bit everything is getting nudged forwards."

DAY THIRTEEN:

"I've started planning some new paper packs! Watch this space."

DAY FOURTEEN::

"My parcel-laden shadow on my socially distanced route to the parcel postbox!

I'm really lucky to live close enough to the beach that I can walk in all this wide open space during my state sanctioned bit of exercise. Any day I have parcels to post (stuff that won't fit in my local postbox) I'm taking the parcels with me on my walk, then looping quickly off the beach up to the parcel postbox before I head back home. It's great being able to combine the two trips and to avoid having to walk through the town centre which has looked quite busy!"

DAY FIFTEEN:

"Yesterday I was tidying up my workspace and thought "ooh, I've finished lots of projects recent, I should plan a sample sale!"... then instead of carefully planning one, I held one straight away in my Stories, haha."

DAY SIXTEEN:

"I had a bit of a meltdown yesterday while ordering some paper and tape for my parcels. I thought I'd ordered totally the wrong thing and I was feeling so tired and stressed and anxious and worried about money and, well, that's not a great combo, is it? 

After I'd calmed down I then sat on hold for ages trying to get the order cancelled (listening to some soft rock and a looping recorded message telling me how wait times were longer than usual due to COVID-19)... but it had already been processed by the time I got through. The customer service rep I spoke to was very nice though and reassured me I could easily return anything I needed to.

Then my order arrived this morning and it turns out I hadn't ordered the wrong thing at all! I feel like an idiot, but an idiot who now has ALL THE PACKAGING SUPPLIES.

I also now have customs labels so I can start sending international post again, too! Hurrah! I'm going to be taking things easy for the next few days (because I clearly need a bit of a rest!!) but I have plans for lots of new stuff coming soon..."

DAY SEVENTEEN:

"My living room floor currently looks like this!* 

I'm putting together some new paper packs, a £5 pack about the same size as the last batch and these much bigger bumper packs which will be £10 each. Both full of crafty papery goodness, of course!

*Out of shot: lots of other piles of paper and related chaos, pictures waiting to be framed, and my current in-progress jigsaw puzzle."

DAY EIGHTEEN:

"Here are a few of my current felt-y works in progress! 

I'm feeling very tired at the moment and struggling to find the focus for sewing, designing new things, or writing anything longer than an Instagram caption. I've mostly been tinkering with my new paper packs (coming next week!) but I've also been making myself do a little bit of sewing each day (or at least every other day), then taking a few step photos when the light is just right. Each small batch of sewing + photos helps nudge a few projects forwards and means that when I'm feeling more able to focus I'll have lots of pics ready to edit and use for new tutorials for my blog, shop, and newsletter."

DAY NINETEEN:

"Yesterday was another restful day, sorting through some awesome book pages for new paper packs and making a start on prepping for my next @lauralupinsells sale. Jigsaws, books, and crafty goodness, coming soooooon!"

DAY TWENTY:

"I took a trip to the magic postbox today! Okay so it's not actually magic but it FEELS like magic. A great big postbox I can put parcels in and thus carry on selling stuff without having to go to the Post Office??? This is AMAZING and WONDERFUL. 

(I took a break from this project for a few days because I was feeling rubbish, if you can't press pause for a bit during a global pandemic when can you? I'm hoping to get back in the daily rhythm of things again now...)

More updates soon, or you can follow along on Instagram HERE.

Recent(ish) Additions to My Instagram Sale

As I mentioned the other day, I've come up with a plan so I can post parcels without having to go to the Post Office: I've found a parcel postbox near me, I've ordered lots of stamps online, and a wonderful friend has offered to send me a roll of customs labels - hurrah!

This means I can start sending out orders from my Instagram sale page again. I'm in the middle of stocking up on packaging supplies so you may have to wait for me to ship some larger items, but if there's anything you've got your eye on please get in touch.

Here's a selection of the items still available from the sales I held in March...

A couple of gorgeous vintage atlases, perfect for framing and/or using in paper crafts.

 

A very pretty jigsaw puzzle (so soothing!).

A selection of craft books.

 

 

Some lovely First Day Covers featuring gorgeous stamps. These would look really nice framed or propped up on a bookshelf or picture ledge.

 

 

A brand new Leuchtturm notebook, still in its packaging.

Some floral fabric, including a vintage Laura Ashley print!

A charming brooch to pin to your jacket.

A colouring book full of birds.

And an absolutely fabulous vintage bedspread.

 
Click here to view everything I've got listed!

If it's not marked as "sold" or "sold pending payment", it's almost certainly still available. You can message me on Instagram or get in touch via my contact form and I'll get back to you as soon as possible.

Send Happy Snail Mail With Vintage Stamps & DIY Envelopes!

One of my New Year's Resolutions for 2019 is to make time to send more snail mail to my friends and penpals. Maybe that's something you'd like to do more of, too? In this post you'll find two fun and easy ways of making the snail mail you send extra special...

Did you know you can use old-but-not-used Royal Mail postage stamps for sending your post here in the UK? I recently bought a big bundle of old mint stamps for my letters, and using them is proving to be an absolute joy!

I bought a big bundle of stamps, giving me lots of different designs and values to choose from when making up the correct postage value and saving me money, too (always a good thing when you send a lot of post - snail mail is wonderful but stamps are rather pricey these days!). I bought my stamps from here.

Sorting through the bundle when it arrived was a huge amount of nerdy fun. So many lovely old stamps! And so many possibilities for getting creative with my letters!

Even if you just selected any old stamps to make up the correct postage the result would be pretty cool: a handful of quirky old stamps (some with ha'penny values!) are always going to be more exciting than just a single modern one. But of course (OF COURSE) I've been playing with colour and themes when putting together the stamp selections for my mail.

Carefully selecting the stamps can be rather a time suck but totally worth it, I think! I described this as "a bit of a waste of time" to a friend recently but, as he immediately pointed out, actually it's not a waste of time at all: I've been enjoying it as a relaxing task while watching TV in the evenings, and the end results can be rather wonderful.

This week I've been playing with colour, matching stamps to a set of fabulous notecards I got for Christmas.

 

In case you're admiring the notecards (and why wouldn't you be?), they're the "Pen to Paper Notecards" set by Present & Correct for Chronicle Books. Mine were bought from Waterstones here in the UK, but those of you in the US can buy them direct from Chronicle Books.

Here's a closer look at the cards and the stamps I've used:

All that lovely colour makes me very happy indeed.

The second thing I've been doing recently to jazz up my post is making my own handmade envelopes. I've made some from coloured paper, but I've also been making lots from a book of maps and a gorgeous book of British wildflowers.

When you use book pages to make envelopes the end results are so pretty, and totally unique! Oh, and the books only cost me about a quid each at my local charity shop so they're a bargain, too.

If you've never made an envelope before, don't worry: they're so easy to make that you'll wonder why you never tried it before.

Just unfold an envelope that's the size you need (or download and print a free template from the internet - there are loads available), stick it to a bit of card and trace the shape onto the back of whatever nice paper you want to use. Then cut, fold and stick (with glue or double-sided tape) the envelope together and add a plain label for the address when you're ready to send it. Remember to position your template so the paper will be the right way up on the front of the envelope!

Cheap second hand books are perfect for making envelopes, though you may need to use different size envelope templates depending on the size of the pages. If you need to make envelopes of a specific size, simply take the template with you when you go browsing for books to use.

I also love making envelopes from leftover gift wrap and colourful magazine pages. Sometimes my stamps used to fall off my letters en route when I sent "magelopes" as a teen, but with modern postage stamps being like stickers it's much easier to use shiny paper for making your envelopes without worrying about the stamps going AWOL.

I won't be combining these two happy post ideas and using a selection of vintage stamps with my book envelopes - I think the effect would be a little visually cluttered and I'd hate to cover up those lovely flowers and maps! Instead I'll be keeping my eye out for some suitably lovely Special Stamps, or using some of the pictorial definitives, either of which are much prettier options than standard 1st/2nd class stamps, if you care about that sort of thing (which, as you've probably gathered by now, I totally do). 

Post Office Posters

UPDATE: I'm now sharing my collection of Royal Mail advertising posters over on a dedicated Post Office Posters blog. 

One of the things I'm lucky to have inherited from my grandparents is a collection of old Royal Mail advertising posters, from the days when they ran a village shop and Post Office.

 
If you've been reading my blog for a long time, you might have seen some of these posters before as I had a few of my faves framed and on display in my old flat. I only have wall space for a few of them, though, and I thought it might be nice to have a space to share the whole collection, so...

... I've started a new Instagram account for them: Post Office Posters.

 

I'll gradually be photographing and sharing all the posters over the coming weeks and months, as and when I have time to do so. If you're a stamp nerd like me, are interested in typography or poster design, or just like old stuff then do follow along!