How to write your and your friends’ surnames in your Christmas cards

How to pluralise your family name.

Pluralising a last name can get quite complicated but it is straightforward if you know the basic rules and how to apply them. Signing off your Christmas cards is about to get much easier!

1. No apostrophes.

Rule number one. Contrary to popular belief, you never need an apostrophe after a last name when pluralising it. Ever. At least when you’re signing off, addressing an envelope or greeting a family at the beginning of your card or letter. Now if you’re talking about them owning something, that’s different. But not the topic of this short explanatory blog post!

2. Most of the time, just add an -s.

For the majority of family names, all you need to do to pluralise it, is add an -s on to the end. For instance, 

The Hamills wish you a really lovely Christmas!

or,

With lots of love this Christmas from the Smiths and the McCartneys.

3. Some endings get -es instead of -s.

Any surname that ends in -s, -x, -z, -ch or -sh have -es added on to them rather than just the -s addition. Some examples of this are:

To all you lovely Joneses!

or, 

The Sussexes will spend Christmas in Belfast this year.

or, 

The Fernandezes are joining us for a New Year’s Day gift exchange.

 And that’s it - simple when you know the rules, right? I hope this makes writing Christmas cards and addressing envelopes so much easier this year, and makes it that little bit less stressful. Because no one wants a stressful run up to Christmas! If you’re still needing some cards to send to friends, you can see all my offerings here.