It’s that time of year again… time for your mail carrier to put on the weightbelt as she lugs batches of holiday greetings from around the world and crams them into your mailbox.
As I mentioned in a previous blog, I thoroughly enjoy getting Christmas correspondences (even the ubiquitous four-page family newsletters packed with pertinent personal details like the fact that Susie lost her front tooth in August, Sam was successfully potty-trained in May, and Rover dragged a skunk home on Halloween). What’s more, any of these holiday greetings include adorable pictures of family and friend’s darling children (some of who are much more darling in pictures than in person).
While getting these festive (and sometimes expensive) reminders that someone is thinking of you is flattering, figuring out exactly what to do with the deluge of cards and pictures can be a problem. After all, what kind of Grinch is heartless enough to toss a picture-perfect glossy snapshot of his cousin’s kid?
Then again, there are only so many picture cards a mantel can accommodate. After about the 50th greeting I start taping them around a doorframe. The first 49 get the honor of being affixed to my elegant wire cardholder designed in the shape of a Christmas tree that I picked up at an after-Christmas sale at Target a couple of years ago. Might I add that the box said the cardholder could hold up to 24 cards, yet I found a way to cram more than double that on the sturdy metal frame.
If you only receive a handful of Christmas cards each year, then obviously you are too unpopular to even deal with the dilemma of what to do with your card collection when the holidays are over. But, for you others out there: Do you dump them, preserve the pictures in a special photo album, or just cram them in a Ziploc bag and store them in a closet? As a parent I don’t have the heart to throw them out, namely because I can’t imagine having someone do the same to the snapshots I send out each year of my precious offspring dressed in her holiday finest.
What do you do with the stacks of holiday greetings and pictures you receive this time of year?
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