Wedding Blog

Are you moving to a new address around the time of your wedding? It’s probably a good idea to let people know! I always loved the sentiment of receiving a card containing newlyweds’ new contact info.

Mr. Mary Jane and I did things a little out-of-order (as is our style :D): We bought our house in May, but we’re not getting married until September. Still, with family and friends buzzing about our new digs, we decided it’d be a good idea to send them a little something commemorating the move.

I’m a pretty computer-crazed gal, but I think that some things require a little more attention to detail than a Facebook status change. (I also may or may not be suffering from a touch of invitation DIY envy. :)) I decided we should use our new address as an excuse to send out some mail. Snail mail. As in, you put a stamp on it and put it in the mailbox.

Mr. Mary Jane and I love photography, so a photo card was the logical choice. Since this is not a wedding invitation, and we have to send out a lot of them, I decided not to enter into full-on seven-trips-to-Michaels-at-3-a.m.-with-the-paper-cutter DIY-territory. Instead, I turned to Shutterfly to make this simple Change-of-Address card happen. To sweeten the deal, I had a gift card (of course)!

But first, the pictures!

Mr. Mary Jane and I stepped outside on a Sunday morning to snap a few shots. First, a shot of us with the house. We did this with a tripod and remote. (And when I say “a shot”, what I really mean is “we took about 30 shots and this is the one that came out”. Ah, digital photography!) We then each took turns with the camera. I took pictures of Mr. MJ with our house number, then he took some of me with the street sign. Here are the shots we chose for the cards.

After editing them in Photoshop (we decided to go black and white), I uploaded them to Shutterfly. I then selected a 4×8 card option for three photos and aligned our pictures appropriately. Adding my text was a breeze, too. The whole Shutterfly layout process was very easy and only took about 10 minutes.

It says:

We’ve got big news to share with you.
(A few thousand square feet of it, in fact!)
A few weeks ago, we became homeowners!
Our new address is
[Address]
Much love,
Mr. Mary Jane and Miss Mary Jane

Once we were both satisfied with the design of the card, I hit up Retail Me Not, where I managed to combine enough coupon codes to save $17 and receive a credit for 30 free prints on a future order. (I like saving money, don’t you?)

Shutterfly shipped the cards with envelopes, and they took about a week to arrive. They even came with envelopes.

I sent the envelopes through my printer to address them:

I found that even though my printer’s paper tray could handle more than a few envelopes, it was best not to stuff them in there. Doing so resulted in edges like this:

Once I started feeding only a few envelopes in at a time, there were no more smudgy edges.

The font I used is “Miama”; it’s free from dafont.com.
The cards were $32.50 (before applying the coupon codes), and I also paid $17.60 for 40 stamps.
Total project cost: $50.10

In the past 6 months I’ve received three photo card announcements from friends and family: a baby announcement, a save-the-date, and an engagement announcement. It’s perhaps not the most unique or cutesy option out there, but personalizing these cards with your own photos adds a special “fridgeworthy” touch.

Check out my high school friend’s engagement announcement: so cute! She found a card style that matched the theme of their photo; I believe she printed these through Walmart.

(And here’s where I get to gloat a little: I took their photo :D).

For those of you who are DIY-challenged (or simply busy-as-all-hell like me), this is a fun and easy way to get the news out. While I was browsing the options on Shutterfly, I stumbled across these sets of blank photo note cards; what a perfect option to use for a Thank You or other semi-informal greeting!

I most commonly see these 4×8 cards used as Christmas/Holiday greetings; would you or have you considered using them for anything wedding related?