The Plan

Let me make some suggestions, if I may.

Don't use secondhand stock pages, mounts of stock books. $100 will get you a nice range of brand new material to allow the expansion of your collection. While they are not the cheapest option, stock pages (Hagner or similar) offer the greatest flexibility.

Join a stamp club. You will find collectors of all experience and I have never encountered a long term collector who didn't have time to assist a newbie (even if they didn't know what a newbie was). The same applies to finding a street front stamp dealer. They are wealth of knowledge and while it is undoubtably cheaper and easier to hop onto the computer and get what you need, your street dealer (I need a better expression than that!) needs your custom.

If people give you something or go out of their way to assist, put them on your Christmas card lost (or whatever your faith permits).

I'd be wary of printed perf guages. The ink will stain if wet, you will just be prining on normal paper and this can stretch or distort. I have used the Stanley Gibbons Instanta for years and swear by it. I have a spare I can post to you if you want to send your postal address by PM.

Now here's an idea to set a collecting challenge that won't be easy but won't cost the earth, see how many stamps you can get postmarked in your home town.

Research is the key. J R W Purves, one of the greatest Australian Philatelists (he was so much more than a collector), would research a new area of interest for a year or more before he started to acquire material for his collection.

5 year old catalogues can give you a great deal of information very cheaply and show relative prices (some rarer material has sky rocketed in this period) can be determined.

But most of all, have fun. Collecting is not about spending buckets of money but spend a little at the start to equip yourself with good storage (stockbooks, pages and mounts), tongs, perf guage and this will set you up for a lifetime of fun.

Enjoy!

a ton of information and I am greatful for any and all of it! I am here to learn not to argue (though I do tend to point out various angles LOL) let me repond a section at a time if I may....


i am at this time using printed pages and as money and time permits will be looking in to album sets (new) for the total US collection the others will be custom as they are topical (though a few online ones have fit) so I am working on that....

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i am actively looking for a local club to no avail so far but the search continues and if I can not find one I may advertise and start one LOL as for on line I agree face to face is often the best bet and a good dealer is some one you come to trust which often means more than the actual product at times..

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faith is a topic for another time and place but let me say that I can not agree more with taking care of those who take care of you.. and at times take care of others just because andif you get a return great if not you still get the satisfaction of being human

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i have noted this issue and will be talking to you via PM about this ...

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research is often over looked (by myself included) and I agree up to a point... I am not that patient.. a flaw I know but one that I have learned how to deal with LOL as for local I am staying in country ( not local I know) local would be hard for a number of reasons I rather not attempt to elaborate on here.... but the thought is intriguing...



not with in 5 years but with in 10 and that is a great start since my main focus is 1975 and up right now until I get ready for the big US one .. this will still help in collecting the older ones and that is daunting enough....
and finally

this is the main function of any interest!! thank you so much for your words and thoughts..... this has helped me a lot more than it appears...

this thread has taken some wonderful direction! so to mildly get back to the journal aspect I forgot to write about last evening.. I have now saved about 6-8 of the post cards based on good advice here.. I have soaked the rest of them and now have a ton of stamps dry and currently being pressed right now... as a side note I have looked for much advice on drying the stamps after soaking and thought I would try something not often written about.. I took a pack of $1 sponges (about 10 ) and I use them to lay the stamps on face down to dry. if they have a lot of water on them I use a second one to gently press them for a few moments and this seems to work very well. the typical sponge can hold about 10 stamps face down on a sponge they tend to curl less, if for some unknown reason they stick a bit the sponge can be flexed to ease the removal of the stamp with no damage to it. I have found that this also makes for a very easy clean up with out leaving any residue on the table I use for sorting and soaking.

last night became a bit antsy with doing small batches as I have done with the ones I wanted to take special care of got those done and decided to attempt a lrge soak... so 100 stamps hit the water and I did a great job!! even took some pix (to post later on) and will show them off ...

got the family interest up and things are moving well.....

As to your last post, soaking 100+ stamps is a great timesaver, just be cautious about the paper that you soak. If you ever soak stamps off manila envelopes (i.e. clasp envelopes or the larger yellow envelopes that come in the mail from various businesses), some of the yellow color may soak off and discolor your stamps. Same thing with stamps on greeting cards that may be a bright color (i.e. Valentine's Day and Christmas cards with bright red or red/green envelopes are notorious for having the color bleed onto a soaked stamp.)

I always separate my stamps destined to be soaked off paper so that any clipped from yellow/manila envelopes or bright colored envelopes are separated before sokaing, so that I do not inadvertently discolor other stamps in the process. (Not too different from doing the laundry ... separating whites from colors.)

I know absolutely nothing (good or bad) about this organization, but since your profile suggests you are in Berkshire County, MA, the following link may be helpful as to an organized stamp club in your area of Massachusetts:

http://www.nefed.org/02_BerkshireStampClub.htm

you are the best!! I will report back after I get more info on them... as for soaking and removing colors I thought that may be an issue so remves all colored paper first.. see I thinkin! :)

ok so I recognized the email address and checked with my sent mail... I emailed that club in 4/21 and have not received any information back from them at this time I am going to give them another week and then investigate it in another manner (showing up at meeting time LOL) and see what happens... of the two other clubs I have attempted to contact one has not replied and the other is no longer meeting for unknown reasons according to the Berkshire Museum. the search continues LOL

ok so as I was fearing pix never happened turns out in all my wisdom and excitement I forgot to actually take the pix I thought I had LOL.... oh well all in time right? any way over the week end I hit ebay (horrible place if you have money in the paypal LOL) and won 4 lots and all of them for under $4 USD each LOL.. so I have about 700 stamps on the way and more work ahead...

that said after the soak and in between all of the holiday things this week end I also sorted a bunch of the stock I have and grouped like with like... this weeks main task is to decide what ones to keep and store them until I figure the "Main US" album. this is of course while taking the stamps for the other albums and mounting them..

need to make a few groups up for some very kind folks I know here and then perhaps sell some others off to finance the next few big purchases... the US album, a stock book or three LOL, and some better tongs.... so far things are really coming together....

just bought my first stock book!!! got it for a good deal on ebay and its on its way....

Bearwithfish,

As indicated previously, stamp collecting is is a ton of fun and a great tension reducer. Just remember, its a hobby, not an investment. In all probability, you'll never realise the $$$ you spent in building your collection. But, that wasn't the reason you started it.

but I have realized the investment..... perhaps not in a monetary way and I really done mind that... not at all when I look at all I have gained... these thoughts are further remarked upon in another thread you are reading LOL...

You knnow what I like about you, Bearwithfish (apart from your very cool name) is that your plans are like mine...they change...
I am currently on plan E5.56(b)subsection h
But at least its a Plan!

LOL I find that being flexible makes life a bit easier at times... it is the one great lesson I contiue to learn from my three daughters......

Mr. Launier the book arrived in good order and I am forever grateful!! I have much reading to do and research into the organizing of my book according to the information gleamed ... (this really helped a lot!)