life, love & laundry
Holiday cards (with an offer)
The color scheme I chose for the kids’ Christmas pictures this year was not traditional. At all. It ended up being brown/gold and purple and green. I know, right? After years of doing white and black and red I just wanted something different. I don’t always have an eye for color and it wasn’t really planned but I think it turned out ok. I noticed our neighborhood christmas trees are decorated in this same color scheme this year. Maybe I’m trendy? That would be a first!
In the past I’ve always created cards through Costco because they are ridiculously cheap and fast. I’ll probably do that for the vast majority of our cards again this year but did you know you can upload your own custom card template through Costco too? Also I had a few other ideas for a fancier card this year for my family. I wanted something with LOTS of pictures both inside and out but none of the online services really offered that so I’m making my own. I’m still narrowing down labs so if anyone has anything to say about Millers vs MpixPro vs WHCC please let me know.
Anyway I’ve never made my own card template before. I covet the cards at TinyPrints and Minted but I just could not handle the idea of paying all that money. I started looking around for a template on Etsy – which is a great place to buy templates – and found some great ones online but even spending $15 or $20 for a template I could easily make myself made me stomach turn.
So I did what I always do and I wasted way too much time making my own inspired by a few different cards I found online. So now I’ll have custom cards this year for the first time ever!
I’m seriously thinking of possibly creating these templates to sell on Etsy or online. Not for this Christmas, as I don’t have time to mock up cards like I’d want to. But maybe next year or maybe for birth announcements, etc. They are soooo fun to make. And the idea of people paying 3x as much for their holiday cards as they need to makes me angry. We’re in a recession people!
So that said…here’s my offer for you: If you see something you love online and want me to create it for you to use with a lab and skip the crazy ordering? Drop me a line! I’ll make cards for the first 4 people who contact me, for nothin’! You’ll have to pay for lab printing fees of course but it will be WAY cheaper than ordering from somewhere like Tiny Prints!
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Ok, we’re on it!! This would be my first choice: http://focused.whcc.com/store/new-holiday-2009/knapp-scraps-christmas-2009-4×5-5-flat.html
And this would be a close second choice:
http://focused.whcc.com/store/new-holiday-2009/knapp-scraps-holidays-2009-5×7-vertical-christmas.html
We bought our template last year for way too much ($25 I think), then had to borrow a friend’s pirated Photoshop, which neither of us knows our way around. We probably spent 10 hours making that damn card. WHCC is who we always use to print our stuff and they are AWESOME. They also have sales really often.
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First – love that picture of the bee and flower. Totally a frameable picture, IMHO.
Second, I envy your ability to see something and then go make your own version, especially with picture software. I get so overwhelmed doing stuff like that.
Third… totally might take you up on your offer, but I’d want to pay you because that is a totally marketable skill and I’m all about people being rewarded for using their talents! :-) But um, I’m nowhere close to having a Christmas picture (or pictures) to use so um… I’ll get back to you on that?
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mine are done otherwise I totally would do it.
I ordered in August from tinyprints last year section. I usually order through our photographer which is 3x tiny prints so it seemed like I got a deal.
can’t wait to see your cards!!!
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Yes!! I would love to have you design something!!! I haven’t attempted photos yet, however, as my son is away at school but will be home for Thanksgiving… so let me know if that is too late… or maybe you just want me to pick the design and then add the picture later?
Thank you! How fun!
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You are so generous! We already have ours so skip me. BUT you should absolutely sell your templates on etsy. I think you should make cards / prints from your photos and sell them there, too. They are beautiful. Postcards!
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So… I see that there are four ahead of me but… can’t figure out if they want to take you up on the offer. I know I do! : ) As a single mom… who is a teacher in a district that has frozen our salary increase this year… I’d love any help I can get financially! I love all your work. From dresses to writing to photography.
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Am I too late????
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PS: I think you should charge for this and would be happy to pay you for customizing a holiday card for us. Have you even seen what sites charge for their “card sets”?! $150 for a year’s worth of holiday templates. That’s obviously insane, especially since most people don’t do Valentine’s day family photos, etc., but you could create custom sets for people (based on the holidays they like to have cards for – fall / Christmas / St. Patty’s Day / 4th of July / etc.) and charge reasonable fees and do really well!! You could bundle it so people can choose 4 per year for $60-100 or something, which I would pay if it could be something where we sent you our photos and you inserted them into your templates to customize our cards. It’s a thought anyway.
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