The Ultimate Guide to Creating Family Christmas Cards
Family Christmas cards don’t need to become one more overwhelming holiday task. Here’s my simple system for choosing photos, ordering cards, finding a good deal, and mailing them on time.
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Ordering family Christmas cards sounds like one simple holiday task until you realize it involves choosing photos, finding a card design, tracking down everyone’s addresses, ordering everything and somehow getting 50 envelopes in the mail before Christmas.
It’s a lot of little decisions during a season when most of us already have enough on our lists.
After ordering family Christmas cards for years, I’ve learned to keep the process as simple as possible. We use photos we already love, keep our addresses organized from year to year and order early enough that I’m not stressing about shipping dates in December.
For the past three years, we’ve ordered our Christmas cards from Staples with great results. I’ll share why that’s become my go-to, along with a few other options, when I order our cards and the shortcuts that make getting them into the mail much easier.
Make Christmas Cards One Less Thing to Stress About
Easy Family Christmas Card Photo Ideas
You don’t need matching Christmas pajamas, a professional holiday photo shoot or a perfectly decorated tree to make a beautiful Christmas card.
Use a photo that actually feels like your family. Some of my favorite cards are the ones that capture a real moment from the year rather than a photo taken specifically for Christmas.
Photo Ideas for Your Christmas Cards
- Family Photos From Vacation
- A Favorite Family Photo From the Year
- Professional Family Photos
- Funny Outtakes From a Photo Session
- Individual Photos of Each Child
- A Candid Photo of the Kids With Your Pets
- Cozy Photo at Home
- A Photo From Picking Out the Christmas Tree
The silliest photos can make the BEST Christmas card photos! They share joy. 🙂
Planning to take new family photos for your Christmas cards? I have a few simple tricks for choosing family photo outfits without making everyone match, including the one person I always dress first to make coordinating the rest of the family much easier.
Christmas Card Ideas When You Don’t Have a Family Photo
If you cannot find a family photo that you love or getting everyone together at one time is near impossible, there are some creative ideas for you to do this year!
- Create a Year-in-Review Card – Choose a design with space for several little updates from your family’s year. Think vacations, new jobs, sports, school milestones, a new pet or one of those tiny family moments you know you’ll laugh about later. You don’t need a year filled with huge accomplishments to make this fun.
- Use a Family Drawing! Our neighbors sent their cards like this one year, and they were adorable. I immediately asked her who she used because they captured her family SO WELL.
Other Posts I Think You’ll Enjoy:
- How To Plan Christmas Breakfast The Easy Way
- The 20 Best Places to Buy Christmas Decorations
- How to Organize Your Gifts This Christmas!
- 5 Easy to Do Holiday Storage Organization Tips
When Should I Order Christmas Cards?
I would order your cards as early Mid-November to make sure they arrive with plenty of time for you to mail them out! You’ll likely find lots of Black Friday specials for print ordering and usually, that is plenty of time to mail out your cards.
If you are waiting for early December, be sure to plan to fill the envelope and mail the cards in one night! You’ll likely only have a few days between receiving them in the mail and wanting to send them out.
When Should I send out my Holiday Cards?
I aim to have ours in the mail by mid-December. If they go out a little later, I don’t stress about it. I’d rather send the family Christmas cards late than let missing an arbitrary deadline convince me not to send them at all.
Have you recently moved into a new home?
If so, you may want to send out your cards earlier than usual to give everyone plenty of time to update their address books before they mail their card to your old address (thankfully, USPS mail forwarding should cover any missed items!)…
Did you order your family Christmas cards pretty early?
If you had a Fall family photo session, you’re likely ahead of the game when it comes to ordering holiday cards! If you ordered your cards in Mid-November, wait until after Thanksgiving to send out your family Christmas cards.
Where I Order Our Family Christmas Cards
For the past three years, we’ve ordered our family Christmas cards from Staples, and we’ve had great results.
At this point, I appreciate having one less decision to make every Christmas. I can upload our family photo, choose a design I like, place the order, and move on to the next thing on my holiday list.
That’s really my biggest Christmas-card advice: once you find a process that works for your family, you don’t need to start from scratch every year.
I still compare the final cost and turnaround time before ordering, especially if there’s a seasonal promotion available, but Staples has become my first place to check when it’s time to order our cards.
Other Places to Order Family Christmas Cards
No matter where you order your holiday cards, look for promo codes to save even more money. If you’re worried about time, double-check shipping times. Make sure you have plenty of time for them to arrive and for your turnaround time to get them in the mail!
What to Have Ready Before You Order
Before you sit down to order your Christmas cards, take a few minutes to gather everything you need. It keeps a 20-minute task from turning into an entire evening of searching through photos and text messages.
Have these ready:
- Your Final Christmas Card Photo
- An Updated Mailing Address List
- Your Approximate Card Quantity
- Any Family Update or Message You Want Printed
- Your Return Address
- A Promo Code, if One is Available
I also order a few more cards than I think we’ll need. Someone always gets added to the list after I’ve placed the order, and I’d rather have a few extras than order another small batch.
The Christmas Card Shortcut That Saves Me Time Every Year
One of the best things I’ve done is keep our Christmas card mailing list in a spreadsheet.
Create columns for Name, Street Address, City, State and ZIP Code, then update the list throughout the year when someone moves.
When it’s time to send Christmas cards, use the spreadsheet to create mailing labels instead of handwriting every address. I use Avery labels and a mail merge, but the important part is having one master address list you can reuse every year.
It takes a little time to set up the first year. After that, Christmas cards become so much easier.
My tip: When you receive a Christmas card from someone with a new address, update your spreadsheet right then instead of hoping you’ll remember next November.
A Simple Christmas Tradition Worth Keeping
Family Christmas cards don’t need to be another complicated holiday project. Choose a photo you love, keep your address list organized, order early, and call it done.
For me, the best part is knowing those cards will end up on refrigerators, mantels, and kitchen counters of people we care about. That’s worth keeping the tradition going, even if the process isn’t perfectly Pinterest-worthy.
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