A Spanish New Year

3009 - Eating Twelve Grapes to the chimes of the clock at midnight on New Years Eve has been a Spanish tradition since 1909. In December that year, some vine growers from the Alicante area came up with "The 12 Grapes" as an idea to sell huge amounts of grapes from an excellent harvest.  Since that time Spanish people have kept up the tradition as a way to celebrate New Year's Eve. On the last day of the year, the 31st of December, they wait until twelve p.m. Everybody has to have twelve grapes ready to eat when the clock starts to chime. It is traditional to listen to the clock from Puerta del Sol in Madrid and in other town squares around the country. The tradition consists of eating a grape with each bell strike and Heleen, who was in Spain at the New Year, sent me this mail art made from two packets of seedless, peeled grapes sold especially for the occasion.

Postal Services

3012 – Postal Services no 1.  This card from EJ in the Netherlands is the first 2016 themed one.

EJ put a variety of postal themed stamps on it and did the same with another of his cards.

Murcia

3006 -3008.  Three cards from Murcia in Spain from Heleen.

A miscellany

Please note that it is impossible for me to scan and blog all the cards I receive but every single one is appreciated and the absence of a card from here does not mean I didn’t like it.  In some cases a card may appear some time after it was received so as to put a particular group of cards together.

3001 – The first card of the new year came from Eva in Morocco.  It is Rene Magritte’s  “La clef des songes” 1935

The Moroccan stamps are not usually the most exciting but I like this one very much.

3002 – Friedrich von Ammerling’s “Wrapped up in dreams” c1835 from Susanne in Germany.

3004 – This remarkable picture of the aurora is entitled Magic Mountain and was taken by David Clapp.  It was a finalist in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition and was sent to me by Danielle in Nebraska, USA.

3005 – A card from Monica in Sweden to add to my collection of Findus cards.  Sometime soon I hope to show them all so people can see which I have already received. This, I’m pleased to say, was a new one to me though even duplicates are appreciated because I adore this series.

Some Christmas cards

The Christmas decorations will come down shortly and in the meantime I have taken down the Christmas cards so that Partner-who-loves-tea and I could discuss them over dinner last night.  Needless to say some of them had postboxes on them.

Not surprisingly these included ones to me from P-w-l-t and Son-who-watches-movies.

Irina in Bulgaria sent this one.

This came from Heleen in the Netherlands. 

And from Monica in Sweden - a most delightful one.

 

My old school-friend George and his wife Chris sent this one.

And from a former colleague, Marilyn.

And, finally, a postcard - From Anastasia in Belarus, a Postcrossing friend.

Thanks to everyone who sent us cards and postcards - with or without postboxes!

2016 - a new theme - postal workers

It was great fun getting so many cards on the theme of clocks during 2015.  It is a shame I couldn't keep up the blog designed for them but at least I have learned my lesson and will not be creating a separate blog for 2016's theme.

And the theme for this year is Postal Workers - postmen, postwomen, post-people, even post-bears!

These are some of the great postal worker cards I have had in the past:-

A New Year's Day parcel

I had not expected any post on New Year's Day.  It's a Bank Holiday here in the UK.  But although there were no letters or cards there was a parcel from Heleen in the Netherlands.  Not only did it contain good wishes on a clock card but also a delightful clock pencil sharpener.  What a great reminder, of all the great 2015 clock postcards, the latter will be as it sits on my desk.

Happy New Year

2989 - From Irina, a friend in St Petersburg, came this New Year card and a great frank on the back.

2993 - Susanne in Germany has just sent me this beautiful card.  I expect there will be plenty of card and letter writing going on in 2016.

2988 - There will be many different postboxes used over the next twelve months but this card from Eva wasn't posted in the box shown - it is situated in Madrid and only used for postage within that city.

2990 - I expect cats will feature on a number of the cards I receive.  Thanks to Susanne for this one.

2991 - And, of course, cats come in all shapes and sizes.  Another from Susanne.

2992 - No doubt the subject of  'Reading' will feature on a number of cards like this one, also from Susanne.