About
About Wording Guide
Wording Guide is a small, free library of printable greeting card wording, organized by occasion and by tone.
Most of us write a few cards a year — birthdays for the kids in our life, a sympathy note when someone we know loses a parent, a wedding card for a friend who is finally tying the knot. But almost none of us are practiced writers, and the cards we sit down to write are often the ones we most want to get right.
Wording Guide exists for that gap. The library collects greeting card wording samples — heartfelt, funny, short, religious, and specialty — across more than a dozen common occasions. The samples are written to be adapted, not copied verbatim. They are starting points, not scripts. The most powerful card you ever send will be the one in your own words; we are just here to help you find them.
How the library is organized
Every occasion page (birthday, sympathy, wedding, baby shower, graduation, the major holidays) lists wording samples grouped by tone. You can browse all of them on a single page or focus on a single tone — for example, only the funny birthday lines, or only the religious Christmas wording. Short reading guides on writing each kind of card sit alongside the wording library.
How to use it
- Find the occasion that fits the card you're writing.
- Skim the tones until you find the one that matches your relationship and the moment.
- Pick a sample that is close, then make it yours — name a memory, drop in a nickname, change the rhythm to sound like the way you actually speak.
- Sign it by hand. Always.
About the writing
The wording on this site is original work, written in the voice of a human who has sent a lot of cards. None of the samples are AI-rewritten templates from greeting card aggregators, and none are copied from card publishers. If a sample feels close to a line you've seen elsewhere, that's the convergence of the form: there are only so many ways to say "Happy Birthday" warmly.
Want to suggest a category, send a wording sample of your own, or report a typo? Get in touch.