Over the past week, there have been natural disasters and attacks all over the world. I don’t really know what to say about them other than I hope that one day we don’t have problems like this any more. I don’t have anything extra to say that could be helpful or poignant. So I will continue with my already-planned content for today, pray for peace, and spread love through the world whenever I can.
Well, it’s that time of year again. The stores are breaking out the holiday decorations and Pinterest is filling up with Thanksgiving recipes and various holiday crafts. And many people are pulling together and ordering holiday cards to send out in a few weeks. Which means that this is the perfect time to address the grammar you need to know for your holiday cards.
In this post, I will touch on the main things you need to know for writing your holiday cards, but I will not go into detail on everything. I literally wrote a book for that!
Apostrophes
If you are making your last name plural – aka to say happy holidays from your whole family – you do not use an apostrophe. When it comes to names, you only use apostrophes when making the name possessive. If your name does not end in s, add ‘s to make it possessive. If your name does end in s, just add the apostrophe.
Example: Happy holidays from the Mitchells
No apostrophe is needed because this talks about multiple Mitchells.
How To Use Apostrophes Correctly
Capitalization
Here are the key rules of capitalization you need to know:
- Capitalize the first word of every sentence.
- Capitalize proper nouns.
- In the title of your holiday card, capitalize the first and last words and all others except for articles and prepositions. Articles are a, an, and the.
The title of your holiday card might read: Happy Holidays from the Mitchells!
From is a preposition and the is an article, so they are not capitalized.
If you include a letter describing what happened during the year, the title might read: What the Mitchells Did This Year
How To Capitalize Correctly (Part 1) | How To Capitalize Correctly (Part 2)
General Notes on Grammar
- Add a comma after the greeting and after the closing
- If your greeting is something like “Happy Holidays!” and you want to use an exclamation point, you don’t need a comma
Here is an example of how a letter is formatted:
Dear [_____],
Content
Sincerely,
Signature
Any specific questions about your holiday card grammar?
All Grammar Posts | Buy The Essential Grammar Handbook
Kate Mitchell is a blogger, chronic illness patient, and advocate who helps people understand chronic illness and helps chronic illness patients live their best lives.
Love this! It drives me crazy how many people put apostrophes in their last names on holiday cards.
Yes! How do people not check first?
Gahhh I’m so sick of the apostrophes! Apostrophes everywhere lately! I don’t know if it’s autocorrect on peoples’ phones, but I’ve been seeing them in places like “Happy Holiday’s” <<< eeek!
Yes! I get the struggle if you’re using apostrophes as possessive and if it ends in s. But there’s no need for an apostrophe if it’s plural!