Wearing Green on St. Paddy's Day

Faith 'n begorrah! But o'course you knew we had lots of St. Pat's Day Ecards!

Here's St. Patrick himself, dancing a jig with a few of his favorite snakes.


Or here's a classic, Danny Boy, my old man couldn't sing it better even after a bottle of 12-year-old.

Valentines Poems!

This just in - Valentines Poems E-Cards!

Some will rhyme, but some do not, but every one of them will make you hot!

Clearly I'm not a poet, but you should check out my new favorite Valentine's Day ecard, featuring beautiful acoustic guitar music by Mark Knopfler:

Valentine's the day for Poetry

Fresh Ecards for Valentine's Day

We've just launched some new categories of e-cards -- just in time for Valentine's Day. We've got your roses, your bouquets, your hearts and flowers, your sappy sentiments, even a rapping valentine!

29 new Funny Valentines include:

Yo yo yo! Do the Cupid Shuffle, the Valentine Rap



If this trailer's Rockin', don't come knockin' -- a real Rocking valentine

There are more to come! In the meantime, remember that the center of the VDE universe is right here: Valentine's Day Cards

save a tree. And a rainforest.

I remember making paper valentines as a kid. The Kindergarten teacher showed us how to fold a piece of red construction paper in half, draw half a heart shape with the center along the folded edge, and then cut along the line. The wonders of symmetry were not dampened by shaky childhood hand-eye coordination or the lumpy hearts revealed by opening the folded card.

I don't send paper valentines any more, and it's not just because I no longer have the hots for the pigtailed girl in the 2nd row of math class. Paper valentines, like paper grocery bags, are largely made of dead trees, so I've found ways to keep in touch with friends (not to mention objects of irrational lust) that don't rely on clearcutting forests.

So, if you send electronic Valentines rather than paper, you're reducing the demand for virgin wood pulp, which translates in some small way to saving trees.

If you send you Valentine's Day Cards from Care2.com, you generate even more benefits:

1. Care2 saves one square foot of rainforest every time you send a free eCard.
2. Care2 donates a percentage of its revenue to eco-nonprofits.

send your Valentine's Day ecards now

Valentine's Day is the ecard holiday of the year. Care2.com, like many lesser ecard sites, sees a huge spike in traffic every February 14.

Fortunately it's easy to set up your Valentine's Day cards in advance -- today, even. You can create the ecards now, and Care2 will send them on the 14th of February. Just enter February 14 (as 02/14/2008) in the appropriate field in the Delivery Options panel:


Here's my favorite V.D. ecard from Care2:

Worst Valentine's Pick-up Lines in History

"Are you a parking ticket? Because you've got fine written all over you."

Ouch.

1,950,212 ecards to pick from

Care2.com has nearly two million ecards.

The secret? All the shared photos contributed by Care2 members can be sent as ecards!

With so many to pick from, how can you possibly decide? The best way is to search for images:

1. Go to the photo site
2. Enter a word in the search box
3. Click the image you like, and then find the "send photo as eCard" link that looks like this:
   
   

With 2M images in the library, it's easy to find something you like, from socks to eagles to pie.

And of course, cats, lots of cats.

How to send an ecard

Here are simple directions for sending ecards. Many people send ecards for Valentine's Day and Christmas, but you can send them every day for any reason at all.

(Still, if you want a reason, here is a holiday calendar with ecards for probably every holiday you've ever heard of).

1. Step one is to choose an ecard. This is easy to do; just go to Care2, which has thousands of free ecards. You can pick a card from the main page, or view any of the ecard categories, such as funny birthday cards, or wild animal pictures, or the "long time, no hear" ecards.
   
2. Click on the little "thumbnail" image for the ecard you want to see. This will take you to the card's preview page, which looks like this:
   
   
3. Click the red PERSONALIZE button to address the card. The form is easy to fill out; it looks like this:
   
   
4. At the top of the form, write a message to the recipient.
5. If you wish, you can also add a greeting, choose a virtual postage stamp (they're free, of course), and a background color for your ecard.
6. Next, address the ecard. You will see a place to type in your name and email address, as well as the recipient's email address:
   

   You can, of course, send a single ecard to multiple recipients -- just enter every address in a long list in the space labeled "TO".

   (If you don't want every recipient to know that you sent the ecard to others, check the "BCC" checkbox. This is a very handy way to send ecards to a group of clients, friends or co-workers.)

7. Next, in the "Delivery Options" area, choose a date for the ecard to be sent, and check the options if you want to be notified via email when the ecard is sent, or when it is picked up by the recipient(s).
   
8. Finally, click the red SEND NOW button (or, if you want to preview it first, click the PREVIEW button):
   

That's it! You've now sent an ecard.

Remember that Care2 offers thousands of free ecards: everything from Cat photo cards to Jigsaw puzzle cards to Georgie Fame's pop hit Yeh Yeh.