The Making Of Our Christmas Letter

While Julia (right) folded, Veronica (left) handled the stamps and Lauren did the stuffing.

Producing our annual Christmas letter has become a several-weeks-in-the-making production. We started on this year's letter a few days before Thanksgiving. The process begins with Sean asking the girls questions for their bio sections. Next comes the first review of photos. From several hundred pictures, we narrow the choices down to about 10 for each girl, then start considering which ones will actually fit either the context of the letter or even the space requirements (it has to be vertical to make the back section).

There's also the selection of group photos. This year, we had more than 40 to choose from, which was nice. Next up is the layout. The 2011 Christmas letter was one we liked, so we used that template for starters. Finally, there was the writing of the front page stories. Then editing, production, folding, addressing of envelopes, placing of stamps and return address labels, message-writing, closing and mailing. Whew. Fortunately, the girls are very much into helping with every stage of the process.

You can download a color version (PDF) of our Christmas letter here. Please note that it is a huge (175 MB) file, so it might take awhile for it to download.

Olivia was the queen of addressing again this year.

Veronica (right) wore the same shirt as Lauren did for school pictures a few years ago.

Here's what the front page looked like as Sean worked on it in the airport in Paris.