Collect-a-Books from The Collector!

My blog has been overrun lately with my Ultimate Allen & Ginter Mini Set Bracket (which finally concluded yesterday).  As such, I've found myself way behind on posting trade packages but I'm going to work hard to get caught back up over the next couple of weeks.

For today, I'm being a bit lazy and starting with one of the easier packages to show off since it's a small PWE courtesy of Chris over at The Collector.

Chris held a little giveaway (actually it was a fairly large giveaway) but there was one card in particular that caught my eye.  I simply had to request it since I do collect Ken Griffey, Jr. as another one of my PC guys.

That's a lovely little Collect-a-Books card from 1990.  I remember seeing some of those Collect-a-Books that some of my friends owned back when we were all kids but I don't think I ever actually owned any for myself.  Thus, this Griffey book makes for a nice addition to my collection!  

It's funny what one can remember from a random childhood object...  For me, as soon as I saw Chris offer up the Collect-a-Book I had vivid images in my head of cartoons within the book.  

I was sort of right, the cartoon was actually at the end of the book but I'll still count that as a "win" for my memory!  Not bad for a guy getting closer and closer to 40 years old, right?!

I only asked for the Griffey card but Chris padded out the PWE with two more cards.  The first was this well-loved Pete Rose card from the 1987 Topps set.  

I think I'm going to set this particular card aside for a few years and then give it to my son.  My first ever baseball card was a 1987 Reds' Team Leaders card so I'd kind of like to continue that tradition for my little guy!

The third and final card in the envelope was a "bonus" Collect-a-Books card.

That's Joe Dumars...some guy that I can honestly say that I've never heard of.  I don't follow professional basketball at all but I did enjoy looking through the Collect-a-Book at least!  

I do think I'll probably include the Dumars in a future Trade Stack post - it simply doesn't fit within my collection though I do like the Collect-a-Book concept.  Maybe someday one of the current card companies will bring a similar concept back to life, preferably in an affordable set ala Collector's Choice or Topps Total in the past (maybe Big League?).

Many thanks to Chris for the awesome addition to my Ken Griffey, Jr. collection (plus the bonus cards).  As for anyone else, I'm always willing to trade and soon I'll be cleared out of my backlog of trade packages and I'll need new things to show off on the blog!  Check out my want list and make an offer if you want!