Photo Christmas Cards Through The Years: A Fun Tradition

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One of our favorite traditions is creating and sending out Christmas cards. We keep it pretty simple around here and I just take and edit the photos myself. For many years it has just been a picture of the kids but last year I got brave and used the tripod to take a photo of our whole family. 

PRINTING PHOTO CARDS:

I really love getting Christmas cards, but I LOVE photo Christmas cards where I can see how much friends and family have changed over the years and have their photos up in my house for a while. There are lots of great pre-made designs online that you can choose from, but I always design my own using PhotoShop Elements and free digital scrap-booking elements found online. Canva is a great resource as well and has many free design elements to choose from.

WHAT SIZE:

We usually go with one-sided 5×7 photo cards. We print our own address labels at home but there are lots of places online to order now that are very inexpensive. Many of our friends and family simply print a 4×6 inch family photo and put it in a store-bought card. You can also add text to your photo on Canva and then have it printed. I like it when they at least have the year on them so we can easily tell later what year it was.

2009:

My cousin, Ashley, took our family picture for this card in 2009. It is so weird to look back and remember what it was like to have just one kid! Emma was the sweetest little thing and still is. I worked at Drewes Floral in Brigham City, Utah at the time and took the picture of her by the tree at the floral shop. I LOVED that outfit, which you can’t really see in the picture. The shirt was silky and was a onesie so it stayed tucked in which I thought was the best thing ever! The skirt was black and had velvet black polka dots and then that cardigan, man, she is adorable. 

2010:

In 2010 we lived in Williston, North Dakota. It was so DANG COLD! Like, negative degree weather cold. I took these pics of the kids in the snow just outside our front door and they were freezing cold, but we did it quickly. My friend, Emily made the adorable outfits they were wearing on the bench and I absolutely LOVED them! Also, it should be noted that I DID NOT have Lightroom to edit my photos back then and I cringe just a little looking at them. I am still no professional, but my photo skills have improved for sure.

2011:

Old red trucks are such an iconic Christmas symbol. We took this picture when we lived in Cheney, Washington. Ivan worked in the rolling hills of the Palouse. We loved to drive around and enjoy the scenery while looking for photo opportunities and we found this spot complete with the old red truck and barn just off the road. Can you guess which kid was naughty and which was nice? Also, I had someone who received the card this year ask how I got the letters on the barn! PhotoShop! The words were not really on the barn. haha!

2012:

2012 was also super simple with the kids just sitting on our deck in the backyard in Washington in their church clothes. Levi’s crazy fun personality was perfect for this card. I should have ventured further into the yard though because we lived in Cheney, Washington, and rented a home on 33 acres in the forest. We had a huge pond behind our house with MOOSE! It was fun and a little bit terrifying to me. We also had wild turkeys, really loud frogs, lots of elk, and a wild boar whom we named Mr. Pigglesworth. I need to do a post on the different places we’ve lived!

2013:

In 2013 we lived in Canyon, Texas. People are always surprised to hear of snow in Texas but we lived North in the panhandle. One of the worst blizzards we ever experienced was when we lived there. We were literally snowed in for a couple of days. These pictures were so quick, easy, and adorable. I found this cute snowman hat at the Target dollar spot and knew it would be perfect. We made the reindeer antlers from a headband, craft foam, and some tulle bows. We grabbed clothes they already had, a carrot, and set a chair in the snow in the backyard. We snapped a couple of pictures while I was still standing on the back patio. The kids had lots of fun too! Taking fun holiday pictures doesn’t need to be complicated.

2014:

2014 was the year of our super fun Christmas Cookie Photo Shoot. We used the pictures for this photo Christmas card and got lots of compliments. We even included the ridiculous picture of Ivan and me that Emma took for us!

2015:

2015 I’ll be “gnome” for Christmas card. From our “gnome” to yours. So clever, I know. We lived in Colby, Kansas at this time. This was a year that I didn’t have it in me to take pictures for a card so we used their adorable pictures from our Halloween Gnome Photo Shoot and created something fun that worked for Christmas.

2016:

In 2016 our good friend, Stephanie, took our pictures. This old sled I found at a flea market was so cute and I knew I wanted to use it for pictures, even if we didn’t have any snow at the time! Tiny baby Lincoln looks a little cold in these pictures because his skin is purple, but I assure you he had on MANY layers and was toasty warm.

2017:

For our 2017 Christmas, we lived in McCook, Nebraska. As I said, I took these pictures with a tripod. It was fun to set the camera and run and get in place before the shutter went off. Lincoln was clearly very confused, but we managed to get a good smile out of him for his individual picture. These pictures were taken in a little grassy area off the road. Maybe you can call it a park? I loved the wooden stairs and thought it would be a good location for family pictures. This is also where I took Lincoln’s one-year-old pictures.

Christmas is less than two weeks away and I have barely thought about a card for this year! It may or may not happen and I’m okay with that. Hopefully, I surprise myself and come up with something amazing.

CHRISTMAS LETTERS:

My husband, Ivan, always writes our Christmas letters to go with our cards because even though a picture’s worth a thousand words, we tend to have a few more words than that. I love looking back at his letters through the years. Hopefully, I can find them all and get them in one place. It is a fun documentation of the things we have experienced each year and our faith and testimonies. Ivan is a great writer and is creative with his letters. One year he did this hashtag letter which I thought was hilarious. His parents didn’t get it. 🙂 He is embarrassed that I’m sharing this here but he is a good sport. 

In closing:

We’ll see if he can at least write the letter to post on social media this year even if we don’t send out physical cards. Does your family send out photo Christmas cards or letters? Do you love getting them in the mail? I think snail mail is the absolute best and I look forward to receiving cards from loved ones each year. Wishing you a very MERRY CHRISTMAS and an incredible New Year.