Our Holiday Card - 2024

I love to create holiday cards; especially for my own family. You can see my past holiday cards here.

I’m actually frustrated that my family hasn’t managed any professional photos since the end of 2020. But, I am hoping to remedy that in 2025. If anyone can recommend a photographer in Salt Lake City that is good at posing families, please let me know.

For us, 2024 revolved heavily around the sports my kids play; soccer, taekwondo, track & field, and cross country. My husband is an assistant coach on one kid’s soccer team. I have a black belt in taekwondo and often help train kids for tournaments or belt testing. I’m sometimes a hurdles coach for our track team and I do all of the social media for our track and cross country teams. I also take photos at soccer games, track and XC meets, taekwondo tournaments, and belt tests. Because of sports commitments, we didn’t even manage to squeeze in a family vacation this year. The trip to Missoula, Montana we took for a track meet didn’t count!

So yeah, my husband and I feel like all we did was work and drive kids to and from school and sports this year. I’m not resentful, we both feel that it’s important to stick with a team if you’ve committed to it. But, DAMN we’re tired.

It was only appropriate that our holiday card to reflect that sentiment. I had no shortage of photos of my kids in their respective sports, but alas, no photos of the four of us except for a selfie or two (at a sporting event no less!).

On the back, a brief rundown of what my kids were up to with their respective sports and photos of my husband and me doing what we felt like we did all year…. taxi driver, photographer, asst coach, and day job to pay for ALL the sports.

I’m really happy with how our cards turned out.

I had them printed at my local Office Depot on card stock. I ordered some really cheap kraft paper envelopes from Amazon (that I won’t order again because the adhesive didn’t work). I printed addresses using my old HP laster printer to make things easier.

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Kwanzaa, Yule, Saturnalia, Solstice, Festivus… whatever you celebrate to make winter feel less dreary.

2017 Holiday Cards

We're a week away from Thanksgiving and I have holiday cards on my mind already! Below are a handful of the customizable cards available in my Etsy shop or available as custom orders. I love trying out different textures and backgrounds. Some of my favorites end up surprising me, like that fun knitted sweater texture! 

I will be accepting orders for custom holiday cards through Friday, December 15th. After that my family will be traveling to spend our Winter Break in California. I can set up ANY of the files I create to be printed anywhere; whether you plan to print with a local print shop, VistaPrint, OvernightPrints, or even print on your home printer. Just let me know so I can set up the files correctly. If you'd like a design on the back of your holiday card, let me know. If you mention this blog post, I'll create a design for the back at NO extra charge!

Click on any of these photos to link to the listing on Etsy if it's available there. 

This was our holiday card a couple of years ago, and I still swoon a little bit over my boys so little and so cute in their matching PJs. We are doing Santa photos like this again (that's me in the Santa suit!), and again my boys want to wear matching PJs. This card is available in your choice of 4 chalkboard background colors. We can use which ever coordinates best with your family photo.

This is such a fun design with the polaroid photos on top of a faux wood background. Choose a layout with 4, 5, or 6 photos and customize the caption at the bottom of each one, or you can leave them blank. Also choose between a Merry Christmas or Happy Holidays greeting.

This is the holiday card we mailed to our friends and family last year. The selfie pose was my oldest son's idea and that's me in the Santa suit! I LOVE how it turned out. Choose from four different colors for the faux knitted background. 

I still love a faux chalkboard background, and a smiling face just makes it even better. Choose between four different color schemes.

This is my most popular design and I still love it. I will update the listing to show a couple of color options for the background and a couple of script font options too. 

I love this knitted sweater background! Showcase a handful of family photos and choose from 3 background colors.

This card features faux watercolor holly leaves and pine needles on background that has a faint wood grain. Showcases one family photo or I can do a collage of photos that fill the same space. 

This was such a fun design that I did for my sister and brother-in-law. The comic book theme works with 6 photos and all of the text is customizable. This one is only available as a custom order. Shoot me an email to talk about placing an order.

I love a watercolor background! This custom card can be done as a collage with four photos like pictured, or with just one square image of your family. Choose from four different background colors too.

If you love any one of the designs in my Etsy shop, but you'd like to make changes to the layout, colors, fonts, or create a completely custom holiday card for your family, please shoot me an email and we can talk pricing. 

Cheers!

Emily's Birth Announcement

I had a blast creating the invitations and printed items for my dear friend Cari's baby shower. I also had the privilege of creating a Sip n See invitation for Cari and her husband too. Creating a birth announcement for Miss E after she was born was a real treat.

Having gorgeous newborn photos made it all that much more fun. Newborn photography by Infiniti Foto.

I loved filling in all of the stats and features for little Miss M.

For the back I created this photo collage, inspired by one I saw on Minted.com to showcase all of the great photos. I love how it turned out!!

Welcome to the world Emily!! 

Jake's 1st Birthday

I was honored to get to design wedding invitations for Kelly and Patrick a few years ago, so it was a real treat to get to design birthday invitations for their youngest son for his first birthday. They wanted to go with a sports theme that had a little bit of a vintage feel. Kelly was finding lots of invitations she loved, but most of them only showed one sport rather than a variety and many weren't done in a style she loved. 

Here's the invitation:

I love that huge smile!!

For the party, we made a faux chalkboard that contained all of his favorite things, books, foods, toys along with his one-year stats. I love doing these!

A rookie card long with a few toys and yummies filled goodie bags and they were tied with these favor tags. 

Here's a closer look at Jake's rookie card:

Lastly, with a bunch of the photos taken at Jake's birthday party, we created a two-sided thank you card that included a space for Kelly and Patrick to write their message. 

Wishing you a very happy birthday Jake!!

M's Birth Announcement

I've been lucky to be able to design a lot of fun items for this family, one of my favorite families. From their wedding to the birth announcement and birthday invitations of their oldest baby and now the announcement for their daughter!! 

All of the names have been changed to protect privacy.

For the back, I made a photo collage similar to one I saw on Minted.com a while back. I loved the diagonal lines for everything. It made for a much more dynamic collage.

A heartfelt congratulations to this beautiful family!!