What useful iPad apps have you found for your children? Over the last couple of weeks, my kids have played with a new free design app called Creatacard™ from American Greetings. Creatacard’s purpose is just as it sounds – kids can use it to create greeting cards on the iPad but then, in a cool last step, you can arrange to have American Greetings print and mail the card.
My 10-year-old daughter didn’t need any hand-holding or instructions. I downloaded the app and asked her to make a birthday card for her Grampy, and she was off and running. She has played with Crayola design software at home and learned simple graphics software in the Technology program at school, so she picked up Creatacard right away. There are a variety of tools to choose from – colored pencils, markers, crayons, paint, chalk – and each tool comes in a huge spectrum of colors. Kids can choose pictures from a graphics library or even add photos and frames. She quickly created a card with a cake and candles, pictures of his favorite things, and special messages. After reviewing it together, she decided to change the background color. A quick tool selection and paint overlay, and she’d changed the background to a cheerful light green. Every card has a “Made By” sign on the back where kids can enter their names.
Once she was happy with her design, she was prompted to bring the iPad to me so I could arrange to print and mail the card (kids can’t access this part without help). The shipping and billing process is quite easy – I entered a “From” and “To” address and my credit card number (unfortunately, Paypal is not a payment option). The system does offer the option to *not* keep the credit card number on file, which I prefer; it was nice to have that option available. Printing the card was only $3.49 and there was no charge for the postage. I have to say, this is quite a deal. I had just picked up a birthday card at the store, and most of them seem to cost $4 to $5 these days – I was shocked!
One cool feature is that kids can jump back into the app a day or two later and see where their custom-created card is – has it been printed? Has it gone to the post office? Has the letter carrier delivered it? An important thing to note is that this app is not for creating “e-cards”, There’s no option to save the graphic file and email it; the only option is to print a card and mail it. I personally am really pleased that the only option is to mail a real card. There’s something special about receiving a real card, and I just don’t care for e-cards.
A couple of days ago, I reminded my daughter about Grandparents Day, which takes place on Sunday, September 8 this year. She jumped onto Creatacard, spent a creative 15 minutes designing a card, and then I arranged to have it mailed. A job well done! Of course, printing and mailing the card takes some extra time, so be sure to plan a couple of weeks ahead. Grandparents’ Day cards should be designed and ordered by August 28 to be sure they’ll arrive in time.
To learn more, visit the American Greetings Creatacard website or find the #Creatacard app right in the App Store.
