The Making of a Holiday Card!

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

 

For many years, when our girls were young, we would take an annual Christmas picture and mail it with our Holiday card. I was the mom who, when they were growing up, never took a picture or had a camera at any important event. I have always been technologically challenged and I guess I did not want to miss out on something that was happening right before my eyes, because I was fiddling with the stupid camera. Once or twice, I did try and take a picture and it usually ended with me in a foul mood and yelling, “This _______ (rules prevent me from filling this in)  thing never works correctly!” and my husband shouting back, "Turn it on!"  In fact, neither of my girls can believe the amount of pictures I now take of Fudge and Vern and they like to remind me about the special frames I bought for them that hold their kindergarten to senior year school photos. We got them out not too long ago and it seems I lost interest on or around 7^th grade for the oldest and 4^th grade for the youngest.  I tried telling them that the sample photos that came with the frame were, in fact, their pictures, but they did not fall for that one.

 

The one picture I did take every year was for the annual Christmas card. Since I was not the best photographer, usually I had to go through three roles of film before I found one picture that would work. Yes, that was in the olden days before I even knew about digital cameras. In the beginning, I forced the girls to wear something that matched their sibling and eventually that idea was met with enough resistance it had to be discontinued. FYI: if your kids look adorable, but are shouting out, “This is so dumb!” if does not translate to a smile in a photograph.   Towards the end of our annual picture practice either girl could have shown up wearing a Christmas shirt depicting Santa and Mrs. Claus decorating their Christmas tree and Mrs. Claus asking Santa, “Got Balls?” and all I would have said is, “take you place over there by your sister.”  Sometimes, and I swear they had a private bet going to see how long it took to break me, they would start goofing around. Nothing says lasting memories and holiday cheer like your mother screaming, “I swear to God, if you two do not stop, I am going to crack you over the head with daddy’s tripod…NOW SMILE!!” 

 

Our first Christmas with Fudge was 2009 and by then, we had all had enough of trying to get one good picture every Christmas and I fired those two and hired Fudge as the model for my card. Since my oldest daughter had also gotten her French Bulldog, Bonzai, that year, we wanted to include him on the card with Fudge. Surely, I thought, dogs would be easier to work with than kids, right?  By this time, my youngest daughter was heavily into photography and so I enlisted her help in making my idea a reality. It seemed like such a simple thing. Little did we know that Bonzai came with the baggage of having a stage mother. (Think Toddlers and Tiaras)  The problem started when Megan sent us four pictures of Bonzai, via email, in his devil’s costume. We selected a picture where she had posed him on a dog bed and when Hayley took the bed out of the picture it left Bonzai with funny feet. Hayley said she would try and fix it and I said (famous last words) that no one would notice. We ordered the cards, sent Megan a copy, and my husband and I were out for a lovely lunch when we got the call.

 

Megan was very upset and wanted to know why we used a picture where her dog’s feet look deformed.  I tried to explain what happened with the dog bed, but she was too wound up to listen to a rational explanation.  She said we made her dog look like he had pig’s hooves and she thought Hayley and I should be blackballed from Photoshop.  She went on to say we did it on purpose to showcase our exceptionally beautiful Fudge.  Megan really just said Fudge, but I added the rest because she is so pretty and her paws are perfect.  I mentioned once or twice that it was just a Christmas card and we certainly had no intentions of forwarding it to Ripley’s Believe it or Not, but it did not help. Truthfully, Bonzai looked adorable and really is the sweetest dog.  Nothing I said helped, so I passed the phone to her dad.

 

My husband got on the phone and said, “Your mom and Hayley did not purposely put hooves on Pork Chop’s feet” and she yelled that wasn’t her dog’s name.  We high fived after that one and then John tried to apologize by saying, “I’m sorry, I don’t mean Pork Chop…I know it starts with a B…oh, I remember now...Bacon’s Feet.”  Another FYI: People, who are worried about their dog’s feet looking like hooves, do not think pig jokes are funny.  We are always searching for the silver lining, so one of us told her maybe if the card got in the right hands, Bonzai might be offered a part in a movie like Babe 2 or Charlotte’s Web.  All she said was she hoped the movie also had a part in it for two big, dumb donkeys.  When I told her that made no sense because we only had Fudge and she did not look like a donkey, she said she wasn’t talking about Fudge.  In the end, we fixed Bonzai’s feet, had her sign off on a proof, and reordered new cards at our expense. We also vowed that in the future we were either sending store bought cards or only including dogs not owned by a certain volatile daughter.

 

PS There was also a minor controversy regarding whether or not the two models were miscast in their roles for this card.

 

And now, without further ado, our 2009 (Corrected) Holiday Card:

 

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

F, The cards are already made (Fudge and Vern only) and I did them before Adina picked the same picture for the calendar :) My mom mailed the blog today. She wanted to make sure he got it on Monday. At first, she was embarrassed, but she seems to have recovered...LOL!

[F, Calla & Luca]

OMD, her doctor must have had a ...cow. BTW, I hardly send a card but I did make some cards of last years calendar cover and got compliments. Spare yourself and just put the lovely F and V from the calendar on this years card.

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Deanna, Thank you! I am getting worn out this year. Maybe I will do what you do next year and just post on FB..LOL!

Doris, I would definitely go with the "who is paying for Duke?" threat. No picture, no college...LOL!

Leslie, I am sorry if I made you look like a sicko. PLEASE post a picture of Rudolph....what a funny idea. I would love to get a card like that for Christmas. Hey, dress Halas in the deer outfit and go from there!!

[Laurie, Fudge, and Vern]

Ricki, Are you suggesting I blog a lot? Pretty soon, I will have to turn my attention to DK friends....LOL. Oh wait, my mom is coming soon. BTW, she sent the Viagra blog to her doctor :)

F, One of the perks to being a mom or a dad is the tormenting part. Plus, she dares call my two beautiful doodles MUTTS....all the time. She has a point, but how rude? LOL I think the devil costume only fit one of the models.

Thanks, Jane, Jennifer, and Nina

Phoebe's mom, Good luck!! I cannot imagine photographing four kids! Thanks for the chuckle.

Nancy, OMD...no film. I bet everyone was very happy :) LOL

 

 

[F, Calla & Luca]

True, well, she can always pick on her poor lovable mom.

[Ricki and Tara (doodle)]

But what would she have to blog about, F.?

[F, Calla & Luca]

Ha, only you could make the making of a card funny. But gee, I can't imagine why a daughter would object to a card on which her dog, who although not a doodle therefore not a great beauty, is the devil. But importantly Bonzai does not look like a pig or even a piglet. I think the "rents" should reform and stop tormenting their DD.

[Ricki and Tara (doodle)]

LOL! And everyone has happy feet!!!  :)

[Jane, Guinness and Murphy]

Love that card, Laurie....and of course your blog put a smile on my face!

[Nina, Phil, Harlow & Lacey]

I remember this card.  My DH got a big chuckle out of it.