This is our favorite card so far, and not just because it’s a bunch of pictures of us. It took two days, three separate shooting sessions, and more wardrobe changes than a Cher concert.

We were having our usual dinner table brainstorm back in November when Mars came up with “candy cane.” And that was like a lightning bolt of silliness to my head. I have been wanting to do a card using our bodies as props, and I immediately realized that with our martial arts gear and street clothes we had everything we needed to be human red and white stripes. Almost everything that is. I didn’t have any red pants. It took some hunting but I was able to find some $10 Sporty Spice wind pants at the local discount store.

Our basement has a high ceiling. It also has a killer skateboard ramp. We put our low-buck “green screen,” about 10 yards of cheapo green fabric, in the middle of the ramp flat bottom. I put the camera on a tripod, but then lodged it in the plumbing running across the ceiling. This set up worked pretty well. If I had taken the time to tack down the fabric to get rid of the wrinkles it would have saved some time in the editing. Also using better lighting would have made this easier. I just used halogen construction lights placed on each deck of the ramp.

With everything in place we started posing. Mary, Paris and Mars would lie on the fabric first. Then, I would climb up a step ladder, start the timer, jump down and throw the ladder to side because it caused shadows, and try to get into position in time. The hardest part to get right was the radius. We used blue tape as guide, but it took some trial and error. Unfortunately, I couldn’t tell if it would work and be in scale until I was editing the pictures together. “Everybody put your stripe clothes back on.”

Previous cards: 2006, 2005, 2004

Image on back of card

Camera rig

“I know it’s cold down here. Bend to your left!”

The artist, Paris Sigler, in this piece of performance art is experimenting with light and fire, sugar and caffeine. This truly ephemeral work lasted only eight seconds, and was captured via digital camera using a long exposure time. Her message is clear: “I came to get down, give me another soda, and Happy Independence Day!”

This is the image on the Christmas card we got from my brother Grayson and his wife Kellie. I believe Kellie took this pic somewhere in funky Phoebus, VA. She’s a talented woman. And the coolest techie I know.