How many status updates have I seen on Facebook this week where people have said “oh god I have just spent hours writing cards and I am not even half way through” or “I have cramp” or “I am so bored with writing cards now”. I will tell you how many. A lot. Writing Christmas cards really doesn’t have to be a massive chore, all you need is a bit of a planning and you can have it done in no time.
Know the last posting dates
There is nothing worse than sitting down to write that distant aunt in Australia, penning out everything that has happened over the year, and then realising the card now wont arrive until the new year. You can find the last posting dates for all corners of the globe on the post office website. For first class in the UK this year it is December 21st, and for second class it is December 20th. Sadly you have missed it for Australia and the USA now, but I am sure the distant aunt will still love to hear from you
Buy all your stamps in advance
Don’t make a special journey to the post office just to buy stamps. You will stand in a queue for hours. Buy them when you do your food shopping and keep them all handy. If you find yourself in the post office in October though there is no reason why you couldn’t buy those that you need for overseas then though. Just remember where your “safe place” is that you then store them until you write your cards!
Pick a time to write them
Don’t try and do them in dribs and drabs, it is much easier to sit down and say “right I am doing them all now” and get them done in one bash. That way you can almost set up a production line at the kitchen table.
Get everything you need in one place
Get all the cards, pens, stamps, address book in one place and then you won’t have to keep getting up to find things. Put on some cheesy Christmas music or a Christmas film to get you in the mood too. If you find that your address book is out of date or you can’t find an address for somebody then a handy website to look them up is White Pages Address finder. All you need is their surname and the town they live in and you can look them up in minutes. Maybe you could have one person doing this whilst you start writing the cards.
Have fun
is the most important tip! Nobody wants to receive a card because they thought you were writing it out of duty, they want to receive it because you wanted to write it. Writing Christmas cards is a dying art so receiving cards is now getting rarer and rarer and therefore feels a bit more special. You can make it even more special by maybe adding a bit of glitter into the envelope or writing a daft message in the card, not just signing it.
It is the season to be silly after all!