Collectoins Galore

Our collections, or things we like to collect, are the topic on this week's Show Us Your Life over at Kelly's Korner.  I have a lot of odd collections, some more extensive than others, some I inherited, and some that are just weird. Here are my three favorites.

When I was 15 my Papa gave me his beloved coin collection.  He was an amateur numismatist and it was always something that we liked to do together.  I would ask questions about each one and he would tell me the story behind it and how he came to be it's owner. It's my most valuable collection, but it's also my most sentimental.  

When my Papa was first diagnosed with Alzheimer's Disease my family decided not to tell me right away.  So one day when I was at their house he called me into his office and said he had something for me.  Then he went his safe and got out his coins.  He told me he wanted to give it to me now so that he could always remember the look on my face when he said it was mine.  I didn't really understand why he needed to remember me, because I wasn't going anywhere, but I was so excited that he wanted me to have his pride and joy and I didn't give much thought to the reason behind it.  A few months later when I found out about his diagnosis, I realized the significance of his gift to me.  I can't take any pictures of it though because I have it in a safe deposit box. 

Next up is my oddball one. I love pigs!  I wanted a pot belly pig so badly and instead of an actual Babe of a pig, my parents gave me my first pig collectible. Then it became some kind of running joke with people and then everyone started giving me pigs.

I got the pig on the right at the market in Peru when I was there doing a mission trip with my youth group.  She's my favorite out of all my pigs, although I'm secretly worried she's painted with lead paint, haha.

I try to put my pigs in different places throughout the house, because there's something a little weird about a 28 year old with a bunch of pigs sitting all together staring at you! (I have many more, but I think you get the picture.)

My final collection is that of stamps.  Yes, I said it, stamps.  Although I haven't really seriously collected them in years, they were my first endeavor into the world of "collecting."  We moved to Minnesota when I was in the second grade; I didn't know anyone and for the first few months it was a little lonely.  My Grandma, my Dad's mom, sent me his old stamp collection in the mail and told me to start adding to it.  I took this job very seriously and I went about finding "neat" and "cool" stamps to add to my Dad's very antiquated 1960's collection.  As it happened, one of the first friends I made also liked stamps, and we would hunt new ones down and trade them with each other.  I wrote letters to all my family members that I wanted them to send me "awesome" stamps in the mail.  Since we were thousands of miles away from everyone, I guess they were missing me a lot, because they were always sending me stamps.

Every night my Dad and I would work on our book, making sure everything was laid out properly and in order.  It was something that I really loved doing with him and I have so many great memories of us hunting down new and old stamps.  When his fellowship at the Mayo Clinic was over we moved back to Virginia and I lost my stamp trading buddy.  I kinda kept my new hobby a secret from most of my old friends because I didn't want them to make fun of me- but I still kept working on it.  The older I got the less time I spent on stamps and eventually it slowed to an almost halt.  My dad keeps "our collection" at his house and every now and then we'll pull it out and look at our handy work. And occasionally we'll add new stamps that we've found- I try to add at least one new set a year and any other ones that I think are "pretty." I love that collection because of all the great memories it brings back to me.  Here is my favorite set, it's from 1990.

This is not my actual set, but I couldn't take a picture of mine because it's archived.

And those are my biggest collections.  I also have smaller ones of fleur-de-lis', antique Bibles, and depression glass. What are your collections?