Videos

Description

This database template is for tracking your Holiday Greeting Cards. The template also includes 3 videos in addition to the introduction video.

Video 1 is a free TechHelp video. I will show you how to track your Christmas Card list in Microsoft Access. We will modify my free customer database so you can see who is on your list. We'll make mailing labels for the people on the list. We'll use an update query to track the last date we sent cards out to each person, and we'll use an append query to put a note in their contact history so you can see all of the times in the past you've sent them cards.

Video 2 is the Members Only Extended Cut TechHelp Video. We will see how to create different greetings for card recipients, such as Joe Smith, Joe & Sue Smith, Joe Smith & Sue Jones, The Smith Family, or whatever else you'd like. You can customize the greeting for each recipient. We'll also use conditional formatting to easily see who is missing address data.

Video 3 is a Developer Walkthru of the extra features in the template, such as printing postcards, customizing the design and layout of the postcards, manually positioning fields, changing fonts with the Windows Font Dialog Box, duplicating records, and lots more. Watch the introduction video (00) above for complete details.

Sample Database

If you'd like to download a sample copy of the database template, you can do so here. This is a non-editable version of the template which will let you see it work in action. The sample database requires 64-bit Access 2013 or higher. If you're still using 32-bit Office, read this.

Full Developer Database

Once you have purchased the full developer database template, come back to this page and click on the Download button below. This will give you access to the ZIP file containing the Template ACCDB file. The full version will run on 32-bit or 64-bit Access 2013 or higher (possibly 2007, but I haven't tested it).

License

For internal use only. This template does NOT come with a royalty-free license. You may only customize the template for your business needs and for use within your organization at one location ONLY. You may not resell or distribute any form of this template to others without express written permission. Contact me for additional information on obtaining a license to distribute if you plan on including this template in a product you are reselling. Additional licenses are required if you plan on using this template with more than ten (10) employees or in multiple locations within your organization.

Not a Finished Product

Please keep in mind that most of my template databases are not designed to be finished products that are ready to go in a working environment. My templates are meant as starting points for you to customize for yourself so you don't have to reinvent the wheel. This requires that you have a basic understanding of Microsoft Access development. To work on most of my databases you should have completed my Access Beginner series and the first couple levels of my Expert series at a minimum. Most of my databases require knowledge of SQL and VBA as well. Keep in mind that most of my templates are not like off-the-shelf software. They're starting points for developers to be able to modify and use as their own. It really is going to be in your benefit to watch all of the prerequisite videos so you understand the database and how it works moving forward. This is not like QuickBooks where you just install it and use it. My templates are mostly designed for people who already have an understanding of how Microsoft Access works.

Customize For Your Needs

If you would like to discuss customizing this template for your needs, and integrating it into your current setup, please see my consulting page for details. While I no longer accept custom jobs that are specific to a single user, I may include your features in a future version of this template if they have mass appeal. If you are looking for custom enhancements made to this template just for you, visit my Developer Network.

Technical Support

Please note that technical support is NOT guaranteed for any of my courses, seminars, or templates. If you require help with modifying this template, you may post a question in the Forums, however an answer to your question is not guaranteed. If this template comes with an accompanying Seminar, then you should purchase that Seminar to see how the database was constructed. If not, then you should have taken the suggested courses. Most of my templates are designed on a Developer level and you should have a thorough understanding of SQL and VBA before attempting to modify them. If you have a problem with one of my databases, I will only support the unmodified database exactly as it's downloaded from my site. If you have modified it in any way, it may not be something I can help you with. You can post in the Forums, and I may be able to help you, but if the issue doesn't exist in my unmodified database, it's not something I can support.

Questions?

Got sales or customer service questions about this template? Feel free to contact me. If you have technical "how do I" questions about this template, you discover a bug, or want to suggest a new feature, then please post your comments below.

Keywords

#msaccess, #microsoftaccess, #database, #template, Holiday Cards, Christmas Cards, Hannukah Cards, Kwanzaa Cards, Festivus Cards, Solstice Cards, christmas card database, xmas card database, holiday cards, address labels, print christmas cards, christmas card list, address book, create Your Own Christmas Card Database Tutorial, christmas card template, Hanukkah cards, Kwanzaa cards, business holiday cards, How do you print Christmas cards at home

Comments for Access Holiday Cards Template

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3 years	Bug in Event Procedure	Steve Garrison

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Intro

In this video, I will show you how to use the Microsoft Access Holiday Cards Template to manage and print holiday cards from your database. We will walk through setting up your mailing labels, tracking card recipients, marking cards as sent, and using features like active/inactive contacts and custom greeting lines. You will also learn how to design and print custom postcards, position graphics and text, and adjust fonts and colors for each card. This tutorial includes a basic step-by-step guide to get you started with sending and organizing your holiday greeting cards efficiently.

Transcript

Greetings and season's greetings from Access Learning Zone. My name is Richard Rost and I just finished putting together a template for tracking your holiday greeting cards, whether you want to send Christmas cards or Hanukkah cards, whatever. If you want to just track your mailing labels or actually print out postcards from your Access database, this template will handle that.

As part of the template, you get a couple of videos. There is the basic free TechHelp video that explains how to set up the mailing labels. You will also get access to the members-only extended cut, which shows a little bit more. It shows you how to set up the custom greeting line so you can get something like "Sue and Joe Smith," for example. Use conditional formatting to see missing data and a button to show active people only - the people who are actually on your mailing list.

The full template adds a lot more features. For example, you can print actual postcards. You can customize the design, manually position the different fields on the postcards, change the fonts, font color, and more.

The first two videos are step-by-step videos. The template, as far as the extra features, such as making postcards and similar tasks, also contains a quick developer walkthrough to show you some of the code, but it is not a step-by-step instructional video. It is not a learning video. I will show you just enough so that you can use the database and make modifications. It is a developer-level template, though. If you want to just use the template to print out your cards, you do not need to know any programming. However, if you are planning on modifying the database, you are going to want some VBA experience. I will show you some things, but again, this is not a teaching database.

The database is built from my familiar TechHelp free template. You have a customer list. You can open up each individual customer on the customer form. You can have two people in here - first name and last name - so you have husband and wife, or partners, or whatever. The greeting line can be either automatic or manual. For example, you can enter "Sue Kirk." It will say "James and Sue Kirk," or if Sue has a different last name, "Jones," then "James Kirk and Sue Jones." Or you can turn this off altogether and put whatever you want in here, like "The Kirk family." That will be your greeting line.

You can pick which postcard they get from the postcards you set up. For example, maybe he gets a Merry Christmas from Florida. There are also other features that my TechHelp template has, like order entry, contacts, and so on. You can mark people as active or inactive depending on whether they are going to get a Christmas card from you. You can show active only or you can see everybody.

The yellow fields show you where you are missing data. For example, you might not want to send a Christmas card to someone if their address or city is missing. I have got this form locked down. If you try to make a change here, you cannot make changes on this form. You have to open up their record and make a change there.

You can send mailing labels to all your active people if you want to send all the same mailing label. You can mark cards sent, which means you mark the date for all the active people that you have sent them, so you can keep track of when you have sent Christmas cards to everybody. It will also put a contact in their contact history if you go into contacts here. You can say "Christmas card sent." I cover how to do that in the actual video or the free TechHelp video that explains how to build the mailing labels.

The postcards are all part of the new features in the paid template. You can create your own postcards. You have to get the artwork from whatever source you use. There are tons of free royalty-free Christmas card images, artwork, and all kinds of stuff on the web. It took me two minutes to Google it and I found some. I found a bunch of different free royalty-free images you can use for your different cards.

You click the button, browse for whatever you want - snowman, quads, or whatever images you want to store in your folder. There is the XYHW - the XY height and width of each of these two boxes. You can move them wherever you want, left and right. You can make them wider. You can move them up and down. These are customizable for each postcard that you make.

Here is the height and width. I have got the font set to "distribute." You can go left, center, or distribute. Distribute spreads it out. That is kind of neat. You can make this wider, and the file actually spreads out. Let's put it back where it was. You can make this visually appealing if you want to add up, down, left, right buttons. I just made them like this to keep it simple, but maybe in version 2.0, I will enhance it a bit more.

Down here is the message. You can put whatever message you want in here, and you can change the font. I actually show how to access the Windows font dialog box. This is brand new. I have not covered this in any of my other courses so far.

You can specify multiple different card types. There are holidays. I just have some sample data in here - this is Christmas too, Hanukkah, and happy holidays from sunny Florida (just to rub it in to my friends a little up north). You can either print these out if you have a nice color laser printer, or if you want to use photo paper. You can buy postcard stock from companies like Avery at your office retailer, or you can just print it out on thick cardstock if you have a good laser printer. Inkjet printers: you pretty much need photo paper to print on inkjets.

I used to have a color laser printer. I do not have one now, but I used to print nice postcards. You can print out backs of the cards if you want to. It will give you a count so you can see how many are ready. If you try to click on the button to print but do not have anybody selected, nothing happens. If you click on "Christmas too," for example, here are the fronts. You click "Print Fronts." It gives you the fronts all laid out per page.

You have to do them individually. You cannot run multiple ones together. For example, you cannot do the Christmas, Hanukkah, and Florida ones at the same time. It just does not work. I tried. I spent a few hours trying to figure out how to get different types. It is kind of like with continuous forms. When you move objects around, it moves all of them around, so you have to have a separate report for each type of card you are running. There is no way around it that I can figure out.

For "Christmas too," you print your fronts, then you print your backs. You can simply flip the paper over and run it back through your printer. You can change the return address label if you want to, or you can print mailing labels as with the other option.

The cool part of this is being able to design your own card. You come in here and make a new one. Let's say you want to make your Kwanzaa card. Double click - brings up a new blank postcard. Pick the image, load it up, put in your headline text and your message text.

You might want to move this first where you want it, so move it up, hold the button down, slide it up here, slide it left, then make it wider (W is wide), make it taller (height), then type in "Happy Kwanzaa" as your headline. Change the font using the font button, pick a font you like, maybe go maroon for the color, adjust the font size, then hit OK. Looks pretty cool. Maybe go a little bit taller. Change the font to either center or distribute. For your message, put whatever you want in there - "from us to you" or whatever you want to say.

You can move the message to where you want it to go. Put it right there, move it up, or over to the right if you like it better there. Or maybe you prefer it on the left. There you go. Close it.

Now, add people to the list to get that card. Go to your customer list, pick someone - let's say Deanna Troy is not getting a card. Make her active, open it up, and pick the Kwanzaa card. Close that. Go back to postcards. You will see one person is now getting a Kwanzaa card. You will see a little preview. Print front - there it is. If you have more people, you will see more copies of the card. Let's give someone else that card too. Go to Joe Smith and assign him the Kwanzaa card.

Now, postcards, Kwanzaa, there are two. Print fronts - there they are. Then print backs, and there are the backs. Pretty straightforward, pretty simple.

It took me a while to figure all this stuff out. In the video, I will give you a walkthrough of the code. I am not going to explain it all - it is not a teaching video - but I will give you a rough lowdown of how it works.

Again, this is the holiday greeting cards template available on my website, AccessLearningZone.com. I have made a link for it. There you go. There is a direct link. I will put it down below in the description. You can click on it. If you have any questions, of course, contact me. Thanks.

Quiz

Q1. What is the primary purpose of the template discussed in the video?
A. To track sales orders throughout the year
B. To manage and track holiday greeting cards and printing options
C. To create an employee scheduling system
D. To monitor shipping costs for online orders

Q2. Which of the following features is highlighted as part of the free TechHelp video?
A. Creating custom postcards
B. Setting up mailing labels
C. Email automation for cards
D. Exporting data to Excel

Q3. What special feature does the members-only extended cut video demonstrate?
A. How to import images from the web
B. How to set up a custom greeting line and use conditional formatting for missing data
C. How to set up automated emails
D. How to create financial reports

Q4. If you simply want to print out cards using the template, what level of technical knowledge is required?
A. Advanced Access programming
B. Basic VBA knowledge
C. No programming required
D. SQL scripting skills

Q5. For users wishing to modify the developer-level database template, what is recommended?
A. No prior experience necessary
B. Familiarity with VBA
C. Knowledge of SQL Server
D. Experience with Photoshop

Q6. How does the template handle the greeting line for a household with two people who have different last names?
A. It combines their first names only
B. It ignores the second person
C. It automatically formats the greeting with both full names
D. It requires manual entry for all cases

Q7. How are people marked as eligible to receive a card in the database?
A. By entering their email address
B. By selecting a specific card type
C. By marking them as active
D. By completing an order form

Q8. What do the yellow fields in the customer form indicate?
A. A selected card type
B. Missing critical data like address or city
C. Expired membership
D. Unpaid balances

Q9. When are changes to customer data allowed on the main form?
A. At any time
B. By clicking a "unlock" button
C. Only after opening the individual record
D. After switching to design view

Q10. What happens when you mark cards as sent?
A. The record gets deleted from the list
B. An email is sent to the recipient
C. The sent date is recorded and a contact is added to history
D. The customer is marked as inactive

Q11. What is a unique feature of the paid template related to postcards?
A. Automated email delivery
B. Ability to create, customize, and manually position fields on postcards
C. Importing contacts from Google
D. Built-in holiday card designs only

Q12. How can users add new images for their postcards?
A. By typing the image file name manually
B. By copying and pasting images into Access
C. By browsing and selecting images from their folders
D. By scanning paper cards directly into the database

Q13. In the postcard designer, what do the XYHW settings control?
A. Date and time the card was sent
B. Font color and size
C. Position and dimensions (height and width) of design elements
D. The number of cards to print

Q14. Which options are available for text placement on postcards?
A. Left, center, distribute
B. Top, bottom, diagonal
C. Back, front, middle
D. None; text is fixed

Q15. What does the solution advise regarding grouping multiple card types in one print job?
A. It is fully supported
B. Only two types can be grouped
C. It is not possible; separate report needed for each card type
D. Only works if the cards have the same image

Q16. How does the user assign a specific postcard to a customer?
A. By entering a code
B. By selecting the postcard on the customer form
C. By exporting customer data to Word
D. By sending an email invite

Q17. What are two suggested types of printers for printing postcards at home?
A. Laser and inkjet printers
B. Dot matrix and plotter printers
C. 3D and thermal printers
D. Label and receipt printers

Q18. What is the name of the website where this template can be found?
A. CardDesigner.com
B. PrinterZone.net
C. AccessLearningZone.com
D. HolidayDatabase.com

Answers: 1-B; 2-B; 3-B; 4-C; 5-B; 6-C; 7-C; 8-B; 9-C; 10-C; 11-B; 12-C; 13-C; 14-A; 15-C; 16-B; 17-A; 18-C

DISCLAIMER: Quiz questions are AI generated. If you find any that are wrong, don't make sense, or aren't related to the video topic at hand, then please post a comment and let me know. Thanks.

Summary

Greetings from Access Learning Zone! I am Richard Rost, and I have just finished creating a template designed to help you manage your holiday greeting cards. Whether you are sending Christmas cards, Hanukkah cards, or any other holiday greetings, this template lets you organize your mailing list and print either mailing labels or actual postcards directly from your Access database.

With this template, you will receive a couple of instructional videos. The first is a free TechHelp video that walks you through getting your mailing labels set up. In addition to that, there is an extended cut available for members. The extended cut goes a bit further, showing you how to set up a custom greeting line, such as "Sue and Joe Smith," use conditional formatting to highlight missing information, and add a button to filter your list to show only active recipients, that is, those currently on your mailing list.

If you choose to use the full template, you will find even more advanced features. Not only can you print postcards, but you can also customize their design. The template allows you to manually position fields, modify fonts and colors, and really tailor the postcards to your liking.

The first two instructional videos are step-by-step, guiding you through getting started with mailing labels and the main features. Regarding the more advanced postcard features, there is also a developer walkthrough included. This walkthrough is intended for those who wish to modify the database and is not a detailed instructional video. While you do not need to know programming to simply use the template, a bit of VBA experience will help if you plan on making modifications. The walkthrough will provide enough insight to adjust things as needed, but keep in mind this is a developer-level template rather than a beginner course.

The template itself is built on my well-known TechHelp free template, so if you have used my previous lessons, you will find the layout familiar. It includes a list of customers, and you can open each customer's details in a form. The fields are designed for flexibility, allowing you to enter two names, as in the case of couples or partners. The greeting line can either be generated automatically, for example combining two names and surnames, or you can enter it manually, such as "The Kirk family," if that suits your needs better.

You can assign each person on your list to receive a particular postcard that you have set up—so you might have "Merry Christmas from Florida" for one customer, while someone else gets a Hanukkah card. Other familiar functionality from my TechHelp template is included, such as order entry and contact tracking. You also have the option to mark customers as active or inactive depending on whether they are to receive a card. Filters allow you to easily switch between viewing just the active list or seeing everyone.

Fields highlighted in yellow quickly show missing information such as address or city, helping you avoid sending cards to incomplete addresses. The form is locked for editing unless you open up an individual customer's record, so accidental changes are avoided.

The template also includes options for efficiently managing your mailing process. You can print labels for all your active recipients at once. When you mark cards as sent, the database records the date and adds an entry to their contact history. The basic TechHelp video covers how to set up and work with mailing labels.

A major addition in the paid template is the ability to design your own postcards. You will need to source your own artwork—there are plenty of free, royalty-free images online which can be used for this purpose. Once you have chosen your images, you can load them into the database, and then use the layout tools to adjust the size and position of the picture and text for each card. Everything, including the headline and message, font choice, color, and layout, is customizable for each card.

You can adjust the alignment of your text with options such as left, center, or distributed. The distributed option spreads the text, giving you a different visual effect. The template allows you to customize every card individually, so you can experiment with the layout until you are satisfied.

Another new feature is access to the Windows font dialog box, letting you further personalize the look of your cards. You can specify different card types for various holidays: Christmas, Hanukkah, or just general holiday greetings. You might want to print your postcards using nice color laser or inkjet printers, possibly on photo paper or on specific postcard stock available from office supply retailers.

After setting up your cards, the database keeps track of how many individuals are set to receive each version. You will need to run your print jobs for each card type separately. The template cannot combine types in a single print batch; each report is dedicated to one card design, which is a limitation due to how Access handles object layouts in reports.

For each card type, fronts and backs are printed separately, allowing you to flip and feed your paper back through the printer as needed. Return address options are flexible as well, with mailing labels available if you prefer not to print directly on the postcard.

The postcard designer lets you create brand new cards whenever you wish. For example, creating a Kwanzaa card could be as simple as selecting an image, adding a headline, adjusting layout and font, and typing your message. These items are all easily moved, resized, and styled according to your preference.

To assign cards, just select recipients from your customer list and update their active postcard type. The system will reflect all recipients for each card, and you can preview or print as needed.

In the more advanced walkthrough video, I take you through the main code areas of the template. However, please note that the walkthrough does not provide line-by-line code explanations; it is intended as a general guide for those familiar with VBA and Access.

The holiday greeting card template is available at my website, AccessLearningZone.com. You will find a direct link provided below. Should you have any questions, feel free to reach out to me.

You can find a complete video tutorial with step-by-step instructions on everything discussed here on my website at the link below. Live long and prosper, my friends.

Topic List

Setting up mailing labels in Access
Tracking customers and greeting card recipients
Managing active and inactive mailing list members
Customizing greeting lines for card recipients
Creating and selecting postcard types
Assigning postcards to individual recipients
Highlighting missing recipient data with conditional formatting
Restricting edits on customer data forms
Marking holiday cards as sent and tracking send dates
Adding contact records when cards are sent
Importing royalty-free card images for postcards
Customizing postcard layout and positioning fields
Adjusting postcard font, color, and style
Using the Windows font dialog in Access
Designing postcard fronts and message areas
Printing postcard fronts and backs individually
Selecting and assigning recipients for each card type
Previewing postcards before printing