Colossal Christmas Countdown: 81 Days Until Christmas!

Having a child is such a special time in a person's life.  From the moment you find out you're pregnant, there is a flutter of excitement around as you prepare for the big day...your baby's arrival!  I remember when I was pregnant with Riley, that there never seemed to be a dull moment.  I actually had three different baby showers and had the best time at every single one of them!  Once Riley was born, I was so sleep-deprived and anxious about being a new mommy, that I never got around to sending out her formal birth announcement. Bad mommy, I know!  Well, as the saying goes, "Better Late Than Never", right?  Hallmark.com was generous enough to ask me to review their wide variety of personalized baby announcements and I loved how the one I created turned out!  What would you think if you received a baby announcement in the mail for a child who is now almost 2 years old?  :)  I'm very tempted to actually send these out!

It was no surprise to me that Hallmark.com had a huge selection of beautiful baby announcements that could be customized using a favorite picture and greeting.  I had a very hard time finally settling on which design to select as well as which baby picture of Riley to use!  Finally, I decided to try the Yellow Label - Add Initial Birth Announcement because it was a large 5" x 7" flat card which mainly showcased the photo of the baby.

One of the things I really liked about the Hallmark.com baby announcements, was that they were all printed on textured white premium paper stock, not a flimsy thin piece of paper.  Of course this premium type of paper also displays the colors of your photo more vividly too.  Once I had finally chosen the perfect picture, all that was left to do was to personalize this card using Hallmark's online tools.

Hallmark.com did their best to make the personalization process very easy, but unfortunately, in their attempt to automate everything for you, they ended up making one step harder than it had to be.  I had a very hard time getting Riley's picture cropped and lined up exactly how I wanted it, because Hallmark.com gives you virtually no control over the alignment of your picture.

I had to keep editing the picture in my own photo software and then reimporting it to Hallmark's online service and trying it.  After about 7 attempts at this, I finally got Riley's picture adjusted on the card exactly how I wanted it.  My suggestion to Hallmark is to give the user more control over their own picture and stop automating how it comes up on the card.

After the picture was in place, the rest was very simple and I finished the card in a snap!  Inputting Riley's birth information took only seconds and I was pleasantly surprised at Hallmark even letting me personalize the back of the card too!  I decided to include a picture of Michael and I (and Riley) only 5 days before Riley was born with a short message attached.

Hallmark made this part quick and convenient for they had a whole directory of sample messages to use if you didn't feel like creating your own.  I thought this one was perfect:

"Our home is filled with happiness, our hearts are filled with love, because we have the baby girl that we've been dreaming of."

Now that my birth announcement was all set and ready to go, I received another pleasant surprise!  Hallmark.com actually includes the envelopes in the price of the birth announcement and will even address them for you!  If you don't want to type in or import the recipients' addresses, you can still have just your return address printed on the envelopes, like I did (shown in picture above).  How helpful is that!  The envelopes also looked very professional and top of the line.

I couldn't be happier with how Riley's birth announcements and matching envelopes turned out and I was thrilled at how fast my order arrived!  Hallmark.com has such a wide selection of everything from Invitations, Thank You Notes, Holiday Cards, etc. that I now have a one-stop shop for all of my personalized cards!

Disclosure:  I received a gift card from Hallmark.com in order to facilitate my review. No other compensation was received. This product review is based on my own personal experiences with this item and is completely honest and objective.