Can you believe that Christmas is only 60 days away?! I know it’s only October, but I feel once the calendar reaches November, time flies by with all the holiday to-dos and such. This year I am doing some advance planning to get a head start on my holiday to-do list—a key step is to design our family Christmas card well in advance.
I love to receive mail from friends and family, but it seems that “traditional mail” is quickly becoming a thing of the past. Because of that I have always enjoyed the tradition of sending and receiving Christmas cards during the holiday season. It makes getting mail a little more exciting each day! Growing up, my parents would play a game to guess who the Christmas card was from by giving little clues about the family that sent it. We usually played this game during dinner and as I got older I looked forward to playing along. 
This year is extra special since it is the first Christmas Jeff and I have spent together as a married couple, and I chose to highlight that in our Christmas card design. 
Early in September, my friends at Basic Invite generously asked if I would be interested to look through their Christmas cards and holiday greeting card selections and pick my favorite design to highlight. Honestly, it was a tough decision to pick just one since they have over 250 Christmas and holiday designs to choose from, and I loved so many of them. In the end, I decided on a two-sided card, not a “fold open” style, and to use a wedding-inspired theme since I wanted to use a picture from our wedding. Here were a few of my favorite designs:
I admit that I am somewhat technologically challenged, so if a program is too confusing I most likely won’t use it. But I found the Basic Invite platform incredibly easy to use to create the card I desired. First, I created a free account. Then, I went through and clicked “favorite” on all my potential card picks and uploaded the photo I wanted to use and tried it out on my potential card picks. See . . . it’s super easy!
Once I picked my favorite design I changed the color of the typography from white to a festive cranberry red—it is Christmas after all. This is my favorite part of using Basic Invite, having the freedom to customize the color of my designs to fit my personal preference and see my customization instantly in an online preview. Additionally, if you like a little sparkle in your cards, Basic Invite offers foil designs in gold, silver, and rose gold. Who doesn’t like a little glamour for the holidays? 
Once the front of the card was finished I turned it over. Basic Invite offers several design choices for the back of the card. These include: photos, photos with text, just text, or a “timeline” option which allows pictures to illustrate different times or events in a chronological order. I selected a collage design, highlighting some of my favorite wedding candids, including pictures of our pups, who were a cute part of our wedding.
With these finishing touches to the card design, I could pick out my own envelope color. I chose the simple white envelope since I love the combination of white and red colors. One bonus of the envelopes is that they are “peel and seal” so you never have to lick an icky envelope. That’s a win win! Plus, for the ultimate custom printing look, you can even choose to have Basic Invite address your envelopes for you! It’s free on all Christmas cards.
I can’t wait to spread a little holiday cheer to my friends and family with these lovely Christmas cards. For once my cards will be ready to send on December 1st. And you can too! Right now, Basic Invite is offering 30% off all Christmas and holiday cards with the coupon code: holi30. Let me know what designs you pick in the comments below. Happy creating!
Thank you to Basic Invite for kindly providing the cards for this post. All opinions and photography are my own. Thank you for supporting the brands that support this blog. 