2015 Holiday Card Competition

This year our family had a ‘competition’ for the best “Christmas in Los Angeles”-themed holiday card. The entries were as follows:

Oliver’s was a ‘open the door and find a surprise’-style card, with Knights in suits of armor hiding behind the presents (sorry that this cannot be digitally demonstrated). One might ask what this has to do with Christmas in LA– and the answer would be: it has more of a plot/premise to it than your average children’s holiday film, and Oliver could therefore be credited as a screenwriter. Here is the card front:

Andy’s card depicts an imaginary scenario with Christmas carolers singing on the I-405 freeway, with a backhanded ‘enjoy peace and joy’ while it lasts tagline. (All of those apocalypse movie posters must be getting to his head.)

Mine was by far the most tame–Santa in the hills of LA on a bicycle:

And because I was the one most initiative, I did a color version of mine:

This year, everyone was a winner. Oliver and Andy’s cards were reproduced in a limited run for distribution to select audiences. I turned mine into a holiday postcard with no return address, and with the address box on the incorrect side. If you didn’t get a postcard from me, it’s because it’s probably lost in the mail for all time due to the improper address placement. I thought the holiday postcard would be more environmentally friendly since it didn’t have an envelope and was small. The Zero Waste people among us frown on holiday cards as a rule, and then there’s the very sage tweet from my brother-in-law, who asks “How long are you supposed to hold onto a Christmas card before it’s acceptable to throw it in the trash? 2 yrs? 5 mins???” My preference is to give only cards that nobody would feel badly about recycling shortly after they receive it (hence, no baubbles, glitter, plastic). I suppose one would ask why I do holiday cards at all?

And the truth, like so many other environmentally damaging activities, is that I love getting holiday cards, and am not quite ready to part with this tradition. Here’s my wall of cards from 2015– thank you to everyone who continues to send cards. I love them!