This year and every year going forward.
The holidays are coming and you can sense
that your credit cards are taking a deep breath in expectation of all the debt
that is going to be put on them. How do I know that the holidays are coming,
the stores are starting to expand their Christmas products (that have been in
store since August) out over the whole store. This is the time to start to plan
your holidays, what gifts to buy and for whom, how many Christmas cards you
will need and who you will be sending them too, checking the list twice to make
sure you have not left anyone out. Time to put that year planner to use and
mark of days that you will not be available as you have already agreed to go to
a social gathering.
Let’s get one point straight, saving money
on Christmas cards will not mean that you will be sending poor quality cards or
that everyone will be getting the same card for the next twenty years but if
you do find value cards at hundreds for pennies then I will show you haw you
can use them letter on. Knowing how many Christmas cards you will need and for
whom will mean that you are prepared when you come across an opportunity like a
sale in a store. I know some people that got some or all of this year Christmas
cards in the January sales (that would be me). So get that list written after
you have finished this post so that you will be ready for the next opportunity
you come across.
You may have missed the January sales but
there will be other sales both on the internet and in the high street before
the holidays, in fact it feels like not a week goes by without me getting an
email telling me about a sale with 20%, 30%, 40% or 50% off. When I find cards
that I like and want to buy I make a note of the product number in a file on my
computer, I group them together under the site if found them on like Zazzle,
Greeting cards Universe or Cafépress so that when I get notice that the site is
having a sale I can go straight to the cards on the site, saving me both time and
money.
Making your own Christmas cards can be fun
and very enjoyable with the added advantage that the card will be uniquely yours
and that the recipient will not be getting the same card from anyone else. You
maybe thinking that you have no skill in making cards so yours will look
terrible and cheap but with a little practice you can be producing wonderful
cards that your friends and family will love.
Everyone has some skills that can be
applied to card making, weather that be sewing, scrap booking, photography,
calligraphy or even finger painting that you loved back in kinder garden. All
of the skills used in card making are easy to learn but you do not need to
learn all of them, just the one or two that you need to make the card you are
working on at the moment.
So now I guess you are thinking “how are you going to save money after
buying all the card making equipment and the materials you will waste learning
the skills needed”. First off, do not buy any card making equipment, let me
say that again DO NOT BUY ANY CARD MAKING EQUIPMENT not at first anyway because
at the moment you do not know what you need. Make do with what you have around
the house and as you make cards you will learn what you want from your tools,
maybe you need bigger scissors or smaller scissors or it is not scissors you
need at all but a craft knife. Rather than learning new skills using your card
stock try honing your skills using plain printing paper, the cost of a ream of
printing paper is less than one or two greeting cards and before you have
gotten half way through the paper you will be confidant in many new skills that
you can add straight to your card stock.
Not everyone is confident to make greeting
cards starting from just an idea; some need a little help before they can
believe that they can do it, so here are two methods to help you get started.
The first is kind of like a kit greeting
card. When you buy a greeting card you like you down load a file or a PDF that
has all of the key elements on and maybe some extra ones so that the PDF could
be used to make a birthday card or a thank you card. If you make an error you
can just reprint the PDF and start again or just use the element that you need.
This bring us to the money saving aspect of this kind of greeting card, the PDF
sits on your computer and if you need another card you print it out again, if
you need 10, 20 or 100 you just keep printing out as many as you need. It does
not stop there, as you get more adventurous you can start to mix and match
different elements with different cads giving you more unique greeting cards. A
good place to start is Digi Design Resort or at Crafts U Print as well as
having many card templates they also have lots of tips and an active forum
where you can ask questions, they also have a selection of free templates for
you to down load and try to see if it is for you.
The last method is to alter cards to make
them uniquely yours, remember them bargain cards you found. You can add as
little or as much as you like after all the card did not cost much or was even
free. From adding glitter to highlight a few elements to a complete makeover so
that you can not recognize the original card. If you want to cover large areas
of the card in glitter it is easer to paint on the glue and then sprinkle on
the glitter but if you want to add glitter to smaller elements of the card like
the trim on a Christmas tree you can buy glitter in different colours already
mixed with glue and this method is like drawing with the glitter or like piping
icing on a cake. I design greeting card on my computer and then print the image
on to card blanks of different colours to get different effects One time I
printed the image upside down, rather than throw the card away I cut in two and
added it to one of my bargain cards (the right way round) with a strip of
coloured paper on the spine of the card to make it look a bit like a book so
that the only part of the bargain card my recipient would see was the inside
massage. Altering bargain greeting cards can also be a great way to get your
children involved to make personalized Christmas cards for their grandparents
and friends.
If you have found this post useful then
please share it or leave a comment or both. If you know of any other money
saving tips or crafting sites leave a link in the comments so others can
benefit.
