OUR 2018 CHRISTMAS CARD
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Holiday cards! I live for these. Absolutely love them. Love designing them, writing them, getting them, decorating with them, seeing the changes in our family and friends’ families year after year, all of it.
But also, I want to recognize that many things about holiday cards can feel stressful. The photoshoot (if you choose to do one), getting everyone to look at a camera, dealing with the tantrums and emotions of toddlers and/or multiple children and babies, the picking of the photo, the design, the getting the updated addresses, the mailing. It can feel…overwhelming, to say the least, not to mention expensive. I get why people opt out. I have a few tricks up my sleeve to take as much stress out of the holiday card as possible. Here is how that went for us this year:
We traded a photoshoot with a friend (at their generous suggestion, not ours), who is an actual, real-life, full-time, professional photographer. (Thank you, Joe). How I feel about that is this: I tried so hard to return the favor, and good luck editing your batch.
We spent the morning on a ferry ride, and it was mostly just fun to hang out and catch up. We got photos as a bonus, but it did feel very non-stressed, not the point of that Saturday morning. We also happened to get great weather which is kind of like winning the lottery in the late fall in Seattle.
For the design, I went with Postable, who I’ve used before, when Trey was 6 months. (See that card here.) I absolutely love this company and think their concept is so brilliant. I use their (free) address book to keep my addresses up to date throughout the year, and when I need an updated contact I can press one button and it emails my contact for me, and they enter their contact info, saving me mulitple steps. Genius. You can also use their address book without using their cards - just as a way to keep yourself organized.
I picked my design, edited the card, and wrote a little something about our year on the back. That Christmas tree photo was taken at a local Christmas tree farm, and I followed the same formula I usually do to get the majority of our family photos, which goes like this: I bring my big camera and tripod, set the 10 second timer, and run for it. Free photoshoot! We got this in about 5 takes since the battery was dying and the boys were over it. But we got it. Done and done.
The feature I love the most about Postable is not only will they address your cards for you, but they have an option to send them out for you. This saves me hours, and I don’t have to lick a single envelope. Some people love the art of handwriting the addresses and writing a note, and I get that, so you can also choose to have them sent to yourself. But in this season of life, anything that saves me time around the holidays is a win for me.
Love love love these. Happy holidays!
Thank you to Postable for partnering with me on this post.
