Custom Notecards with Child's Artwork (Art by Ayla)

How to Turn Your Child's Artwork into Professionally Printed Notecards and Greeting Cards

I surprised Ayla today with a really fun package in the mail. I turned a couple of her "Best Of" first grade artwork projects into custom notecards at Zazzle! She was totally pumped when she saw them! 

"Oh wow!!  This is so cool!"

In order to turn her large pieces of artwork into small printed greeting cards, I photographed them with a high quality camera (and a tripod) in natural light.  Our front porch in the afternoon is a perfect place to do that.  I used painter's tape to tack them to the brick wall, hanging them as straight as I could, and placing the camera on a tripod directly across from them (to minimize any distorting). I ended up with pictures like this:

Then, I cropped the images to include only the artwork (it helped that they were pre-matted pieces), and auto-adjusted the contrast and colors in Photoshop, until I had two high quality images, like this:

Finally, I just uploaded them to Zazzle and created Ayla's very own personalized notecards with her own original artwork on it.  What a cool way to show off her work! She'll love sending these to her friends and family (they even come with their own envelopes).

The cards turned out fantastic! The slick printed top looks really professional, and I love that I could customize the inside (I made the inside flap a solid coordinating color) add a little note on the back:

I'm definitely a fan.  We'll totally be doing this again.  

• Cameleon Watercolor Cards - Art by Ayla
• Sailboat Pastel Cards - Art by Ayla
• Watercolor Fish Cards - Art by Ayla

What do you do with your kids' artwork each year???