You can create all kinds of greeting cards for holidays, birthdays, baby announcements, and invitations. It’s very easy! The ‘Shutterfly Store’ section of our site takes you through the process step-by-step, but you may wish to print out these instructions for reference.

Getting Started

First, click Shutterfly Store on the green navigation bar. Next, click on the Cards option under ‘Shop by category’ to proceed to the card start page and click on Greeting cards at the bottom of the screen.

1. Border

Shutterfly has dozens of borders for all occasions. Start by choosing a general card type, like Holiday cards, Baby announcements, or General cards. On the next page, browse through the borders and click on one to preview/choose it. You can also see other border types using the links on the right. If you want a simple, plain border or edge, or if you don’t want any border, click ‘General borders’.

2. Picture

The next step is to add your picture to your card. Click Choose Cover Picture, then select an album and then a picture from that album for your card. Click Use Picture for Card Cover (or just click the picture directly). You will be taken back to the ‘Preview picture’ page to see what the front of your card will look like.

You can use the zoom in/out buttons and 4 arrows to move the picture around on the card, and you can also remove red eye or add effects (like black & white or sepia). Additionally, you can select matte or glossy finish for your card cover. Remember that your card will be printed as it appears. If your image appears upside-down, use the ‘Rotate’ icons to rotate the picture within the border. When you are satisfied with your picture and border, click Next.

Special borders: If you want to add an uncommon border that you didn’t find on the main card borders pages, you can click ‘Enhance/edit picture’. This screen allows you to choose any border in our archive. On the ‘Borders’ tab, use the drop down menu to choose a set of borders to see, or choose ‘More borders’ to see the whole archive of borders on one page.

3. Greeting

The greeting and closing will appear inside the card on the bottom (if your picture is in landscape mode) or on the right (if your picture is in portrait mode). Click on the boxes to add or edit your greeting and closing. The boxes will not be printed on the final card.

As you are entering your text, you can use the controls to choose a font, size, color, and alignment. The greeting and closing can each have different fonts, sizes, colors, and alignment, so that you can make your card look just the way you want it. Note that the size is a “suggestion” — but if you type in many lines of text, the system will shrink the text to fit on your card, even if you choose “extra large” text.

If you want ideas for what to say for special occasions like invitations, holiday messages, etc., click Choose a suggested greeting and browse through our collection. Click on the title of the suggested greeting to insert it into your card. Many of the suggested greetings have “fill in the blank” areas for you to add your own information. Click on the Greeting box to edit the greeting and replace the blanks [____] with your own text.

Please review your text carefully. Shutterfly cannot be responsible for any errors made when entering your card text (typos, misspellings, etc.)

Once you have your Greeting looking just the way you want it, click Next.

4. Mailing

How do you want us to mail your cards?

Choose Send cards back to me for a box of cards, to be mailed back to you. Blank envelopes are included. You will be asked for a Shipping address on the next screen.The shipping charge for the box of cards will be calculated when you add the cards to the cart and choose a quantity.

Choose Mail cards for me for cards that are sent directly to the recipients that you specify. These cards will all be inserted in envelopes, addressed, and given a first class stamp. On the next two screens, you will be asked to select all of your recipients and specify a return address for the envelope. The postage and handling fee will be calculated and added when you add the cards to the cart.

5. Optional Message

If you want, you can add a message to the inside top (if your picture is in landscape mode) or inside left (if your picture is in portrait mode). The Personal Message is optional and may be skipped.

If your cards will be sent back to you, then the same message will be printed inside all of the cards. If your cars will be sent to your recipients, then you can write a standard message and then customize it for each person in the next step.

As with the Greeting, you can customize your Message with a variety of fonts, font sizes, etc..

Again, please review your text carefully for any errors.

Final step! Preview

This step will show you exactly what your card will look like. Use the links for Cover, Inside, Top and Bottom to see the different parts of your card. If you want to make any changes, click on the numbered steps at the top of the screen:

Make your change, and click ‘Preview’ to come back and preview your change. When you are happy with your card, click ‘Next, add to order.’

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