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Hi! This is my first time posting, and I appreciate all your recommendations. I started making cards approximately 2 years ago. I don't give a lot of them, but usually give them to the same people (mostly family and friends). Since sometimes I duplicate the design or make the same with different sentiments, I like to create a system where I have visibility of each card and the person receiving it. I guess this will help me in not repeating the design to the same person, and remembering what card I sent to each person. Thought on taking a picture of the card and adding the name of the recipient, but it seems complicated; there must be another method. What do you do?
Almost all my cards are uploaded to the gallery here. So I just have a spreadsheet with the name of the person in one column and a brief description of the card (enough to help me identify it) in another. It's an ongoing sheet with a new month added at the bottom when I start organising my birthdays for the upcoming month.
I keep a separate document for Christmas cards. For that I prefer a document rather than a spreadsheet because it's easier to see what I sent to the same person each year. I strikeout previous cards and type the new one in in colour.
In effect, each person is their own paragraph.
I send few enough that I just take a photo and remember who it was for.
If you want something low-tech you could perhaps write the person's name and date on a piece of paper in large letters and put it by the card when you take the photo.
I actually have been collecting rubber stamps for 20+ years so, I have an evernote file to keep track of tools ( stamps, dies etc) and over time I started adding photos to the files of tools to prove to my self that yes, that has been inked... and then after even more time had passed I started files for family and friends and I have added mug shots to their folders inside the inventory. so, I can go to my mother in law and see that I must evidently LOVE that IO garden bench scene because, I have used it twice for her birthdays... :mrgreen:
(and she saves all the cards in a photo album and has never said a word) :lol:
honestly, I think most people just love receiving them and its not going to matter if so and so gets a fishing card every few years know what I mean?
I keep track in a steno notebook (really old school). Put the year in the middle of the page, month underlined and then name, description and occassion. I have used cards for multiple reasons and this has been a huge help. Plus it keeps up the writing skills....soon to be a lost art.....LOL
I have been doing cards nearly 40 years... and in the beginning for holidays, made different cards for each family member in case they compared cards, I wanted them to to know they were getting special cards from me. After many many years of that, I found some friends using one theme for each holiday and it made things so much easier. I have a recipe box, and list the name of the die cut or Cricut cut used, and list the persons name on the index card, or where the die came from (Spellbinders Small Die of the Month Club). I have been doing this for years now, and have 2 full recipe boxes of cards but found this was the best method for me. Quick, easy and to the point. But, as someone posted, the recipients enjoy all hand crafted cards, even if the 'basic theme' is a duplicate. For my themed holidays, I take a picture (digital camera) and print the pic, and have them in a little album and list everyone who received that particular card. I also do this if I make several cards of one style that I especially like and might want to repeat later on (take a pic and put it in my album).
When making multiples (usually 4 or 6) of the same card, I keep one of the design in a plastic sleeve for my "inventory" that has a sticky note on it with the date, and name of who got it. I also keep track of the "recipe" for supplies, what dies used and techniques used.
Thank you so much for the recommendations, I like them all. I worked as office administrator for many many years, and believe it or not, now I try to use technology the less possible. Now prefer "old school" like some of you mentioned. I always read about evernote, but not feel motivated to use it yet :( Will try either taking the photo with a note of the recipient/date included, or printing the photo and create a book with the recipients name and date.
I don't exactly mind repeating a design to the same person, but I love to remember what card I send to a person, even after years have passed ... weird yes!
I enjoy this forum a lot! Although this is the first time I post something, I always read it and have learned a lot from you all. THANKS A BUNCH!!!
I have a 3 ring binder (5x8”) and have a page for each person I send a card to. I put down the date and occasion (birthday, get well, thinking of you) and stamp the front image and sentiment and the inside verse. I’ll also do a sketch and list the supplies I used. I sometimes attach a piece of paper, ribbon, etc.
I take a picture of every card I make but haven’t organized them in any order at all yet. Might be a good lockdown project...
I've found uploading to the gallery here easy - after the first time! - and you can add notes to your heart's content. I just often forget to do so. But like you, while I'm a comfortable end-user, I don't enjoy smooshing together computing and crafting with few exceptions. A low tech way to keep track of who you sent what might just be to copy your cards on your printer and jot down notes next to the card.
Or if you wanted a bit of computing, you could type notes on a permanent Word doc, print it - but don't save it so you'd just have the permanent form- print it out and lay it on the printer with the card to copy it. You could put the copies in a binder by date, occasion or person.
Hi, Marta! I also prefer low-tech. I take photos of every card with my phone. I LOVE the idea of adding a note with the name in the photo. I have started taking a photo of the inside also, so I don't use the same birthday words over and over.
When my daughter can help me I load the photos to Google, but I don't know if I can add comments there.
Much easier to scan through a row of photos instead of opening each posting.
Right now I dont give so many different people that I cant just pop the pic into a file folder with their name and then label the card pic like Christmas 2019.
But if I had a LOT of people I was sending cards to....
and I really wanted to know that, I could number them and then just keep a list either handwritten or in a computer with the corresponding number to the pictures.
ie Aunt Mary has gotten
2018 Christmas # 3, Easter # 8, Birthday #20
2019 Christmas #1, Easter #2, Birthday# 3 and so on.
This way you have the visual and the low tech option.
I do make the same holiday card for everyone so I only have to keep one sample in my book or a picture to know. For a couple of years I made the same card for all the women and all the men for birthdays, all the couples for anniversaries...and then made it personal with my handwritten note. the odd card like a wedding I just labeled the picture who it was for. I have never had anyone complain about that. Though I would like to make the birthdays a little more personal in the future. In which case I can just label the picture too.
WOW! Some of y'all are so very organized! You put a lot of time and effort in keeping track of card giving. That's wonderful. I used to be pretty organized but not really motivated so much anymore. So to answer OP, I don't worry about it. I never have (15yr card maker here). I know I have most likely sent the same bday/anniversary card to the same person/s more than once. I have never heard a complaint or even a comment about it being the "same as" last whatever. I do, however, have a very small notebook I write in: date-occasion-recipient. No idea whatsoever what card I sent to any of them at any given time, other than it was a bday card or whatever. Sheesh, now I feel like I should be keeping better track. Oh, while reading through some of these responses, thank you very much, I had the idea to write the date-occasion-recipient- in the notebook, I should just write it on the back of my address card for each person. Then I could see at a glance how often I send cards to folks.
I scan every card I send. I save them on my hard drive by year. Then as back-up I copy it to a rewritable CD. I always use the same naming convention: Name occasion year. e.g. SusanG MD (for Mother’s Day) 2019.
When I want to see the cards I have previously sent to SusanG, I just search the folder on my hard drive (I call it Cards Scanned) for SusanG, then open them all (click on 1st one, hold shift key & click on last one to select all, then right click & select open to see them all). Can also search for MD to see all Mother’s Day cards I have sent. Or SusanG MD to see only those sent to Susan.
It just takes a couple of minutes to scan & save but has so been worth the time to not replicate cards sent to one person or to be able to see a card I want to replicate.
When I look at all the cards I have sent to a person over the years, I shudder at the cards I made in my first years of stamping & can see how my skills have greatly improved.
I send out at least 30 cards a month to people for various reasons. Birthday cards are done by theme each month, as are anniversaries, Christmas, Easter and Thanksgiving by year. Everyone gets a different card. Sometimes I will make several of the same birthday card, but put a different greeting on it, if my stash is low in thinking of you or thank you, for example. I would not like to send the same thank you to someone who got that card for their birthday. Also, I like to keep track of the technique, stamps, sizes of cardstock in case one of my stamping friends wants to know how it was done. I used to make a sample card for each card I made but it didn't take too long and I had 5- 4" binders full of plastic pocketed pages that held 8 cards each and not enough room to devote to any more. So, even though I really like "old school" I decided to scan in, or photograph (if the card was too bulky) each card and wrote up a description, date, occasion and person it was sent to in text form to go with it. I file them by theme and further by stamp in my documents. It is easy to do a search by the stamp set, technique, theme, or date. A combo of the above makes it even easier to find. I do miss paging through my theme binders, but it would be filling a whole room after 20+ years of making cards and since I take my computer with me wherever I go, I always have the info handy. My sisters loved that I did it, as they were the recipients of all those sample cards and could send them out for many years afterward.
Last edited by jeanne3579; 04-22-2020 at 06:02 AM..
I'm a low tech person who sends a lot of cards and keep track by making copies of my cards with my printer, two cards per page. I jot down the recipe for making the card and the date and file the pages, back to back in plastic page protectors. In a separate small binder, I keep a list of recipients alphabetically and include the date the card was sent. I am able to quickly find the information I want, so it works for me.
I'm gobsmacked by how many cards you send out and how organized you are! I've been making cards for 16 years. I don't know as many people as some of you so I'm sending many fewer cards than you each year. Early on I made an agreement with myself not to make the same card twice. Because I don't send many this wasn't a hard promise to keep, and it eliminated the problem of sending the same card twice to the same person/family. I keep inkjet copies of the cards I like best in case I want to rework them and to chart my progress. I take pictures of the larger, mixed media pieces I make.
I take photos of the outside and inside of my cards as shown and I always date the inside. It's easy to browse my photos to back to the date I sent their last card. You can always write tags/comments with your photos for future searches too. I was doing that but found I could scroll/browse and find things just as easy. I do make a special folder for my handmade cards and drag and drop a copy of them from my photo library into that folder so I only have to look through that folder and not all my photos. Not too much technology in this method. Wow! Big images...don't know how to size them here...sorry to hog space.
For keeping track of cards I send, I use excel. I have a master file of family and friends birthdays and anniversaries - dates in order and names are first two columns. I add a column when it is the new year, and fill in a note about what kind of card I sent - butterfly, ocean, owls, etc. I can see what theme I used in prior years in those columns to the right of the current year. I select the birthdays and anniversaries each month and print them on a sheet of paper that I keep in a folder on my desk that I can grab and check to make sure I am on track for mailing cards on time. Writing what card I sent also helps me when someone thanks me for the "beautiful card"!
I take pictures of all the cards I make and keep track of them using an Adobe product called Lightroom. I like it because I can put keywords in like sympathy, birthday, the technique or the stamp company. Then I can search to remind myself how I used the stamp or technique before.
Finally, I do use Evernote to keep track of my stamps and stencils. I can search through the tags to find words or images that I want.
__________________ Jo AnnMy SCS gallery / my blogThe cure for everything is salt water - sweat, tears or the sea~Isak Dinesen FS 776
I have books where I write down what I have used on each card and who I've sent them too. I also scan in all my cards, so I know what each card looks like. I've recently started making files on my computer for each recipient of my cards and copied and pasted a thumbnail of each card I've sent to each person. I've made them as word documents, so I can easily resize each photo pic.
My card making isn't organized at all. I do have a paper list of people and their bdays, etc. But each and every card i make is an "original ". The layouts are very similar as i like to cut my paper ahead of time ala Connie Stewart. So i don't worry about who gets what.
One of the most used stamp i own is LIMITED EDITION:1 OF 1 which I stamp on the back of each card. (I found it at a thrift store, it's a Stampers Anonymous stamp, not sure if they're still in business though.)
Hi Marta, I don't have the titles of all my stamps or die cuts listed so I usually upload my card into my computer into "the folder of the month" I have these folders going back about 10 years. It's not a perfect system but it's working for me. Then, underneath each picture of the card, I list the name/names of the people that I have sent it to. I don't usually duplicate many cards unless It's a specific holiday especially Christmas then there might be several names under a card. The slight problem so far is when I have to check back to see if I've sent the person that image in the past if I'm using a favorite image but again, doesn't happen to often because I've got so many stamps I haven't used and most of the time I can narrow it down to within a few months of their birthdays or a holiday.. Still, it isn't perfect...
Some of these are way too organized for me! I have a board titled "Cards Sent" on my Pinterest Board, take a picture & pin it & then add comments to who & why the card was sent.
Hi Marta! I use a very simple system. I make an "initial card" for ME, just to make sure I like it enough to send out. It doesn't have to be the entire card - just the "main image." Then, when I send it out I place the name of the people I send it to on the back of my sample. I don't have a camera or a cell phone, so I can't take a picture and have albums on my computer or have a gallery on SCS. This works for me. Hope it helps.
I am low tech and send out about 30 cards or less per year. I photocopy the outside of the card and write on it who I sent it to, the date sent and for what occasion. i.e 47th birthday. I also make a few construction notes if needed. I keep all the photocopies in a 3 holed binder. My Christmas cards are all the same - I do not make a customized one for each recipient.
Wow, I'm very impressed with the organization skills I've seen on the previous posts. I've been stamping for about 30 years and have used various methods to keep track. I don't send a huge amount of cards.....not like I've seen from some of you but I have a large extended family so I make an effort to send something fresh. I agree that most people are just thrilled with a homemade card and don't care. I've used a binder for several years but someone steered me onto Pinterest. I take a photo of the card, upload it to a folder on Pinterest that's just for me and then I add a note about who it went to and anything else I want to remember. It's working well for me, although I have to admit, there were a few times that I found myself addressing the envelope and forgot to take a picture. When that happens I go back to my old binder method.
I usually make 6-8 duplicates of each card and store them in sandwich size ziploc bags. I keep a post-it note attached to the bottom of the front card that says who I have sent that card to.
So many great ideas. My method is fairly simple. I usually use it for Christmas because I have a very large family and get tired of making one card 40 or so times. I make 5 or 6 styles, copy two to a page on my scanner and cut the page in half. This way there is one card on each half. I make all of my cards up before sending them so I keep these prints close when addressing envelopes. I just put who the card was sent to on the back or front if there is room. When finished I staple the prints together with the year on the front. It lands in the box I keep for left over Christmas cards from year to year. A lot of times I end up with extra cards. The following year
I don't want to use last years card for the same person so I look on the back of the card picture to see who it went to. No repeat this way.
Since I take photos of my cards for posting to my gallery, I keep them in an iPhoto album and you can add info to the photo so I type something like "Jane 2020" in the info then I know who I sent it to and what year. I can search by the person's name and all the cards I sent to that person will show up.
__________________ Susan
My SCS gallery is here should you care to look! Or please visit my blog, Cardmaker's Garret.
Card inventory
