Ballet

I never did want to be a ballerina when I grew up.  Even as a child I knew I would never manage to look like this, though if I'd seen this card, maybe I might have tried a little harder.

It is a card of a very beautiful stamp issued by the United States Postal Service in 1998 to honour classical ballet.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday, hosted by Beth at The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

California

I didn't do a map on Monday, so here is one for Tuesday instead.  California is one of the US States I can recognise from an outline and I also know where it is!! :)  I used to have the state flower, the California Poppy growing in my garden.

H is for Hollywood, Houston and Honeymoon Island

A journey across the United States of America, from east to west.

I would think the majority of people would know both Hollywood and Houston, but Honeymoon Island?  That one was new to me.  It was apparently once known as Hog Island but the name changed when some honeymoon cabins were built on the Island.  those cabins no longer exist, but the name remains.

G is for Green Giant

Norman Rockwell's style is fairly easily recognisable, though I'll admit to having been confused once or twice.  He was an American artist who created covers for The Saturday Evening Post from 1916, and went on to depict small town life after he moved to Vermont.

This piece, dated 1939, has the title "Who's Having More Fun?" and was an illustration for an advertisement for Green Giant canned corn.

Strangely, it was sent to me from Japan.

New Jersey

Because I was away for quite a while, I made my Postcrossing account inactive.  When it reverts to being active, I always receive several cards from the same country, usually, the Big Four of Germany, Russia, USA, and the Netherlands.

This time it happened again and four arrived from the USA with consecutive IDs.  And two of them were the map card above.  I couldn't even start to calculate the odds of that happening but it strikes me that it's an enormous coincidence.

One day I hope to receive a card from Deal, New Jersey, for the simple reason that I live in Deal too.

New Yorker

It really isn't easy to use the Blogger app. There is no html and no option to add any links, no way that I have yet found to add labels.  However I managed to upload a number of postcard scans so I'll try to plough onwards.

The card shown is one of a boxed set of New Yorker covers and the first I've received.  It fits very well in my books/libraries/reading collection. 

I've bought a couple of boxed sets myself and they are extremely good value even though I find I am left with a few cards that don't seem suitable for anyone.

Smolensk

The card of Archangel Michel's (Svirskaya) Church in Smolensk was sent with the stamp commemorating the 1150th anniversary of Rostov in north west Russia. The stamp would have been on a mini sheet like this one.  Smolensk is also a very old city - the church on the postcard was built at the end of the 12th century.

I noticed  a few other stamps with a similar colour to the one above so I took that as a theme:

 From Bosnia Herzogovina, a donkey

 Some traditional houses from Croatia

A sand gazelle from the United Arab Emirates 

And from the USA, I suppose you could say another traditional dwelling, skyscraper apartments!

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Rural Pennsylvania

Cows in an idyllic setting.

Interstate 95

Here is another map for Monday.  It looks almost like a handmade card but in fact it isn't, though the map does look hand drawn.  It was sent in 1988 from an 8 year old girl in a Brownie troop, to a boy in the West Midlands.  Maybe he was in a cub pack.

From the back of the card:

The Interstate Highway System comprises approximately 43,000 miles of expressway throughout the United States.  Interstate 95 is the major north-south corridor in the Eastern US linking northern Maine to South Florida.  I-95 will be approximately 1,850 miles in length when complete: over 1,700 miles are in use.

 I have just read in Wikipedia that it's still not complete, with sections in Pennsylvania and New Jersey due for completion in 2018.  It was started in 1957, making it one of the oldest of the Interstate system.

A country school

The title of this picture is, "Norman Rockwell Visits a Country School", first appearing as a Saturday Evening Post illustration in November 1946.  Norman Rockwell was an American artist, especially known for his illustrations of American small-town life.

I love the way the children are all gathered around the teacher, absorbed by whatever she is saying, all except one little girl sitting apart and reading to herself.  I wonder what story that tells..

Sonoma Wineries

My husband and I used to visit wine producing areas in France, occasionally in Germany or Italy, but we never made it to the USA.  The most well known wine areas in northern California are the Napa Valley and the Sonoma Valley.  This card, with its attractive Art Nouveau detail, shows the wineries, some of them at least, of the Sonoma Valley.

My map on a Monday.

Woods Hole, Massachusetts

The harbour of Woods Hole, Massachusetts, as seen on a map dated 1857.  The postcard itself is from the USA and postmarked 1998.

And this is a Google eye view of the same area as seen 2014.

Games - Olympic and others

During 2012 (I nearly said last year) when the Olympics were in London I had more commemorative cards and stamps than I knew what to do with, so of course I sent them to people who showed an interest in the Games.  As a result I have very little to show of that time but I did receive a lovely card of the Rocky Mountain National Park with a Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympic Games stamp.

All that I have from 2012 are these "left overs", for first class domestic mail and worldwide up to 20g.

I'm including a commemorative card and stamp mini-sheet from the 2013 University Games held in Kazan in Russia because I was so delighted to receive them very recently.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

A little piece of history

I've received quite a few postcards of books recently and this looks like another.  But it's different, it's a piece of history.  It's the joint declaration on the future of Hong Kong, signed by Margaret Thatcher, then Prime Minister of the UK, and Zhao Ziyang, Prime Minister of China.  It was signed in Beijing in 1984 before the big hand over of Hong Kong to China in 1997.

It was sent to me from the USA but it was bought in Hong Kong.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

A castle, of sorts

I have on my Postcrossing wishlist that I'd be happy to receive postcards with medieval castles.  Someone with a great sense of humour sent me this one from Las Vegas.  The Excalibur was opened in 1990, which in Las Vegas terms makes it an old hotel.  On the reverse it states: "a luxury hotel and casino disguised as a medieval castle".

Cape Cod for July 4th

I intended this week to be filled with cards from Canada but for Independence Day USA I have had to break the theme.  Well, there remains a link with my holiday in that every other person I met seemed to be going, or intending to go, to Cape Cod for their holidays.  I hope the weather there was an improvement.

To complete the link, this card was waiting for me on my arrival home.  The sender tells me the weather there has been hot and humid so maybe the Canadians enjoyed it.

Quiet Places, Other Paths

When this postcard first arrived I thought it was a lovely autumn scene.  I'm not sure whether it was intended as an autumn scene but what I hadn't realised was that it's a picture of a quilt but Ruth McDowell.  The picture comes from the book Art & Inspirations.

If you need some inspiration yourself, you can look at some of Ruth McDowell's amazing work on her own website.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Indiana

I understand the red cardinal is the state bird for Indiana, and that I do recognise, but all the other birds on this beautiful postcard are unknown to me.  If anyone can name them for me, I'd be delighted to hear.

Updated to add the names of the birds: (my thanks to Christina and Suzanne McCarthy)

Ruby-throated Hummingbird (in flight)
Baltimore Oriole (partly obscured)
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Northern Cardinal
Blue Jay
Mourning Dove
American Robin
American Goldfinch
Red-winged Blackbird
Red-headed Woodpecker (partly obscured)


This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

The Virgin Islands

I was delighted to receive a mapsent from the USA, showing The Virgin Islands, somewhere I'm never likely to visit.  I know nothing about the islands but apparently they were named by Christopher Columbus after St Ursula and her 11,000 virgins.  Gosh.

So I had to find out about St Ursula and her virgins.  She was a British princess in the 4th/5th century and set off to marry Conan Meriadoc in Brittany, accompanied by 11,000 (or so) handmaidens.  The story continues when Ursula decides to make a pilgrimage around Europe but she was shot and her handmaidens were beheaded.

The early legends mentioned only a few handmaidens and it wasn't until the 9th century that they became 11,000.  Scholars think that the confusion may have come about by someone mistranslating undecimilia (Latin for 11) which is not too different from undicimila (Latin for 11,000).

Pittsburgh

I can't decide whether this counts as a map or not.  It doesn't really matter because it's very attractive whatever its definition.  However, I do have to assign labels.  To map or not to map....?

Better yet, it arrived with the new round USA global forever stamp.