So Prepared

I knew that I wanted to do birth announcements for sure but after looking everywhere online (even ebay and etsy) the cheapest I could find them was for about $1 each card (one was $15 plus the cost of printing) and since I knew I needed around 50 of them, it seemed to be a problem. I just can't justify spending that much money on cards that nobody actually NEEDS.

I found a few examples that I liked and Cliff and I picked out our favorite design. Just so happens it was simple enough I knew I could figure out how to do it on my own. It took me a few hours of playing with Gimp (photo editing program) but I got it down. I even figured out how to hijack font types from other computers (my own selection was sorely lacking) so I could use a pretty font.


The hardest part of the whole process was getting time to take her photo since I needed Cliff to hold her for our chosen photo and somewhere to take it. I ended up recruiting my mother to hold up the back drop (couch blanket) in our kitchen and I got Evelyn drunk (on breast milk, not really drunk), stripped her down to her birthday suit (with the cloth diapers it was too bulky for Cliff to hold) and snapped a few pictures. Poor Cliff's arms were dying because I kept taking pictures so that I could get the perfect one (lighting, her position, etc).


I took the photo and edited it (took about an hour for the whole process) then sent it in for printing. With the extra time I had waiting for Evelyn to come I managed to address and stamp my envelopes and design the birth announcements. What a brilliant idea it was! Several days later I got my announcements in the mail and all I had to do was stuff them in the envelopes and send them on their merry way.

Sure I could of purchased them and saved myself the hassle (not much of one in the first place) but I think the 10 dollars I spent on printing and envelopes was a much better use of my money.