DIY Christmas part 2

I love getting Christmas cards in the mail. Photo Christmas cards are my ultimate faves and of course, anything handmade makes me squeal in excitement. So I decided that as long as I can muster up the energy, I will be hand making our cards each year. So far so good. Next year, with a 9 month old? Not so sure it will happen. But for now it’s one of my favorite projects each year.

In 2007, the year of our wedding, I had to use a wedding picture. What newlywed couple wouldn’t love to showcase a photo to family and friends once more? If you are a newlywed I say go for it….even if you think everyone is sick of seeing your wedding pictures, they probably aren’t:)

So I picked one black and white picture, then chose a bunch of fun Christmas printed paper and went to town:

The whole process goes something like this: get neutral colored paper for the background, cut a ton of basic cards from this paper, then cut even more printed paper to fit on top. Then you’ll need to print off your text onto regular paper, print your photos, and glue it all together. Yes, it does take time but it’s so worth it! I always use at least one Christmas stamp somewhere on my designs, usually on a bright red envelope, because I adore rubber stamps:) This was my pick for 2007:

When 2008 rolled around, I knew I liked my general process of printed papers on top of neutral ones, combined with a photo. Here are all of my papers pre-cutting:

And here is the final 2008 project: this year I used a little more digital scrapbooking supplies with my frame around our picture. I also used two different papers for the front of the card. Oh, and for both 2007 and 2008 I hand wrote little messages inside the cards to each family. THAT didn’t take long at all for our 75 addresses….yeah right!

For this year, I decided to use multiple pictures and forgo the handwritten note inside the card. Here are the pictures I chose and again, I used more digital scrapping supplies for my frames and typed up the text directly onto the image this year:

I stuck with one print on the outside of the card, then when you open it up you see the larger two-in-one picture on the inside. All I have to do now is stuff the cards in envelopes and address/stamp them all. I need to get on it!

My best piece of advice if you are going to DIY for Christmas Cards? Keep it fun. I could not handle staring at the same print over and over 75 times while I fold, cut, paste, etc. So I always use a variety of printed papers to keep things entertaining for me. I also roped Nate into the fun this year and had him help me cut the papers and even glue a few pictures down! Team work is totally awesome, btw.

Does anyone else love making Christmas cards as much as me? Any tips I’m missing?