Cool Christmas Cards

Merry Fucking Christmas. And other seasonal tidings of joy to you. It's time to get your biros at the ready and write your Christmas cards. Actually, it's quite late to be starting - last posting date to Canada is today, for example - so let's post haste and work out what cards you should be sending this year. Well, what better way to mark the year we discovered Calligraphuck than with one of their seasonal greetings? You can have a Merry Fucking Christmas for £4.

More showy-off than sweary are Paper Tango's stunning range of pop-out London landmark cards, available from Bouf. There are designs showing everything from the Gherkin to Buckingham Palace. Here's St. Paul's Cathedral, complete with Father Christmas. It's £5.99.

There's plenty more pop-up fun to be had with cards this year, such as the pop-out Christmas tree on this card from Oliver Bonas, or the grow-your-own Santa's Grotto garden care of Matchcarden.

There are loads of cute animal cards this year too. I'm particularly fond of these dancing squirrels by Nicholas John Frith and £2.50 from Soma. More woodland delights come courtesy of Anthropologie's stag or the fancy fox on Lagom's Winter Walk card. And Ham's hilarious piggies and bunnies are always worth a mention.

Humans can be pretty cute too! Well, if they look anything like Donna Wilson's Eskimo Kiss they can be. (More enticing eskimos, this time courtesy of Lagom here.) These cards from Alice Potter at Ohh Deer were my cards of choice last year, and I can testify they produced genuine awws on opening. Or, for your long-term crush or long-term squeeze, what could be more appealing than Selfridges's Pull Me card?

How cosy does Alice Pattullo Christmas House card look? This scene of fairytale loveliness is £2.50. Or, for more homespun charm, Nancy and Betty's Gingerbread House is almost as  delightful as one of Ms Laura Brown's creations.

Looking for the card to match your mid-century sideboard? I recommend Telegramme's deliciously retro range of cards, again available through the Soma gallery. Or Paperchase have also been vintage inspired for their 50s-style cards.

Father Christmas has clearly been at the sprouts if Paul Thurlby's Flatulent Santa is anything to go by. I'm not sure if I'd rather receive a visit from him, or his very sneaky Secret Santa. For more Christmas cheering-up-ness, Mark Callaby's set of winter-related silliness are also worth a peek.

Or you could just invite people to Be Merry! This card is by Hello! Lucky, who clearly are a company that enjoy an exclamation mark! You can buy a set of 6 for £11.88. There's more of that kind of enthusiasm available in the Kate Spade range currently in at Quill!

I'm delighted to see Crispin Finn have developed their classic cocktail prints into this cocktails Christmas card set. They'd be an excellent festive aide-memoire, especially if you're feeling too squiffy to refer to our Top Ten Christmas Party Cocktails, or have managed to spill your mincepie martini all over your keyboard. A set of eight cards is £14.

Another aide-memoire, or simply a whole new level of hint-dropping, comes with Laura George's What Would You Like For Christmas? card. Ask your recipient to fill it in and return to you, or simply and classily hand out ready-ticked. It's just £3 from Hannah Zakari, so you should easily have enough change leftover for the pocket sloth of my dreams.

When in doubt, there's always birds in hats. Nothing says Christmas to me like a set of five birds in all their festive finery. A set of the five cards is a tenner from the Birds in Hats Etsy shop. I also plan on keeping the glad tidings going with the 2014 Birds in Hats calendar. (And, yes, there's a Calligraphuck card for that too.)