Make a List and Check it Twice!

Most of us store our contacts in the app on our phones and computer. Sometimes you need to print labels, or get a spreadsheet of that information. Here is how to do both of those things:

PRINT LABELS DIRECTLY FROM CONTACTS

This is how you print labels directly from your contacts app on your computer.

1. Open your contacts app on your computer.

2. Select the addresses you want to print. Hold down the control button while you click on the people you want to select. If it's everyone on your list, click on any contact in the list and press Command+A to select them all.

3. Command+P to bring up the print menu.

LAYOUT TAB

Style>Mailing Labels

Page>Choose your Avery Label Number and it will automatically format for you

LABEL TAB

Addresses> Home. If not it will print all addresses you have associated with each contact.

Color> You can change this to any color you want

Image>You can add an image that will print on each label

4. Print on regular printer paper first. This will allow you to make any changes necessary before using your label sheets. Check addresses, duplicates, spacing, etc.

CONVERT CONTACTS TO A SPREADSHEET

This is how you convert your phone contacts to a spreadsheet that is then readable by printing companies and label software.

1. Open your contacts app on your computer.

2. Click the + sign to create a new group and label it "Christmas Card List" (Wedding Guest List or whatever the group is)

3. Click back to "All Contacts".

4. If your display isn't set to last name, first name:

Go to CONTACTS>Preferences>General>Sort By: Last Name

5. Control+click (hold down the control button while you click on the people you want to select) on all the people you want to send Christmas Cards to. I do it by each letter of the alphabet, then drag the stack over. It helps me keep my place.

Once you have a full Christmas Card List group:

1. Go to www.icloud.com on your computer.

2. Login with your Apple ID/password.

3. Select "Contacts" then "Christmas Card List" (or your named list) from the menu on the left.

4. Click on any contact in the list and press Command+A to select them all.

5. Click on the gear icon in the lower left corner.

6. Select "Export vCard..."

A window will pop up asking if you want to IMPORT all these contacts. Click CANCEL. A file has been saved (usually to your downloads folder) with the file extension .vcf

1. Click on this link to open the file converter website.

2. Locate "VCard-File: Choose File"

3. Click on Choose file and navigate to the .vcf file that you just downloaded. (It should be in your downloads folder) Click on the file and select "Upload" in the bottom right corner.

4. Back on the website, Click "Convert".

5. Open your downloads folder and find the newly downloaded .csv file.

Open the .CSV file. It should automatically open in Numbers. The goal now is to make the information readable by the online printer.

Delete all the columns that are not these ones:

Last Name

Address

Address 2

City

State

Zip Code

Country

You now have a list that you can upload to your online printer. You will need to check what column headers they use and adjust your file accordingly. For example: Basic Invite uses "Street" instead of "Address". When you change the header to match what the printer is looking for, it can find your information and print your cards.

EXTRA CREDIT

You're going to feel like a real hacker with this next part. If you want the cards to read "The BLANK Family" instead of just their last name. This is how you do it.

1. Add a column to the right of the "Last Name" column.

(Right-click on the Last Name Column>Add column after.)

2. In the first cell of the new column type =. This brings up a formula box.

3. Then type "The "&(click the first cell in the Last Name column)&" Family"

4. Hit Return. It should have populated the cell with 'The BLANK Family'.

5. Hover over the bottom of this new cell and a little yellow dot should appear in the middle of it.

6. Move your cursor over the yellow dot and an up and down arrow should appear.

7. Click and drag down the column to the bottom of the list. It should populate "The BLANK Family" for each family on your list.

Now it's clean-up time! The result in your new "The BLANK Family" column is a formula, not text. So we need to go through a couple of steps to make it text and therefore readable by your print company.

1. Add a new column after your formula column.

2. Click on the entire formula column (the letter at the top of the "The BLANK Family" column)

3. Select Edit>Copy

4. Click on the entire, new, empty column (the letter at the top of the column)

5. Select Edit>Paste Formula Results. This should look just like the column you just copied but now it's just text.

6. Go back to your original Last name column and the formula Last name Column and DELETE BOTH columns.

7. Read through all of your contacts and make sure that "The BLANK Family" is appropriate for that contact. If not, manually change it to whatever it should be. (Typically if they are a single person, it should be addressed to them as an individual, not as the family.)

You now have a list that you can upload to your online printer. You will need to check what column headers they use and adjust your file accordingly. For example: Basic Invite uses "Street" instead of "Address". When you change the header to match what the printer is looking for, it can find your information and print your cards.