Before the Holidaze Begin, the Holiday Letter is Done!
It’s really not my fault, even though it does seem hypocritical of me. I mean, how can someone who grumbles about the “Happy Hallow-thanks-ismas” season that morphs and spreads through all the retail stores as soon as they take down the Back To School signs be done with her Holiday Letters? (Photo credit: The Casual Perfectionist.)
Yes, it’s true.
I stamped, sealed and addressed the last ones on Halloween.
Now, that’s scary.
But, like I said, it’s not my fault. If I don’t do them now, I’ll be rushing to get them done amidst traveling, guests, anniversary celebrations, holiday parties, more traveling, birthday shindigs, and more guests. (Have I mentioned all the parties, traveling, and guests?)
So, I do them early. This year, I have them done a little bit earlier than normal, because of our overactive travel schedule, but I’ll still mail them out on December 1st. I’ve always tried to get a December 1st postmark on my Holiday Cards. It’s my own little “Welcome to December!” party in my head.
The only year I missed the December 1st deadline by a few days was when I was in the hospital having Claire. But, that’s the year we cheated and had our Very First Family of Three Photo taken in the hospital, and then we used that photo on a Birth Announcement/Holiday Card. Two proverbial partridges got knocked out of the pear tree by the same stone that year.
Every year I pick a different theme or style of Holiday Letter and Photo. This year, I used Photoshop to put together a photo collage of our adventures, and I had them printed as a 4×6 photo. I found specialty envelopes at a local office supply store that fit the size of photo and letter we used, and leisurely cut, folded, stamped and addressed them, well before the holidaze started.
But, don’t you have a blog? Aren’t you on Facebook? Haven’t you embraced most things technological? Why do you still send a snail mail Holiday Photo Card and Letter?
Because I want to! Turnabout is fair play, and I love getting Holiday Cards, Letters, and Photos, and we get a ton. It may be old-school, but it’s a tradition that I’m holding on to as tightly as I can.
Plus, I only pretend to share everything online. Some things, like complete family photos, never show up in my blog and rarely does my husband appear in photos on Facebook. (Don’t worry. His team of lawyers were familiar with the Holiday Photo Clause and granted me special, though limited permission.)
And, I know this will be hard to believe, but there are some people on our Holiday Card List that don’t read the blog and are not on Facebook. I was curious, so I decided to take time out from bragging about being done with my Holiday Letter and actually count those people. I always send 100 cards, so the math was pretty easy. The result? 79% of the people on our Holiday List do not live their lives online.
That’s a lot, and certainly enough for me to justify keeping this little tradition alive.
What about you? Do you send a Holiday Letter?
I send out a photo card and a holiday letter because most all of my family and friends don’t read my blog, are not on twitter and I refuse to be friends with my family on FB.
I’m getting fewer and fewer letters and that makes me sad.
Yay! Another Holiday Letterer! I haven’t really noticed a downturn in the ones I’m receiving yet. We’ll see what happens this year.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by JoAnn Rasmussen, JoAnn Rasmussen. JoAnn Rasmussen said: Do you do a Holiday Letter? Check out my @milehighmamas post & share your thoughts! http://ow.ly/3bfnF [...]
I do a newsletter that’s all photos with captions of the highlights from our past year. I find I don’t always take the time to read holiday letters, shameful I know. So, the hope is that others might find our snapshots a little easier to digest!
Good for you for being so organized, JoAnn! Half my battle is always putting together our mailing list – I never know how many cards we’ll send out each year!
I love a good mix of letter and photos. I keep it pretty short and sweet, usually. This year, it’s just a half page. The year I did a poem, which was clever, but not as “newsy,” I got reprimanded by the traditionalists on my list, saying they wanted to know what was going on with us!
I keep a master list of the addresses. I’ve changed my computer system so many times over the years, that it helps to have a hard copy just in case things get lost in the shuffle. I can also physically check off where I am in the list so that I can address them little bunches at a time without going completely mad.
Have fun putting yours together this year, Chris!
JoAnn – I love your letters by the way, so keep ‘em coming! We haven’t done one the last couple of years, not for not wanting to or technology (as you know I’m a new one to FB and haven’t yet embraced Twitter), but because of time and er, money. Time is probably the biggest factor with four kids, because if I was more on top of it then I would do them early enough when we have money. But as we are self-employed when we hit winter things tend to fall off with our business. So… my goal is to do one this year and maybe, just maybe after I finish my Masters in a few weeks then we will get one done if we’ve got a way to pay for them! Let’s keep our fingers crossed!
Okay, JoAnn, you make me ill… haaa. I think it’s great that you’re done and that you’re diligent. We actually celebrate Diwali and I try to send out Diwali cards. This year I have failed failed failed. Maybe I’ll be caught up by next Diwali (November 2011).