My Christmas Card Inspiration

In this digital age we live in, I know a lot of people have given up on sending holiday cards.

Thankfully some of my friends still like them!

I'm not one those people, and designing my annual card is one of my favorite things about the holiday season. It's fun to look through photos of all my adventures from the year and decide which ones tell the stories I want to share with my friends and loved ones in printed form.

This year many of my adventures were made more special because I got to share them with my boyfriend Paul. He loves taking pictures as much as I do, and he even served as photographer on some of my favorite shots. Since he's such an important part of my life, I wanted him to be involved in the design of the card, so I asked him to choose his favorite picture of me to be the "cover shot."

I'm not including the photo or a shot of the finished card here so it will be a surprise to those that receive it, but I wanted to share the the story behind the photo he chose. Hopefully I can paint the picture well enough with words that you can visualize it for now.

Paul and I met over a year ago but didn't "officially" start dating until February. Then in April, he made his first trip all the way from New York to visit me in California. The photo he chose was taken during that trip, on a visit to the Santa Monica Pier on a gorgeous spring afternoon. It was a breezy that day, and random curls of my hair kept flying in my face or up in the air, ruining his perfectly planned shot.  Every time he saw a hair out of place, Paul stopped, walked over to me and put it carefully back in place. After numerous trips back and forth without a photo, I warned him that fighting Mother Nature AND my hair was probably more than any one person could handle, but he was undeterred. When he finally got the shot he wanted, he looked at his camera and smiled. Then he smiled back at me.

I was happy Paul chose that shot, because thinking about the moment it was taken reminds me all over again why I fell in love with him. Everyone wants to feel special, and he gives me that feeling every day, in big and small ways. My holiday card is one small way to celebrate that and hopefully give some of that feeling back to him.

Now to find some inspiration for the addressing and mailing....