In 1990, I sent out my first holiday card with a photo of 8 month old Hillary. Brookes joined in a couple years later, and then Jonathan joined the gang in 1996. Back in the day, I would take my own photos - a whole roll of film - to one hour photo, choose the best one, and assemble cards with ribbons. I loved the planning and executing of the project and looked forward to it every year. Here are a few!

As our family grew up, getting all the kids together for a family photo wasn’t as easy! I’m sure I thought I’ll skip one year, and that became a string of years, and here we are, 10 years later! Hillary’s wedding in 2023 should have produced a family photo for sure, but holiday cards just didn’t happen. (I made her send out cards though!)

All this to say, we are back! Icing on the cake was working with Happy Menocal again. This is my third “Happy” project and I can’t wait for the next. Supreme joy for me is opening an email with an attachment from anyone@happymenocal.com.

Included in the holiday card package, is a family emblem or crest. How fun for stationery, note pads, gift tags, etc. I didn’t want to share that Vrana means crow in Czech because crows are ugly and this didn’t really fit the aesthetic I was going for. But it also seemed like a cool thing to incorporate, and I must have known Happy is the one who could make it work.

I wanted a message of unity, of love. As with all families, we have had our share of challenges, but we are still here! We still love each other! We have made it through some tough times! I really wanted to highlight our strength as a family - for the family emblem as well as the holiday card.

As expected, I’m obsessed - crow and all.

I will be putting this little family emblem on anything and everything I can think of!

The holiday card took my breath away. An acorn for each of us in our family, signifying potential, strength, growth, and new beginnings, and overall symbols of good luck. Semper Unitas, literally meaning Always Unity, used to express the idea of maintaining unity, always. The colors are sumptuous and perfect and I have to share Happy’s verbiage when she shared this gorgeousness with me.

“The colors hit a few seasonal notes, but mostly read sophisticated, happy, lived in. Like how a very stylish gentleman in Milan might dress -- a salmon scarf, paprika pants, french blue shirt, loden coat....”

Yes, yes. She is an artist in every way, including her words.

The back of the card shares info about the loose photos. The original plan was to highlight the art rather than a photo. But I have never sent out a holiday card without a photo! And I felt with the message of unity, even though we weren’t all together in person, it was fun to share updates in this way. After all, I haven’t sent out cards in 10 years! Recipients were probably like who are these people? Good to have a visual.

Stacie Kinney came to the rescue for us. It was a windy afternoon, and one of the last before it got too cold to be outside. If you know me, you know I am the most unphotogenic person on earth, but she got some good ones!