My own personal stamps - from Christi

The Post Office knew this was a special envelope so they took really good care of it and did not put any kind of machine cancel, hand cancel or scribble on it. They were mesmerized. As was I.

It's been at my house since August and must have arrived on a day that I was trying new organizational methods. Today, I found it in a file neatly labeled *Thank yous*.  There is another envelope from 5 years ago - still waiting for me to write a thank you. I am pretty sure I wrote a thank you to Christi - but maybe not. I also found an envelope addressed to Alan Blackman - and I remember doing several attempts on his and can't figure out if what I found was the one I intended to send or a reject. Should I send a second one with a note explaining how confused I am?

I'll take you through the whole process of finding what was enclosed in Christi's envelope because not only was the gift of the personalized stamps so cool - the process of things inside of things and little notes and tape was EXACTLY what happens to me when I send things. It made me appreciate why I am drawn to empty envelopes. The innards get too complicated.

These photos tell the whole story. I knew immediately that it was from Christi. I recognized her penmanship. Her blog is on my blog role - which is a very exclusive list.

In case you don't know where my blog roll is - here is link to her blog.
https://ewoandchristi.wordpress.com/

I flipped the envelope over and saw - yup - it's from Christi.

It was not difficult to slit the envelope - the orangish one - what do we call that kind of envelope? Online merchants call them *gold*. That doesn't seem quite right.

A manilla folder slid out and inside the manilla folder was the coolest sheet of personalized stamps. There was a note on the back of the stamps. You can see it peeking out on the bottom.

Above are the personalized stamps.

At some point - and I think it might have been a couple days later - I saw this note on the manilla folder. And I recall it taking me a while to figure out what it meant. Eventually, I realized that the white part of the envelope was a white envelope. It took a while to find a place to slit into it while preserving the whole package.

There was another letter inside that envelope.
Below is a shot of the stamps exiting the outer envelope. As you can see, there is one stamp missing. I finally realized that she had used one of my stamps. When it first arrived, I didn't even notice that stamp on the front. I did notice her return stamp which is her own version of the design. She wrote that the company that will print original stamps refused to print these for her (back when she came up with the idea) because they look too much like real stamps. I'm not surprised. If I had time, I would research what the fine is for printing your own stamps to substitute for real stamps. I bet it is hefty.

And here is a close up of the pristine front of the envelope - sans cancels. Thanks again P.O.
And thank you Christi.

So - readers are probably wondering how can I possibly bring myself to use these. I'll keep you *posted* on the blog. I'm sure it will take a while to part with any of them. The hardest part will be making my envelope worthy of one. 

Wow. I just noticed that the color of the envelope is really close to the color of the walls in my *studio.* I hesitate to call it a studio since it is clearly a bedroom with a desk. The walls are saffron. That's the name on the can of paint.

That little blonde kid grew into a teenager and he bought the print. I framed it and thought his bedroom would look nice with the same color walls as the print. It is really hard to get colors just right in photos - but I think you can see how close the envelope is to saffron. So, now I have a name that I like for those envelopes. 

Next question. How did manilla folders get the name manilla?

The Manila hemp is derived from a species of banana originally from the Philippines, whose fibers are tough. The hemp is then used during the paper making process, similar to how Kraft paper uses wood pulp. So the mystery is solved,the manila envelope gets its name from the hemp in which it is made from.

Above: first random answer from the Google search.
Below: link to Wiki - with more info - all of which I found interesting. Also, all of which would bore people to death if they had to talk to me at a cocktail party. So, if anyone wants to know why I do not go to cocktail parties, or holiday brunches, that is the very valid reason - and here is the support information.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manila_folder

Did anyone else notice that in Wiki they have a photo of the manilla folder (see the one peeking out of the saffron envelope in the photo above?  Wiki also has a photo of a saffron envelope - which is the orangish one. So, I guess they are both manilla - even though *gold* seems to be the name you will find if you are going to order some online.

I'm so glad none of this bothers me in the slightest. That's the only up-side to having bigger earth-sized problems with no solutions.