Money and time saving Christmas Cards

December is a crazy month for our family. With three birthdays and Christmas all falling into a few short weeks, I'm forced to find creative ways to save myself time and money. One of my favorites, is our digital Christmas Card.

Christmas cards can take up tons of valuable time…getting the perfect picture, getting prints, tracking down addresses, you know how it goes. Last year, in an effort to save myself the hassle, I decided to create a digital version. I used the pictures I had stored in Picassa (see previous post) and another free program called Microsoft Movie Maker. The end result was a fun, 2-minute glimpse of our year in photos that I was able to email to my family and friends.

I'd never used Movie Maker before, but I found it really easy to work with. I simply imported 20 of my favorite pictures from Picasa as well as an instrumental Christmas song from one of my CDs. Once the photos were in the program, I arranged them into sections (I did a spotlight on each child and then a section of family fun). Next, I inserted some transitions between the photos (they're built into Movie Maker) to help it flow from one picture to another. Technically, you can add video clips as well, but I didn't want to devote the time to editing. I also used a graphic design program to add in title slides (like the one pictured here) but if you're not tech savy you could skip those and just use the title pages that are included in Movie Maker.

Once I was happy with it, I saved it and composed a traditional Christmas card-type letter for the body of the email. I chose a Christmas-themed email stationary, attached the Movie Maker file, and added all the recipients. Thanks to the wonders of email, my digital Christmas card was instantly shared with over 50 family & friends. It was quick, efficient and best of all...free.

If you're a little more traditional and would rather go with mail, Movie Maker can help you too. You can create a CD of your file within Movie Maker with a simple click of a button. Add a cute Christmas label and you can mail the CDs to everyone on your list.

I know this isn't the right solution for everyone. I sure there are tons of you out there that love the whole Christmas-card making process. As for the rest of you…you may want to give this easy and free alternative a try. It worked for me. Just thought I'd pass it on.

If you have a newer system, you probably already have Movie Maker installed. If not, here's the link: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/updates/moviemaker2.mspx