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Next week, The Royal Mail will be issuing a new set of stamps. Titled “Magical Realms“, the stamps feature various characters from myths and myth-like stories including the Narnia stories of CS Lewis, JK Rowling’s Harry Potter series and the Discworld of Sir Terry Pratchett.

First class stamps feature Dumbledore and Voldemort from the Harry Potter series and Rincewind and Nanny Ogg from the Discworld series. Stamps for overseas depict Merlin and Morgana le Fay from Arthurian legend and also Aslan and the White Witch from the Narnia series.

I love the Aslan stamp! Postcards with these images are also being released and can be ordered here.

Today sees a special set of stamps issued in the UK, part of a European wide project to issue stamps featuring children’s books throughout 2010. The UK contribution takes images of Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne and uses them on stamps, which although unfortunately not available at most post offices (crazy, heh?), you can order online.

To see the contributions from the postal services elsewhere in Europe, take a look here. I particularly like the stamps issues in Gibraltar with the illustrations from Quentin Blake.

This year also sees the 70th anniversary of Puffin Books. Puffin Books is the children’s imprint of British publishers Penguin Books, which since the 1960s has been the largest publisher of children’s books in the UK. As part of the celebrations a box of 100 postcards featuring front covers from Puffin Books has been published and I just couldn’t resist treating myself to a set.

Now the fun bit – if you’d like to receive a Puffin postcard with a Pooh stamp from me email me your postal address – I’ll send out cards to the first 10 people (anywhere in the world) who contact me via email. If you’ve a particular favourite children’s book which was published by Puffin let me know – if I’ve got the postcard of its cover that’s the one I’ll send to you!

Spurred on by the International Postcard Swap for Families that we’re hosting here on Playing by the book, I thought I’d bring together a list of picture books which features sending and/or receiving post/mail, or writing letters. With the help of the generous community who make up the Child Lit email group at Rutgers I’ve come up with 99 books which in some way feature letters, cards or parcels.

Such a list would be rather unwieldy on a blog post so I’ve made it available on Amazon, split into 4 parts. Click on the links below to take you to the list:

As for some play…

And some music…

What’s your favourite song about post / letters? And your favourite kids’ book which features mail?

Several weeks ago I read a lovely post about collecting postcards at an Australian blog called Adventures with Kids. This got me thinking about a postcard swap for M and J – they both love making cards and receiving post – but when I searched online for one I couldn’t find any open internationally specifically for families. Not one to give in easily I thought I would set up my own… but of course before I could do that I wanted to find some lovely books to share with my girls, and with you, about writing, sending and receiving post.

Photo: Post Box

The Giant Hug by Sandra Horning, illustrated by Valeri Gorbachev is a heart warming, funny and informative book about the joys of sending and receiving mail. When Owen is asked what he wants to send his Granny for her birthday he is determined to send her a giant hug. Not a picture of a hug, but the real thing.

At the post office the clerk is rather surprised at this request but plays game. “We don’t normally send hugs, but I suppose we could give it a try.” And so starts the journey of Owen’s hug – passed from person to person involved in sorting and delivering the mail right across the country, sometimes accompanied by laughter, bristles, blushing and delight. Granny is thrilled when her giant hug is finally delivered right into her arms, and we’re all left laughing when we discover what she sends back to her much loved Grandson.

We all loved this story. M’s interest was immediately captured because the illustrations reminded her of Richard Scarry – and not just because they depict cute animals doing all sorts of human jobs. The generosity and willingness of all participants to play their part in spreading the happiness was lovely to see – I’d love my kids to live in such a community. As well as providing us with many good giggles, it also gave us the opportunity to discuss how post actually gets from A to B, and M found it intriguing to think of all the different people and places that would see her next card she puts in the post. J loved the book because of all the cuddles and hugs we had as we read it! All in all a perfect book about how you can post a little bit of love to friends and family wherever they are.

The Giant Hug: ** (2 stars)

In response to this delightful story J and I illustrated some postcards of our own in anticipation of mailing them to some of you in what I hope w