1992. The first card I made. It was hand drawn, scanned on an early PaperPort, and finally processed on a Mac Classic with some freeware draing program, the name of which I've completely forgotten. Inside it read: Merry Christmas 1992 From a Couple who's Way Behind the Times
1993. We did this as a parody of all the "Happy Xmas Family' cards we were getting
1995. This was the next one I drew and scanned. In 1994 my wife bought cards that were 'unforgettably cute'. We have no idea what they looked like. I had to scan a copy as I don't have the original any more.
1996. "Sandy Claws is Coming to Town". Note how much better my drawing and the computer hardware was getting.
1997 saw the passing of a lot of remarkable people. Every orniment on the tree represents someone. Sorry about the quality. This was another one that had to be scanned from a copy of the card as I don't have the original any more.
1997. This is the list of people that passed in 1997. Each one has an orniment
1998. This was the last of my hand drawn cards. A lot of people thought I was going to stop making cards, but no, it was just time for new technology
1999. A Gimme. We used a picture from our eclipse trip to Greece, Turkey, and the Black Sea.
2000. "Global Warming Has Been Hard on Santa". I used Bryce on my Blue & White G3 PowerMac. A huge bump in thechnology. Also this was 2000. I had been aware of Climate Change for at least a decade before this.
2001. In the aftermath of 9/11 I wanted to do something signifying the disaster but also hope. Once again done in Bryce.
2002. The height of the Beanie Baby craze. I came across these big wooden models and I thought "What would I most like to see this year? Raptors eating Beane Babies!"
2003: "Light a Single Candle." 2003 was a bad year. Both of us had lost parents. The shuttle had broken up on reentry. Bush started the war in Iraq. For these and a dozen other tragic reasons, locally, nationally and for the planet 2003 was a bad year. I did this simple graphic to reflect this.
2004. Down the block we had a neighbor that let stuff grow all over their mailbox. I'd wanted to do something with it for a couple of seasons. Finally I made some styrofoam eyes and, with their permission of course, created the "Mail Monster".
2005. In 2005 there were a lot of anti Gay, anti Women, anti Minority, actions both on the street and in the State Legislature and the US Congress. This is my statement on diversity. Canvas on my G4 PowerMac. Oddly enough the last desktop computer I owned. It's all laptop and tablet now.
2006. We knew that withing a few months we'd be moving from the Prairies to the coast. It's my, somewhat abstract, fairwell to Minnesota Winters. Canvas on a G4 PowerMac.
2007. A picture of our new house in Nanaimo editied with Gimp rather than Photoshop on my G4 PowerBook.
2008. "Cat's Don't Like Sugar Plums". OpenOffice Draw on my new Inteo MacBook
2009. "Peace". Written in Japanese, Chinese, and Korean. In honour of our eclipse trip to Asia.
2010. "Wishing You a Wonderful Holiday Season". Sometimes I agonize over a Xmas card for days and weeks and sometimes I just see it and there it is. I saw Momiji sleeping in the guest bed I grabbed the camera and got the shot before she had a chance to move. Total time to make this years picture ~1 hour including the captioning and layup. I was going for a classic Xmas scene, like you’d see on the front of a gift catalogue or holiday cookbook.
2011. "Merry CHristmas from Lantzville". Busy, Marsha was sick, Cats were sick, I was looking for a job. One Saturday I picked up the camera and this little tree with one orniment. At the beach I got this. It does capture the feeling of life on the coast fairly well.
2012. Remodelling. The first time we've e-mailed the card.
2013. An amazing year. From acting on stage to colon cancer. From seeing friends & Family to thinking I wasn't going to see anyone ever again.
2014: We passed our Canadian Citizenship test. Clipart and The Pint Shop
2015: Just had the idea one morning in the shower and drew it in about an hour. My first freehand drawing since 1998. Drawn on the iPad with Graphic and a stylus.