Chances are that you have received one of those professional looking photo Christmas cards last year. This year, create your own Christmas cards, personalized with your family's best photo of the year.

Preview of the photo Christmas card, showing uploaded photo and selected Christmas border.

Preview of the photo Christmas card at showing uploaded photo and selected Christmas border.

In preparation for this season, I have reviewed the major online digital photo developing services to see which one offers the best mix of Christmas card designs and options. I prefer for their easy to use system and numerous options. Keep reading to find out why.

Highlights

In case you don't want to read the entire review, here is a summary of why I think is the best choice for creating personalized photo Christmas cards:

  • Very easy to use web site walks you through the photo card creation, step by step.
  • Large selection of Christmas theme borders.
  • Offers ready-made greeting text to help with message composition.
  • Several mailing options, including complete addressing, stamping, and mailing on your behalf.
  • Option to add gift card from several national retailers.
  • High quality photo card finish.

Preparation Steps

Before going to the web site, there are a few preparation steps to make the process smoother.

First, select a few photos for the card. Even if you want a single design, I recommend that you choose two or three photos to upload. This way, you can determine which one looks best with certain border designs.

Second, it helps to prepare your greeting text ahead of time. This step is optional because you can compose your text on the web site, and even spell check it, but off-line composition will give you more time to think through what you want to say. Save your text in a word processor file so you can copy and paste it into the card design later. The three text sections on the card are:

  • Message: Goes on the inside left panel and can contain several lines.
  • Greeting: Goes on the inside right panel and it can also contain several lines.
  • Closing: Goes on the bottom of the inside right panel and can contain about two or three lines, depending on font size.

Third, if you want CardStore to address the envelopes, collect all of the recipient addresses so you can enter them during the ordering process. Don't forget to have one sent to yourself so you know how the cards turned out.

Making the Photo Christmas Card

I am impressed with the streamlined process of the CardStore web site. They make the card personalization and ordering process as simple as possible. For example, users are not required to create an account—photos can be uploaded immediately. The general process goes like this:

Upload Photo

The first step is to go to the web site, click on Photo Cards, and you are taken directly to the photo upload page. Browse for the photo on your computer and upload. The system supports JPEG files up to 4 MB in size.

Choose Border Style

Once the photo has been uploaded, the next step is to choose a card design. Quite a few themes are available, but we are interested in Christmas borders at the moment.

After the border style is selected, the first set of borders are displayed. View all border designs with the Next link at the bottom of the page. Click on the design you like to select it. Before you are allowed to continue, you must check the box above the Continue button, indicating your acceptance of the CardStore terms. Now you may click Continue for the next step.

Choose Card Style & Gift Card

On this step you choose between the 5x7" folding or postcard styles. You may also add a gift card from the selection of national retailers. If CardStore will be mailing the cards on your behalf, they will insert one gift card in each envelope, billing you for the cash value at checkout.

If you choose to add a gift card, the next step takes you to the list of retailers. After selecting the retailer, you are presented with a list of denominations, most of which start at $25 or more. The following vendors offer $10 gift cards: Blockbuster, Darden Restaurants (Red Lobster, Olive Garden, and others), and Starbucks.

Message text selected from the "Christmas - Religious" category, after clicking "help with words".

Message text selected from the "Christmas - Religious" category, after clicking "help with words".

Write the Message

When you arrive at the "write message" step, I suggest taking a moment to look over the screen. There are so many options available that it is a good idea to familiarize yourself before starting your composition.

To enter your text, click either in the appropriate section on the card preview, or on one of the three tabs: Message, Greeting, or Closing.

In each text box, you can choose the font face, font size, text color, and alignment. If you have prepared your text ahead of time in a word processor, copy the text and paste it directly into the box on the web page. The keyboard command for pasting is Ctrl+V. Or, compose your message directly in the text boxes. Be sure to take advantage of the spell check link before moving on.

Got writer's block? Click on the help with words link for a list of ready-made phrases and verses. I have selected a verse from the "Christmas - Religious" category in the example to the right.

After making changes, click on Update Preview to see how it looks on the card. For a larger preview, click the large link above the card on the left side of the screen.

Prepare Envelope

The card is complete; now we tell how to handle the envelopes and delivery. Three options are available for preparing the envelopes:

  • Yes, and mail them for me on [date].
  • Yes, but ship back to me.
  • No. Ship cards back to me with blank envelopes.

By prepare they mean printing the addresses on the envelopes. Next to the "No" option you can specify the quantity of cards desired. For the "Yes" options, the quantity is determined by the number of recipient addresses you provide.

If you would like the envelopes prepared by CardStore, select one of the Yes options and provide addressing information. You may even select a stamp from five available designs, unfortunately none are Christmas designs, at the time of this writing.

Checkout

The final step is checking out. At the very bottom of the screen is the Shipping and Tax Calculator. Click this link and provide the shipping state so that invoice total can be calculated.

Take one last look at the order details. It is advisable to click Preview under the photo card image and have one final look before committing the order.

Other Recommendations

In case does not meet your needs, I recommend the photo Christmas card offerings at the following vendors, in this order:


I hope you enjoy sending out your personalized photo Christmas cards this season. Have a very Merry Christmas!