8 Crucial Grammar Rules to Remember Before You Write Your Holiday Card
’Tis the season to be jolly! Unless, of course, you’ve just found a typo on your freshly printed holidays cards. Is there anything more frustrating? After you’ve decided what to write in your card (maybe using a tasteful Christmas quote), your last step should always be to proofread your message. (Is it “Season’s Greetings” or “Seasons Greetings”? Is it correct to say “Happy New Year’s”?)
To help you save money and your sanity, these are the most common holiday card spelling and grammar mistakes to look out for. We’ve had these tips vetted by Good Housekeeping’s copy chief, Benay Bubar, to help you keep your holiday writing as crisp as the winter weather.
1. Incorrectly pluralizing a last name
This is the number one mistake we see on holiday cards. If your last name is Vincent, you can easily make it plural by adding an “s.” You would sign your family card “The Vincents.” But if your last name already ends in “s,” you have to add “es” to the end to make it plural, so Dale and Annette Jones would be “the Joneses.” (If you want to avoid making your last name plural, you could always write “The Jones Family” instead.)
Remember not to use an apostrophe when pluralizing a name! An apostrophe only shows possession, so writing “the Vincent’s” or “the Jones’s” is always wrong.
2. Misspelling “Season’s Greetings”
This festive phrase should always be spelled with an apostrophe, because “Season’s Greetings” means “the greetings of the season.” If you misplace the apostrophe, you end up with “Seasons’ Greetings,” which would mean the greetings of multiple seasons and doesn’t really make sense. If you don’t use any apostrophe, you’re just putting two words together without a real meaning.
3. Getting “Happy New Year” wrong
This can be a tricky one! Because people sometimes say “Happy New Year’s,” it’s easy to think that’s the right way to spell it. But the proper name of the holiday is actually “New Year’s Eve” or “New Year's Day,” not just “New Year’s.”
Given that it is a proper noun, "New Year" should be capitalized when you are referring to the holiday. But if you are referring to the upcoming 365 days as a whole rather than just to January 1, you would lowercase it. So you could write “Happy New Year!” or “We have a lot to look forward to in the new year.”
4. Capitalizing (or lowercasing) inappropriately
“Christmas” should always be capitalized, because it’s a proper noun. But “merry” should be capitalized only when it comes at the beginning of a sentence. So you could correctly write “Merry Christmas to all!” or “We wish you a merry Christmas.”
5. Leaving out commas when signing off
Don’t forget a comma after your sign-off phrase, whether it is “Sincerely,” “Love,” “Best wishes” or something else. Also put a comma between each pair of names when signing the card. For example, your card could read, “Merry Christmas! Love, Adam, Emily, Sarah, and Zach.” (Sometimes the comma before “and” is left out, and that is not technically incorrect, but you’ll always be fine if you include it.)
6. Forgetting the apostrophe in “‘Tis the season”
“'Tis” is a contraction, a shortening of the words it is, and thus it needs to have an apostrophe just like any other contraction (e.g. “isn’t,” “can’t”, etc.). The same applies for “’twas,” the past tense of “’tis.” And note that because the comma is taking the place of a letter as opposed to serving as an opening quotation mark, it should face left. ’Tis an important spelling rule to remember!
7. Confusing “you’re” and “your”
OK, this one isn’t holiday-exclusive, but it is still a common issue in Christmas cards. “You’re” is short for “you are,” so you would use it in a sentence like “I hope you’re enjoying the holidays.” “Your” is possessive, as in “I loved your gift — thanks!” The words sound the same, so keep a close eye on those apostrophes to make sure they are in the right places.
8. Mistaking “it's” for “its”
“It’s,” short for “it is,” is another commonly misused contraction — so “it’s the most wonderful time of the year.” “Its” with no apostrophe is possessive (e.g., “The town is hosting its annual tree lighting”).
Now that you know these handy grammar tips, you’re ready to spread your holiday wishes far and wide!
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