Tips for creating the perfect holiday card with Minted

Thanks to Minted for collaborating on this post. I received credit towards my holiday card order in exchange for this review. Affiliate links are used in this post. All opinions and fun photos of my family are my own.

Christmas cards are one of my favorite things this time of year. I love checking the mail and seeing all of my family members and friends faces. We’ve been sending personalized cards every year since we were married 10 years ago. At some point I should do a recap of our Christmas cards through the years because I think it would be fun to see just how we’ve changed over the years. We’ve ordered our cards through a few different companies over the years, and I’ve abandoned some companies (because you get what you pay for, and I don’t want a poor quality holiday card.) This year we went with Minted and I’m so pleased with the results!

I send personalized cards because I feel like it’s a great way to keep our family and friends updated – at least updated on the size of our family. The first year we sent cards with our wedding photos (because if you’re going to send a card with your wedding picture on it, it’s probably most acceptable the year you were married.) The second year we added a photo of Chloe to the mix. I used to dress her in costume and the year we had our son, I even dressed him as Santa and Chloe was Mrs. Paws. I’m still in a little disbelief that I did that to them, but it was for a good cause. 

Since having children, I have wanted to send cards of a greater quality in case family wanted to hold onto the photos. I am not great at sending updated pictures to family members – except this one time of year. And last year I sent our daughter’s birth announcements around the time our Christmas cards were mailed – you know, when she was 7 or 8 months old. Last year’s cards included just my kids (a really adorable picture of my kids, but really it was just the two of them.) This year I was ready to make up for the lack of parents. 

My tips for getting a great card: 

• Schedule lifestyle photos with a professional photographer. My friend Lindsay has been taking our family pictures for several years, but we skipped last year. This year I wanted to be sure we had a picture of our little family and we spent some time together last month. She got some great pictures – including my son winking in 90% of the pictures. 
• Embrace your child’s quirks. My son is going through a winking and thumbs-up phase. I could have been annoyed that all of my photos have a thumbs up or winking child, but I’m laughing it off and happy to document this stage. 
• Start early with the photo process. It can take your photographer time to get the photos back to you! We scheduled our photos over the summer and I had to change the date at least once. 
• Upload your images to Minted and preview cards with your photo, not a stock image. (This is a real thing! And it’s so easy!) 
• Compare your favorite cards before finally selecting the best one for this year. 
• Try not to second guess your decision – because I’m second-guessing myself a bit for not getting the foiled cards. 

(This was the other card I was working with. And I could have done a different background color if I’d wanted to.)

With Minted, you have so many designs to choose from, the gorgeous foil option is available on a lot of the designs, and you can get someone to proofread your card (smart) or save a few dollars, proof the card yourself and get the cards shipped a little bit sooner (which is what I ended up doing.) 

There are other amazing options as well. Upload your address list and they’ll address the envelopes for you. For. Free. I still use an address book that I’ve been carrying around for 8 years, so I didn’t go the pre-addressed route, but that option would have been a game changer. 

Also I was able to save my designs long before I finally decided on a design. I created multiple versions and then I decided on the Brightest Spirits design, which I love (I really, really love how the blue goes with our outfits. I couldn’t have planned this any better.) 

I had my cards back within a week of ordering, and I’m hoping to send them before the end of this week. This is the year I become an overachiever and have Christmas cards in mailboxes before the first of December. 

Sale! Get up to 20% off holiday cards as part of Minted’s Black Friday sale with code BF2017 – and get your cards done early!

Do you make photo cards to send out each year?