Mrs. Grossman’s Sticker Club!!!

As a child of the 80s, I grew up with all sorts of cool stuff, but quite possibly the coolest of it all was stickers. Seriously, who doesn’t love a nice sticker? My sisters and I grew up with all kinds of neat stickers, but I think of the three of us, Krista was the truly serious collector. We still have some of the stickers and sticker books she worked on back then. I, personally, have a bunch of various duck stickers because, for about a year, Krista thought it was hilarious to sneak a duck into my belongings. Every time I saw her, she would try to sneak a sticker duck, toy duck, duck drawing, or anything else with a duck on it. It was amusing and annoying all at the same time… and so was Krista. Man, I miss her. But when I look around my workspace I get to see some of the duck stickers that she would slip in my bag or book or whatever I happened to have with me at the time. She even got me duck presents for holidays and my birthday. Sometimes I wouldn’t find them for a couple weeks and it would just drive her mad waiting for me to discover them.

So, as you may have guessed, this week’s serving of cute is in the form of stickers! And more specifically, the one and only Mrs. Grossman’s stickers. Sure, there were other brands, but Mrs. Grossman’s stickers were the coolest. I have thought of them often over the years… then I thought enough to google them and I came to find they are still very much in business. Working out of Petaluma, California, Mrs. Grossman’s still offers a variety of stickers, sticker books, and my new favorite thing, a sticker club! For just $12.95 a month you can get a whole slew of stickers and each month has a theme. So yes, I did sign up. It isn’t exactly in this 38-year-old’s budget, but I owed it to Krista… and I just really wanted some stickers in the mail.

I recently got my envelope for August and the theme is animals! So they included all sorts of animal stickers including cats, dogs, shiny sharks, sparkly dolphins, elephants, flamingos, alligators, koalas, various wildlife, and so on. I included a few photos of the sticker sheets I received so you can get an idea of just how many stickers they actually send. You get a lot of magic for your buck. Plus, in addition to stickers, they send a postcard each month with a new design; this month it was a bear in the jungle. The artwork is all based on the sticker style for which Mrs. Grossman’s is known so well. Plus there is another plus, each month they include a little gold envelope that includes a small sticker sheet from their archives. They are actually pretty old stickers in there and it is really cool to see the old stuff. Stickers are so full of magic and memories for me and this monthly sticker club is just perfect for all of that. I am sure, however, that there is a pretty good chance the kids of today would like it too. It is probably kinda sorta meant for them, in fact. I choose to ignore that and just embrace the geek and the child inside of me and allow myself to just get some joy out of having stickers in my life again. It is like bringing back a small piece of Krista into my life. I will never stop missing her, but it makes me happy to enjoy again something we once enjoyed together. Thank you Mrs. Grossman’s for still being around and being so wonderful. I look forward to my September mailing. And October. And November… and on and on.