FAQs

To make our photo announcements, invitations and cards, we take your photo print or digital photo, crop and retouch it, and print it with your choice of copy. Our talented artists will adjust and resize the image to produce your cards, removing flaws, lightening and adjusting colors and values in the process. Some of our cards are only printed in black and white, but we can convert your color photo to make these cards.

We know you are in a hurry, and we do our best to provide custom art in a reasonable time. Orders are normally shipped out within 2-3 business days of receipt (not including weekends or holidays). Holiday Card orders take several days longer, due to increased volume. This turnaround time does not include shipping time to us or back to you. Keep in mind that the U.S. mail can take two days or ten days! If you wish to get your order very quickly, don't use U.S. mail. Express shipping options are available to speed your order to you, but do not shorten the 3 business-day turnaround time in our office. (We are closed weekends and major holidays to be with our families, and our express deliveries do not include weekends or major holidays either.)

Yes. We ship to many locations outside of the USA, including Canada, most of Europe, and many other selected locations. Check our shipping rates page in our information section for countries and estimated rates. You will need to select the option Ground shipping for international addresses, which will be sent via International Priority or Economy, which normally takes 3-5 days for delivery to your country.

We will contact you via email if we cannot ship to you and need to cancel your order. Please note that the shipping rate you are given is an estimate. Due to high shipping costs for large packages, and damage issues, we do not offer frames, albums or gifts to ship to international addresses. Duties, taxes and customs fees are your responsibility.

Yes. We can print foreign languages provided they use Roman characters (the same characters as English). You must provide your wording typewritten if it is not in English. There is no additional charge for this service. If you wish to have two versions of your announcement, i.e., English and French, there is a $5.00 set-up charge for the type change. (The total quantity ordered may be divided in any amount between the versions, i.e., 62 English and 38 French for a total of 100 ordered.) If you wish to print two versions, please call to add this fee to your order. In addition, we recommend a proof of the non-English version. The proof charge is $5.00. You may indicate a second version of your wording in the "My Custom Wording" box while ordering online.

You can reorder for one month after you receive your order. A reorder form will be sent to you with your order.

Our announcements are easily adapted to multiples. Twins can be accommodated by using one photo of both twins on most designs, or our Original Twins Cameo design for one photo of each. Triplets, or more, can be similarly accommodated by any of our versions, depending upon the photo, and are a natural fit for our Expressions design. To keep the focus on the photo, some parents of multiples prefer to omit information about length, birth time and possibly even weight. Please contact us if you have any questions!

To order, send us your order details, photo, and payment using our web site or catalog order form. You can start the online order process by looking through our online product catalog and clicking "add to cart" on the item you wish to order. Once you complete the order details online, you can submit online, or print and mail. You can mail or email photos to go with your order. If you have any problem, please call! (1-800-421-9521 Monday thru Friday 9-5 EST) We will be more than happy to help!

Yes. If you wish, we can send your envelopes for a future card order for a $10 deposit on your order. Just call us to arrange this at 800-421-9521. The office is open 9-4 EST weekdays. You can also email details and we will call you for any missing information and payment information.

You may order a proof of your card via fax or email for a $5 charge per proof. We recommend proofs for orders shipped to international addresses and for cards printed in foreign languages. Since there is time lost in the proof process, it usually adds about a day to your order turnaround time.

Photos are handled with personal care from a digital artist. Since most of our work is done by the time you see the proof, we cannot change which photo we are using at the proof stage. If you wish to start with a new photo, you will need to pay a $30 photo set-up charge at that time. If you cancel your order AFTER your photo is worked up, you will be charged a non-refundable $30 photo set-up fee that is included in photo card orders.

How can you avoid all this and still get the results you want??? Many customers are concerned that the photo they are sending will not work well. If you are concerned, put a note in with your order asking us to give you a call before proceeding. One of our artists will call and review your photos with you, choosing the one for optimum results. Please do not send photos that you do not like, or that are not a good resemblence for how you see your child. We will proofread your order carefully against what you send us. We have an extremely high satisfaction rate and think you will be pleased with our careful retouching and correcting of your photo! If we do make an error on your order, we will gladly make it right and send replacement materials by express mail.

Sharp focus is most important. With babies, this requires a zoom lens. If your camera doesn't have a zoom lens, move farther away to get better focus. Use 100 or 200 speed film. We prefer to work from glossy color prints. We can also work from black and white prints. We cannot work from negatives or Polaroids. See our photo tips page for more information.

We find Bellevue and Medici Script to work well on almost all cards because they are very readable and lend a decorative element. For an announcement with minimal wording, any typestyle will work. However, for cards with lots of text avoid our fancier scripts.

We take pride in carefully retouching, proofreading, and printing each order. We want you to be delighted to mail out your cards! If any problems should arise, we will work to correct them.

CORRECTIONS

-- If we make a mistake on your order from the information you provided, we will correct the problem and express the corrected materials to you as soon as possible.
-- If you provided us with incorrect information, unclear information, or you are not happy with the photo you sent us, we will be happy to work with you to correct the problem using reorder pricing or less, depending upon the materials that need to be replaced.

RETURNS

-- If you are unhappy with your order, you may return it in its entirety, in original condition, for a refund within one month of purchase. However, two charges are not refundable. (1) You will not be refunded for a $30 setup charge (which was incorporated in all card prices). (2) You will not be refunded for shipping charges.

CANCELLATIONS

-- If you cancel your order before it ships, you will incur a $30 non-refundable setup charge if your order has already been worked on by an artist.

The keepsake you are mailing is timeless, and will be saved by many. So, although in a perfect world it is ideal to send announcements out during baby's first month, sometimes life with a newborn delays things a bit. We recommend that you send announcements out even if baby is over a month old, and that you wait to order them until you have a photo you feel does your baby justice. Your friends and family will remember the quality of the card and message of pure joy, not the date your announcement arrived in the mail. On average, it takes most parents about a month after baby's arrival to send their order to us, but we frequently make announcements for babies weeks older. Occasionally we even do an announcement for a baby who is more than three months old. At any age, good news is nice to receive.

Actually, photos taken the first week are not usually the best photos of the baby. We recommend waiting a few days at least to get the best photos, and that you consider all the photos you have of the first few weeks to choose the one that you think looks most like the baby you know and love. Be sure to read our photo tips to get the best photo (linked under "information").

We will be happy to accept your correction or change up until the point your order is printed. Please call and email as soon as you realize you have a change, and we will check the status of your order. Once your order is printed, we will be happy to work with you to reprint the needed changes with minimal charges to cover replacement materials and shipping.

If you already have your item in the cart, but you are getting an error when you checkout, try choosing the payment option "will call in my credit card number or mail a check" and see if the order goes through. Then you can call us with your credit card number for payment.

We prefer to start from a glossy color print, even for our black and white announcements. We can also work from your black and white print for our black and white cards. For best results, be sure to read our photo tips before choosing your announcement photo.

Yes. They will be returned.