One of my favorite things about the holiday season is receiving holiday cards from family and friends. It’s the one time of year where we race to the mailbox just to see the holiday cards that were just delivered. I know many of us stay in touch through social media but we still have friends who are off the grid. Sometimes the holiday card is the only opportunity we have to see their family and get an update on their year.
As much as I love receiving holiday cards, I love creating them too. Minted is my go to for creating our family holiday cards. If I’m really on the ball we’ll have our family photos taken in the summer or early fall so I can get my card ordered before Thanksgiving. It really makes things easier to check that box before the crunch of the holiday season is upon us. For tips on how to create a perfect family picture for your holiday card, read here.
I love that with Minted you can load a picture onto their website and then view it in different card layouts. I can easily see how the card will look and I can usually pick my favorite card design in just a few minutes. I might try a few different pictures but the “find it fast” feature really does save me time.
I know picking and creating cards is not so fun for everyone. If you fall in that category I noticed that this year they are offering a complementary service where you can text a photo to a Minted designer and they will text back five card designs for your photo. I don’t think it gets easier than that.
I’ve used Tiny Prints (now owned by Shutterfly) in the past as well. I think they also produce nice quality cards in a fun variety of designs. My favorite of the cards they offer are the ones where you can bleed a few different images together. There was one year when we just didn’t get a great picture of all of us together or even a great one of all of the kids together. When that happens, I love to use a collage card where the images bleed together so it isn’t as obvious that you just didn’t have a great group of photos. I did that for our card in 2013. We had some fun individual shots of the kids and we put them together in a collage. I like that while the images are individual shots, the card tells a story. This card by Shutterfly allows you do to something similar.
I’m super excited to create this year’s holiday card. We got the best collection of family photos we’ve ever taken. We used Tell Chronicles and our photographer, Julie Monticello, hit it out of the park. She and her sister Emily are super talented. Their niche is to photograph with a lot of negative (white) space. These images aren’t re-created to look off center with photo editing software — they shot the images like this in real time. I also love how they capture the light. They capture a lot of emotion in their work which is unbelievable considering how many things are going on behind the scenes with the kids running around being goof balls. Here’s a sneak peak.
Alright, time to get cracking on those cards. What’s your go to service for creating family holiday cards? Oh, and I want you to know, this post was not sponsored or paid for in any way. I simply love these businesses and wanted to share.
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