A complete collection

So in my last blog post I was talking about collecting things. I was talking about collecting memories really more than anything last time - things that provided reminders of trips away and of things that I have done.

The collection that I am talking about today is a little bit different as it's something that can actually be completed.

I am not sure how many of you have collected things before, when you were a kid - I know I did. I tried to collect the full set of Tazos (I'm not even sure if that's how you spelt it!) and had the collectors book and everything for those. Do you remember them - I think they were out of crisp packets or something and were little cardboard disks basically with pictures on. I know that I never got anywhere near collecting them all though. With all of these collectable things there always seems to be some of the items that are "rare" and are really hard to get hold of. I think they were always shiny ones or something like that in the Tazos. Those that had a kind of glittery, sparkly picture on them.

Oooh - as I'm writing this I'm thinking of other things as well. They were almost the same as Tazos but around the same time there were also Pog's. I don't know if there was ever even a complete list anywhere of all of those. I'm sure there were millions of them. I don't even know if there was a collector book for them either.

So the collectable of the year, at least for me anyway, has been Lego cards. They are little cards, each with a picture of a different lego mini-figure on them. There are 140 in total and have been a big craze to try to get them all.

There is a collector book that you can put them all in - and I have to say that it is a lot more sensible than I remember them being in the past. I'm sure you used to have to stick in other collections like this - when the boys used to collect football cards and things, I'm sure that they were stickers that you had to peel back and stick into the book. This book is really good - it has little slits in the corners where you are supposed to put the cards in so all you have to do is to slot the corners through the holes to keep them in. They can then also be easily removed then if you ever wanted and it doesn't detract in any way from the collection if you stick them in a bit wonky or anything.

The other thing that I love about this collection, is that it essentially is FREE to collect the cards! This is really good for me and my husband - I know it would be really difficult to restrain ourselves from buying more and more packets if we were close to completing our collection. I can't imagine how bad this kind of thing would be if you had kids collecting.

We were very lucky in that Adam's Aunty Sarah actually works for Sainsbury's and was able to get the book for us (and a few cards!) to help us along the way to getting our set, but also we have a Sainsbury's very locally to us that we use fairly often so we have been able to get a lot of cards from doing our shopping there too.

We saved up a number of cards until we got the book and knew what we were aiming for so here is the first grand opening of the packets to start off the filling of our book

We ended up with a number of swaps as we were trying to collect the full set. There were a lot of packets that we got that had the same cards in as we already had got in our book.

This is when you end up starting what feels like a new language. Both me and my husband have been asking our mates (most of who have been collecting the cards for their kids I have to admit!) if they have any swaps for us. We would be sending messages such as "we need 23, 67, 129, 135 and 140, which do you need?" It's all complete gobildy gook really but I guess as long as we understand what we mean then that's all that matters.

It's been, I guess, a couple of months now since we started collecting these and I am pleased to say (probably a bit too pleased!) that we have now got a full set!

The book is looking considerably fatter than when we first got it!

We have quite a few spares as well from where we have opened packets and there were some in there that we already had. This isn't even all of them as we have given a lot away - one of my friends has just started collecting them (for her kid - or at least so she says) so I gave her one set of all of the ones that we had the other day.

I know it is pretty ridiculous but I have got a big sense of accomplishment from completing a collection.

Can you all let me know what you collect? Have you ever got a complete set of anything? Or are you collecting something where there will never be an end to it?