Queen Elizabeth II's 90th Birthday

On Friday I got the stamps from the United Kingdom which I ordered online.

This they are:

90th Birthday of Queen Elizabeth II (issued 21-04-2016)
- The Queen with her father
- The Queen attending the State Opening of Parliament in 2012
- The Queen with Princess Anne and Prince Charles
- The Queen visiting New Zealand in 1977
- The Queen with her husband
- The Queen with Nelson Mandela

I also bought the related souvenir sheet showing Prince Charles, the Queen, Prince George and Prince William:

Austrian Loyalty Bonus Stamp

On Wednesday I got a special present from the Austrian Post.

This is it:

Loyalty Bonus Stamp (issued 2016)
The stamp is exclusively sent to subscribers and collectors who have bought something in the online shop of the Austrian Post during the last year. There is no other way to get it.

Thank You very much Austrian Post! ^___^

Postal Service in China

On Wednesday I got a stamp set from China on a postcard.

This is it:

120 years Post of China (issued 20-03-2016)

Thank You very much Mo!

Beer Brewing in Germany

Last Saturday returned a special collectible to me. I took a beer mat with an advertising for a local beer brand, placed on it one of the new beer stamps and sent it to the Deutsche Post to get a matching special postmark. 

The stamp is about the 500th anniversary of the German purity law and was issued on 7th April 2016. 

The German purity law for beer is one of the oldest still effective food regulations in the World. In 1487 the first purity law came into force in Munich. In 1516 the law was expanded to the whole of Bavaria. According to the law only hops, malt and water were allowed to be used during the brewing of beer. Since 1906 the law is also used in other parts of Germany.

On 5th May 1983 another stamp about the German purity law was issued, which commemorated more than 450 years since the law was enacted. As I have this stamp only on a FDS, I also bought the FDS of the new stamp.

Hops are one of the three ingredients of beer.
To commemorate more than 1100 years of hop growing in Germany a stamp was issued on 16th July 1998.

Today beer is mainly produced in large kettles.
I recently got this maxicard showing the kettles. The stamp is a definitive and was issued on 16th June 1982.

Indian Men and Women

On Friday I got my first mint stamp set from India.

India is a country in South Asia bordering on Pakistan, China, Nepal, Bhutan, Myanmar and Bangladesh. It is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations and the United Nations. New Delhi is the capital of India. India is the second most populous country in the World.

This is the stamp set:

HeForShe (issued 08-03-2016)
It is a joint issue with the United Nations.

The stamp set was sent in the matching FDC.

In the cover was also a brochure about the stamps.

Thank You very much Raghavendra!

Canadian Monkeys

Today I got a stamp set from Canada on a postcard.

This is it:

Year of the Monkey
- international rate (issued 01-02-2016)
- domestic rate (issued 11-01-2016)

Thank You very much Tristan!

Indonesian Monkeys

On Monday I got a stamp set from Indonesia on a postcard.

This is it:

Year of the Monkey (issued 24-01-2016)

Thank You very much Shinta!

Thor Heyerdahl

In the last weeks I got two cards from Norway and on each were two stamps from a set of four.

This is the complete set:

100th birthday of Thor Heyerdahl (issued 28-04-2014)

Thank You very much Cathrine!

German Baby Animals

On Monday I got a stamp set from Germany on a postcard, which I sent to myself.

This is it:

Baby Animals (issued 01-03-2016)

Endangered Birds

On Thursday I got a FDC from the United Nations together with the normal advertising mail as gift of the Postal Administration.

This is it:

Endangered Species (issued 03-04-2003)
The stamps were issued to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
- Baikal Teal
- Hadada Ibis
- Toco Toucan
- Egyptian Goose

Thank You very much United Nations Postal Administration! ^__^

Slovenian Rodents

On Thursday I got a stamp set from Slovenia on a postcard.

This is it:

Rodents of Slovenia (issued 25-09-2015)
- Hazel Dormouse
- Alpine Marmot
- European Hamster
- Eurasian Beaver

Thank You very much Mateja!

Primates of Malaysia

On Wednesday I got a stamp set from Malaysia on a postcard.

This is it:

Year of the Monkey (issued 26-01-2016)
The stamps show Primates of Malaysia.
- White-handed Gibbon
- Silvered Leaf Monkey
- Macaque

Actually the stamps are much brighter, but for some reason my scanner did not want to show the colours.

Thank You very much Matthew!

British Heroines of World War I in Serbia

On Wednesday I got my first mint stamps from Serbia.

Serbia is a country in Southeast Europe bordering on Croatia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Macedonia, Kosovo, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Belgrade is the capital and largest city of the country.

The stamps were in a stamp pack.

Front side:

Information text inside:

Back side:

This is the stamp sheet:

British Heroines of World War I in Serbia (issued 08-12-2015)

Thank You very much Brane!

Serbian Monkeys

On Wednesday I got a stamp set from Serbia on a cover.

This is it:

Year of the Monkey (issued 09-02-2016)

Thank You very much Brane!

Go Green in Sweden

On Wednesday I got a stamp from Sweden in a cover from France.

This is it:

EUROPA (issued 14-01-2016)

Thank You very much William!

Covers and International Stamps about Little Red Riding Hood

On Thursday I got a FDC from Germany, which I sent to myself. On it there are three different varieties of the new Little Red Riding Hood stamp. The left stamp is self-adhesive and from a booklet, the stamp in the middle is self-adhesive and from a coil and the right stamp is gummed from a sheetlet. The three stamps all have different First Day Special Postmarks.

In 2012 I created a special cover for my collection with a special postmark, which uses exactly the same picture as the left postmark on the FDC I got on Thursday. The postmark celebrated the Children's Day.

The four stamps I used on the cover were all related to children and fairy tales:
500 years Till Eulenspiegel (issued 07-07-2011)
For Children (issued 13-09-2012)
200 years Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm (issued 14-06-2012)
Rubbish is a Resource (issued 02-05-2012)

In my collection I also have some other stamps that feature Little Red Riding Hood.
One set was issued on 15th March 1968 in Poland and consists of eight stamps, which all show different children's stories. The stamps show Little Red Riding Hood together with the Puss in boots, the Fox and the Raven, Pan Twardowski, the Fisherman and the Fish, Cinderella, Thumbelina and Snow White.

Another set in my collection comes from Switzerland and shows Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel, Snow White and Cinderella (issued 26-11-1985).

Little Red Riding Hood, Hansel and Gretel, Pinocchio and the Puss in boots are shown on a stamp set from San Marino issued on 20th August 2004.

Monkeys from Australia

On Thursday I got a stamp set from Christmas Island on a postcard.

This is it:

Year of the Monkey (issued 03-02-2016)

Thank You very much Jemma!

Little Red Riding Hood

This is the 400th post on my blog! Thank You everybody for the nice stamps I got mint, on postcards and on covers!

On Thursday I bought the new German stamps including the new welfare showing Little Red Riding Hood (issued 11-02-2016).

Little Red Riding Hood, or Rotkäppchen in German, is a young girl living in the forest with her Mother. She is recognisable by her red cape. One day she is sent to her Grandmother with a basket full of treats. Before she leaves, her Mother tells her that she must not go astray. On her way through the forest Little Red Riding Hood meets the Wolf and he asks her where she wants to go. After she answers him, he tells her that the Grandmother would be for sure very happy to get a flower bouquet and that there are nice flowers in the forest. Against the advice of the Mother Little Red Riding Hood exits the path and while she does this the Wolf hurries to the house of the Grandmother. 

After her detour Little Red Riding Hood finally arrives at her destination, but in the bed there is not the Grandmother, but the Wolf who ate the actual owner of the house. After a short conversation he also eats Little Red Riding Hood.

Luckily a Hunter comes to the house of the Grandmother, kills the Wolf and frees the Grandmother and Little Red Riding Hood. Little Red Riding Hood promises that she will from now on always follow the advice of the Mother.

Ernst Litfaß and the Litfaßsäule

Last Thursday I bought the new German stamps.

This is one pair I bought:

200th birthday of Ernst Litfaß (issued 11-02-2016)

Ernst Litfaß was born in Berlin in 1816. He was a printer, bookseller and publisher. He became known for ending the fly-postering with his new invention, the advertising column. As he had the monopole on the establishing of the advertising columns he soon became wealthy. Ernst Litfaß died in Wiesbaden in 1874.

The first advertising column was established in Berlin in 1855. The companies now had to pay for the publishing of their ads and thus the authorities now were in control of the public communication. Today there are around 67000 advertising columns in Germany.

In my collection I have this stamp showing an advertising column:

100th birthday of Erich Kästner (issued 18-02-1999)