# Greetings Cards



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I am just about to send out our Christmas cards and dickering over whether to enclose a news slip with our new address on it - yes, we finally sold and bought a house, but we're not moving in till January - or whether to just write a personal message in each card. 

I don't really have the time or energy to write in each card, so it will probably be the news slip, but I can't help being aware of how much Christmas newsletters are despised and parodied these days! And we've certainly had some odd ones ourselves in the past. 

These days, too, people worry about the cost or the ecological significance of sending cards. 

What do you think? 

Do you send cards? 

Do you send a newsletter? 

Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters. 

Are you trying to cut down your list? 

Do you think it's a harmful habit. 

Do you eschew religious cards? 

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'? 

Do you have any funny stories about cards - birthday cards or other greetings cards, not just Christmas cards? 

I'm just interested to learn of other people's experiences. Thanks for any replies.


----------



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

No replies - sorry I spoke. *Happy Christmas *anyway.


----------



## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Do you send cards?
About 10 per year to closest family and friends. I'd prefer to do it by email, but I know several hang the card they receive altogether in the kitchen.

Do you send a newsletter?
Nope. Never heard of that custom here either.

Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters.
Don't get any.

Are you trying to cut down your list?
We did a few years ago.

Do you think it's a harmful habit.
In the bigger scheme, it's peanuts.

Do you eschew religious cards?
Yes. Being agnostic and Buddhist ourselves respectively, we don't like overly Christian cards/greetings.

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'?
Merry Christmas.

Do you have any funny stories about cards - birthday cards or other greetings cards, not just Christmas cards?
Nope, boring as hell. Honestly, if it were stopped right now, it would be fine with me.

I'm just interested to learn of other people's experiences. Thanks for any replies.
You're welcome. Merry Christmas to Taggart and you.


----------



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Hurray - someone answered! :tiphat:

I know 'Merry Christmas' is the idiomatic saying, but I somehow don't like it as much as 'happy' - there's the meaning, nowadays, of being tipsy, and there's also the idea of compulsory jollity that doesn't grab me. 

But if you say 'Happy Christmas' it's repetitious to say 'Happy New Year' too, so I like to say 'Joyful New Year' or 'Peaceful New Year' instead.


----------



## senza sordino (Oct 20, 2013)

I am just about to send out our Christmas cards and dickering over whether to enclose a news slip with our new address on it - yes, we finally sold and bought a house, but we're not moving in till January - or whether to just write a personal message in each card.

I don't really have the time or energy to write in each card, so it will probably be the news slip, but I can't help being aware of how much Christmas newsletters are despised and parodied these days! And we've certainly had some odd ones ourselves in the past. *I don't mind writing cards, I'll do it in a couple of stages. I use a sponge to seal the envelope so I don't have to lick all those envelopes. *

These days, too, people worry about the cost or the ecological significance of sending cards.

What do you think?

Do you send cards? *Yes*

Do you send a newsletter? *No*

Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters. *Somewhat interesting. My cousin often writes a rather pompous form letter to everyone, and it's somewhat interesting to read.*

Are you trying to cut down your list? *No*

Do you think it's a harmful habit. *No, I think it's really nice to receive real mail from someone so I send cards to people*

Do you eschew religious cards? *I pick and choose, so I don't send religious cards to my atheist family, but I will send religious cards to family members who are religious*

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'? *We say Merry Christmas here*

Do you have any funny stories about cards - birthday cards or other greetings cards, not just Christmas cards? *No, though I'm frustrated that the time to mail is so inconsistent. I got a birthday card yesterday, but my birthday was last week. The card was sent more than two weeks ago*

I've been sleeping and working since you posted. Sometimes I feel like I'm at the end of the world here.


----------



## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

I've become quite a slacker over the years when it comes to sending out greeting cards. But I do send a few to my small family and a number of friends. Many cards are made with recycled materials so I don't worry about the environmental factor. And it really does help the post office with added revenue. I don't get offended by religious cards although I feel preachy ones are in bad taste. I once opened a card sent to me by a relative and religious tract fell out. There wasn't even a dear me or a name signed on it. That was really bizarre.


----------



## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

These days, too, people worry about the cost or the ecological significance of sending cards.

What do you think?

Do you send cards?
*Only nearest and dearests, hand written and by (air)mail.*

Do you send a newsletter?
*Nope*.
Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters.
*See above*

Are you trying to cut down your list?
*This year for the first time "yes"*, not neighbors and that kind of thing.

Do you think it's a harmful habit.

Do you eschew religious cards?
*As neutral as possible .*

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'?
*Season greetings*

Do you have any funny stories about cards - birthday cards or other greetings cards, not just Christmas cards?

*Nor really. *


----------



## Rogerx (Apr 27, 2018)

All done, with some music playing it goes so easy . Tomorrow putting stamps on and away they go. :angel:


----------



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I keep putting off starting mine.


----------



## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

These days, too, people worry about the cost or the ecological significance of sending cards.

What do you think? Breathing air is bad for the environment too. I'm happy to continue doing so, as well as send cards. Christmas stamps are nice, better than all the other commercialised detritus the Post Office pass for commemorative issues these days.

Do you send cards? Yes

Do you send a newsletter? No. I rarely read the ones I'm sent, so I don't expect anyone to do the same for us.

Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters. See above

Are you trying to cut down your list? The Grim Reaper is doing a decent job there, sadly.

Do you think it's a harmful habit. Emphatically not.

Do you eschew religious cards? A religious theme is ok, but as a cynical Christian myself, any deeply Christian message wouldn't be right.

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'? Not bothered!


----------



## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Do you send cards?
Yes. If they send me one, I send one in return. You know, quid pro quo and all that.

Do you send a newsletter?
Oh, heavens, no. That's what Facebook is for.

Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters.
Groan. They're always too long and too detailed. Haven't they heard of Facebook?

Are you trying to cut down your list?
No. I want people to know I'm still above ground.

Do you think it's a harmful habit?
No. It's kind of nice to think that I'm worth the trouble of someone signing a card and mailing it. 

Do you eschew religious cards?
Well, it is Christmas, and most of my friends are Christians, so it's not a big deal. I'm usually pretty generic, though, like those featuring shadow images of people on camels. Nothing says Christmas like shadows of people on camels. 

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'?
I'm more of a Merry Christmas person. But I have a low voice that doesn't carry, so most people take my holiday greetings as veiled threats and hide their kids. 

Do you have any funny stories about cards - birthday cards or other greetings cards, not just Christmas cards?
My CPA has the sense of humor of an actuary; any attempt at levity is met with a blank stare. But every Christmas he sends out the corniest Christmas cards. (This year Santa is at an accountant, and the caption is, "This year's 1040 form is not E-Z.") I imagine this Jeckyll-Hyde personality of his comes out on December 1st, and he spends the rest of the year in shame and humiliation.


----------



## Dorsetmike (Sep 26, 2018)

Don't send any and only receive one from a cousin, if she's still about, and one from a USA member of this forum, with newsletter. I did get an email from my eldest - first contact in over 5 years so he may send one, just have to wait & see.


----------



## TxllxT (Mar 2, 2011)

Our family & friends live spread over the Netherlands, Czech Republic, New Zealand, Russia, among others. Sending paper cards to Russia is like playing Russian roulette: mostly nothing works out and certainly not on time. Russian Post resembles the sloth in Zootopia. So we are already used to send each other emails / Facebook stuff etc. for a long time.

In the Czech Republic, which is by the way very 'atheistic' but not in the X-mas season, there exists a nice digitalized Advent card tradition that is maintained by Czech Television: https://decko.ceskatelevize.cz/advent Move with the mouse over the picture and you'll hear Czech fun. For children there exist Advent card tablets with hidden chocolates behind the numbers of the month December.

Russia celebrates the New Year as the West is doing with Christmas. Saint Petersburg is hardly seeing any daylight, but they make up with the loss by artificial means:


----------



## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

I prefer my Christmases' with Merry


----------



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I wrote my first five last night, shamed into it by Rogerx. :tiphat:

One annoying thing - the card I bought at Aldeburgh last year for my fiddle teacher (now left behind in E. Anglia) had two violins on the front, but the envelope is that horrid festive red so the address doesn't show up well. I wondered about a label but feared it might come off, so wrote the address in big black indelible felt pen - one was handy - and am now worried in case it's gone through and stained the card.

My biggest regret, though, is not having any cards featuring shadow images of people on camels - since 'nothing says Christmas like shadows of people on camels'! Oh, Manxfeeder! 

Here's a camel candle holder instead. We bought it at a church sale years ago and always put it with the crib animals, though it's a monster compared with them.


----------



## TxllxT (Mar 2, 2011)

In the Czech Republic there exists a great folklore tradition of woodcut 'Betlems'.
A few years ago we were on the way to our family and visited the Giant Mountains town of Vrchlabí in North Bohemia.










There was an outdoors exhibition of a life-size Bethlehem's stable, you know, with mother Mary, Joseph etc. But coming closer we met with typical Czech humor: In the manger there was lying not one child, but twins. Have a closer look at the photo...


----------



## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

TxllxT said:


> In the Czech Republic there exists a great folklore tradition of woodcut 'Betlems'.
> A few years ago we were on the way to our family and visited the Giant Mountains town of Vrchlabí in North Bohemia.
> There was an outdoors exhibition of a life-size Bethlehem's stable, you know, with mother Mary, Joseph etc. But coming closer we met with typical Czech humor: In the manger there was lying not one child, but twins. Have a closer look at the photo...


The main difference between Czech Christmas and Christmas in western europe is that we do not believe in Santa Claus. We believe in Ježíšek (Little Jesus)
https://www.radio.cz/en/section/spe...ions-explained-from-jezisek-to-the-golden-pig
it is the child Jesus from the Bethlehem craddle, hence the strong tradition of Betlems depicting the birth of Jesus. The Russians believe in the Grandfather Frost (Ded Moroz). I do not know where the belief in Santa Claus came from, though I would guess it is some scandinavian tradition.


----------



## TxllxT (Mar 2, 2011)

Jacck said:


> The main difference between Czech Christmas and Christmas in western europe is that we do not believe in Santa Claus. We believe in Ježíšek (Little Jesus)
> https://www.radio.cz/en/section/spe...ions-explained-from-jezisek-to-the-golden-pig
> it is the child Jesus from the Bethlehem craddle, hence the strong tradition of Betlems depicting the birth of Jesus. The Russians believe in the Grandfather Frost (Ded Moroz). I do not know where the belief in Santa Claus came from, though I would guess it is some scandinavian tradition.


https://dutchreview.com/culture/holidays/secret-dutch-side-santa-claus/ Even the North Pole myth can be turned to a Dutch fittie because the Dutch were the first to search for a northern shipping route to Japan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willem_Barentsz


----------



## Jacck (Dec 24, 2017)

TxllxT said:


> https://dutchreview.com/culture/holidays/secret-dutch-side-santa-claus/ Even the North Pole myth can be turned to a Dutch fittie because the Dutch were the first to search for a northern shipping route to Japan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willem_Barentsz


most of the Holidays and traditions we have nowadays are amalgamations of various cultural influence. Several holidays in Czech Republic are amalgamations of Christianity, that was superimposed on even older pagan traditions, whose origins have long been forgotten. The whole Jesus figure is likely a myth of Ancient East. 
https://www.rawstory.com/2019/12/here-are-5-reasons-to-suspect-jesus-never-existed-3/
the old Testament is likely an amalgamation of anciet Jewish history (they were a tribe of sheperds then) and older summerian, akkadian and egyptian mythology. Humankind likes its fairytales.


----------



## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

I spent the afternoon writing cards - did all but one, that needs a longer letter - and posted them all just before tea. Feeling very pleased to have got it done. Now to answer my own questions.

These days, too, people worry about the cost or the ecological significance of sending cards.
What do you think?
I don't think there's a problem if the cards are recyclable, and the custom does have a good side in that charities can benefit at this time of year by selling cards.

Do you send cards?
Yes - about 32 this year, but in times past, when we were teachers, we'd send and receive 70 or 80.
But no matter how many I buy, I can guarantee that just when I have sent my last, someone unexpected will give me a card and I'll have to go out and buy some more.

Do you send a newsletter?
It varies. Sometimes I just write a line or two in the cards, but if I have serious news to impart, for example the year my Mum died, I write a newsletter because it's less upsetting. This year I sent a short one with our change of address in it - we're moving house in January. I do try to keep it short, never more than half a page.

Do you grin or groan as you read your friends' newsletters.
Sometimes I groan - I had a friend who thought newsletters were pretentious, so every year he came up with a way of imparting news obliquely - a poem, a parody etc - and it was such a faff having to work out what he meant! Other friends send newsletters of two or three pages, detailing their grown-up children's lives. It's hard to take in, and impossible to remember afterwards.

Are you trying to cut down your list?
I have done this year - there seems little point in keeping up with slight acquaintances in Norfolk now that I've left the area. And some friends of yore have stopped writing, so I don't send them cards now either.

Do you think it's a harmful habit.
In general, I don't enjoy Christmas. I hate eating too much, the schmaltzy advertising, the materialism. But cards, I enjoy. It's nice choosing them and writing them, and it's nice to hear how people are getting on.

Do you eschew religious cards?
 I usually buy both religious and secular cards and send the latter to those - like my younger brother - who are hostile to religion.

Do you prefer 'Happy Christmas' or 'Happy Holidays' or 'Season's Greetings'?
 Happy Holidays is hardly known in Britain, so it's a choice between Merry/ Happy Christmas or Season's Greetings. I don't like Season's Greetings - it sounds coldly efficient. My favourite greeting, which was in some of the cards I sent is 'Wishing you Peace & Joy at Christmas'.

Do you have any funny stories about cards - birthday cards or other greetings cards, not just Christmas cards?
This is really about a letter rather than a card - but my late mother was absent-minded (like me). It so happened that my grandmother, Mary Gwendoline, had chosen my mother's name to echo her initials - Margaret Gladys. My mother was addressing a letter to her mother. She wrote Mrs M. G. - then by force of habit, wrote her own married name, not her mother's surname. She then automatically completed it by writing her own street number and name and town, then went out to post it - and was surprised the next morning by receiving her own missive back again through her letterbox.


----------



## Open Book (Aug 14, 2018)

I have no plans to reduce my Christmas card list. At my age it's reducing itself, people are disappearing. Why wouldn't I cherish who I have? I'm happy with newsletters, photos of kids or pets, or anything that's sent to me. 

It's silly to worry about the ecological significance of the short term practice of sending Christmas cards. Maybe worry instead about the ecological significance of amazon.com vans out delivering one order or even one item at a time to meet their 2-day Prime deadlines.


----------



## TxllxT (Mar 2, 2011)

Just a slight variation on the Christmas theme which is ding-donging away already. Here a lovely carol in Russian language. Enjoy.











https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carol_of_the_Bells


----------



## CnC Bartok (Jun 5, 2017)

This is our Czech Betlém. Basically an historic display, from somewhere in Moravia? but sold as do-it-yourself cardboard cutouts, got it about ten years ago and spent God knows how many hours cutting it out. The display is about one metre across (that's a Linn turntable underneath for scale!).

I'm jolly chuffed with it to be honest! A labour of love my end!









All the gifts for my girls were kindly provided by Ježíšek, late evening on 24th, although Father Christmas did also visit for the following morning!

I must also confess that I really dislike Christmas. Both my parents passed away this time of year a few years back, exactly 51 weeks apart, so there tends to be a bit of a morose cloud over the holiday in my heart and mind. Brave or poker face for the kids though......


----------



## TxllxT (Mar 2, 2011)

Here an amazing organ version of the Carol of the Bells:


----------

