We all just have to evolve. It's meaningful to me if the thing is hand-made in some way and not just a product of Hallmark's free stuff. Nowadays I only get cards by postal mail from family members who make a big deal out of including a picture of themselves. I love those.

My grown kids always gets tons of the real thing, so maybe it's a tradition to hang on to for younger families, regardless of how busy they are.

Now, if it's something that was mass-mailed with a generic message - no thanks.

But I'm not one to talk. I never, ever send Christmas cards unless there's money inside or it's attached to a present.

totally lame. no thanks.

I've never really understood why sending holiday cards seems to be such a massive time burden. Let's say you're sending 60 cards and you're actually going to manually write each address and a 2-3 sentence note in each one.

If you take 5 minutes per card that's five hours. That's one weeks worth of card writing while watching whichever CSI or Law and Order trips your trigger.

I would prefer that my friends and family spend the time or money on saving a tree. Email away!

Not to be a scrooge but you do the same thing with ecards that you do with paper cards - read them and then eventually throw them away. In my small space I personally don't have a mantel or other place to display paper cards and wonder what I'm supposed to do with them. And with people starting to green up their lives at least with ecards you're saving paper.

I don't get the time burden either indy jeffrey. Last year I custom designed and made our cards- sent out about 100 I think. Hand wrote the envelopes. Didn't take long at all. Maybe a few movies.

Email cards- meaningful if they wrote you a long email i guess, but I prefer the real thing hands down!

I don't have a problem with e-Cards - for Holidays or otherwise...

It's the thought that counts.

print them.

I contemplated ecards, but for me, nothing beats the joy of getting a special card (with note and update on the year!) in the snail mail. It's just one of many Christmas traditions that I'm willing to put a little extra effort into to keep up. Yes, hitting SEND on a mass e-mail would be easier, but it's worth it for my friends to get the real deal. I also purchase Unicef cards, so it's one way to do a little good and spread cheer at the same time.

i'm sure to get in trouble here, but we don't do gifts and we don't do cards. i personally save very few cards - most of what i get is just a store-bought card with a signature to which my response is "gee, i know what your name is already, but thanks for the reminder."

i like the photo cards or the rare one with an actual written message, but for the most part i look at christmas cards as yet another thing to recycle. e-mail away. save a tree. take the time to watch that law & order, i don't care.

to me, christmas is about family, friends and food, all the rest of it matters not one whit. and you know what? since giving up gifts and cards, i love it that much more.

I'm happy to receive e-cards, but I prefer to send paper cards.

E-cards are just as lame as holiday cards with only a signature.

If you're going to spend the time, money and resources sending out holiday cards, at least write a little note.

Just got my first snail mail Christmas Card of the season and I love them!!! I even frame a few that I especially like and hang them up during the holidays every year.

E-mail cards I hate - and they overload my computer!!! Massive amounts of bytes taking up room on my hard drive so I delete them all. Once deleted they are gone from my memory too while the delightful real cards are strewn about for me to enjoy.

At paperlesspost.com, you can create an email card with a photo and type in individual messages if you want. Just like a "real" holiday card, but without the paper waste.

Real cards can be nice to receive, but then there's the issue of how long to keep them and how to discard them. They are nice tokens when people bother writing real messages inside, but I hate having to store lots of bits of paper.

E-cards aren't just about convenience (which was why greeting cards were invented, by the way: to replace letter-writing) but about preventing the waste from making, sending and discarding them. Plus, they never take up as much space as real cards.

I think I'm going to send ecards this year. I don't have many people's address to send a snail mail card. The paper, gas used to deliver and the fact they they will be thrown out don't jive with the greener life I'm trying to live.

hand made real cards are a good idea. store bought ones don't really appeal to me. Why spend the money on them and just create more trash and someone will just throw them out.

not saying I am for ecards. I have to design them for my clients a lot, so I am pretty much tired of them as of 2 or 3 weeks ago...

I feel the same way about birthday cards attached to presents. Like why? I would rather spend the extra $4 a card would cost on the person, or hell even scratch of lotto tickets, then the person has a chance to win something at least.

I prefer e-cards. It's not nearly as wasteful as paper cards that have to be driven and flown all over the place.

I will add the caveat that I NEVER send a card, e-card or otherwise, without a heartfelt message included. I can't stand when people only sign their names or only write "Merry Christmas".

it's SO relative! personally, i would never send a holiday ecard. but i'm a crafty person and the expectation is that would make them, of course. and generally, i'm too busy at the xmas holiday time, so i send out valentines instead. such a nice surprise in dreary february!

I find them wasteful. AND what am I suppose to do with all those cards with their baby, family pictures on them?

It's Lame. The holidays come around once a year. It's nice to know that someone took the time out to actually hand write a little note for you.

I don't mind e-cards, but I do delete them. I actually keep mailed cards; we put them all out in a basket every holiday season. I like to go through them, especially the hand-made and photo versions -- they're like little time capsules. I should say that we don't get a ton of cards, though. Otherwise it would be difficult to keep them.

This year I'm sending out real cards that I made (speedball prints). The last time I mailed cards was almost 10 years ago.

I am a stationary nut and I sell many of my fine art images as handmade cards. That being said, my bf and I started a tradition when we moved in together years ago to create a holiday image using photoshop and/or a wacom board. It's very personal, incorporating our pics and our dogs' pics and then is manipulated to create an artistic image. We send that out via email to all friends and family. Best of both worlds! We would never just send out an e-card without writing something personal and individualized. It's about conserving trees and finances, not time.

We put the picture cards on our fridge. I like to see how everyone's kids/pets/whatevers are doing through the years.

I have a few friends who have begun to use email cards, some doing both email and paper and beginning to give up the paper. I miss them and have no intention of giving up sending out hand written.

In the past I hand calligrafied hundreds of cards a year but as I work towards a paperless life I have a difficult time sending cards out. I have slowly dwindled from 400 to 100 or so and I think this may be my last year.

As far as how long to keep cards, I never know. I am happy that I kept the cards sent by my now deceased Grandmother.

I think e-cards are great! They save trees, cut down on waste, and they don't have to be impersonal - just include a personalized message with each.

I'm against any type of card that hasn't been customized; the one bought at the grocery store saying "Thanks" (in response to a wedding gift) then signed with two unreadable names, or the one sent for free with a copy-pasted message field.

This year I intend to send emails with an attachment I've designed myself. Card-sized file with some kind of cheerful holiday greeting. It will probably be a bit faster than handwriting some cards, but on the other hand I wouldn't even send snail mail but to a selected few. What's wrong with customizing and saving a tree in the process? Lame? Not personal enough? Whatever, not in my opinion.

LoriSF, I suggest you tell your friends to take you off their list, if getting photos of their family is that objectionable.

"AND what am I suppose to do with all those cards with their baby, family pictures on them?"

You mean the ones where the entire family plus the dog dresses up in matching holiday sweaters and Santa hats in late September to have their photo taken for the family Xmas cards?

I think I'd rather get an E-Card...
:-P

Why is paper a "waste?"

Let's experiment: Take a piece of paper and place it outside. Take your computer, and put it in your yard. Which will biodegrade first? (Note: A computer takes 1700 years to decompose. Paper at this size takes about 1 week.)

The argument for e-cards is ironic and lazy.

I love getting a real Christmas card that I can hold in my hand. There is just something more personal about holding a card, like getting a hand-written letter. It just seems more special.

I really love nice cards - for all occasions and apparently many people do, because the recipeints often email me (!) to say thanks for sending something so lovely.

Perhaps the paper vs email dividing line is the beauty of the card and personal note?

However, I do get twinges of tree- and energy-guilt.

I don't like e-cards. I'm a big fan of e-mail in general, but I don't like it as a substitute for Christmas cards.

@goloskidesign: Computers are not at all comparable to paper cards, which are one-use items that are either saved or thrown out or (hopefully) recycled. Most people use their computers for things besides sending e-cards.

I'm going to be brusque and claim that you can't send physical Christmas cards and be "green" - how much carbon do you think is released into the atmosphere by the post truck driving from the mailbox to the sorting centre, then another truck driving from the sorting centre to the airport, then a jet flying from the airport to another airport, then the process being repeated in reverse down to your recipient's house? Then multiply that by however many cards you send, PLUS the amount of carbon generated by getting the original cards (or ink stamps, scrapbooking paper and flair, if you make your own cards) from the factory in China to your local shops and then to your home.

In the age of email, Flickr, Facebook and blogs there's no need for the traditional annual family photo or update either. So basically sending a physical card across the planet is a big self-indulgent slap in the face for Mother Earth.

I'm not even remotely "green", but I don't send cards anyway because it seems kind of pointless. In addition I often have no idea what even my best friends' addresses are - I know their email addresses, their phone numbers and how to get to their houses, but not the number on the street. Most of the time I just don't need to know this.

Completely lame and not personal at all. I would much rather receive (and send) paper Christmas cards. I guess it's knowing someone put time into picking them out and signing them instead of sending them in mass online.

I agree. E-cards are lame. It doesn't take that much time to sit down and mail out a few Christmas cards.

I hate getting paper cards, especially the ones with people's kids, because I feel guilty about throwing them in the trash.

Maybe it's just a cultural thing, but nobody in my family -- or my husband's family -- ever displays they cards they receive. I don't get why you'd want to.

I think that email has its place, but I don't think that emailing a Christmas card or an invitation to something like a wedding is ever appropriate.