We have enjoyed creating Christmas cards over the last two decades and our final gift to you is a look back at all of our cards throughout the 20 years.
As our kids are now grown, we thought this was the right time to put a bow on it and find new ways to spread Christmas cheer.
Thank you for letting us into your homes to share our family and our love of Christmas.
We hope you have enjoyed receiving them as much as we have enjoyed creating them.
Merry Christmas!
Peace, Love and Joy to all!
Bob, Shannon, Sydney, & Adam
Scroll through all of the cards with some inside scoop in what was behind the concept. Then, let us know what you think!
2002
So this one started it all. Even before our first anniversary, we were blessed with our first child. Two things inspired the design idea: (1) Sydney was only two months old but she exhibited a high range of emotions in her facial expressions and (2) the opening of the Brady Bunch TV Show, a favorite from our childhood. This one made Sydney’s Top Five All Time Favorites because Adam wasn’t born yet. :)
Sydney Top Five
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2003
After the first one we had no idea we would continue with these types of Christmas cards, but after receiving positive feedback from Year One, it didn’t take much encouragement to keep it going… but what could we do to top it? Actually getting into a bubble bath as a family with our clothes on with Santa hats, of course! No Photoshop in this one…actual bubbles were spilling all over the bathroom floor.
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2004
Adam joined the family in 2004 and now we had two toddlers, and additionally Bob’s mother had moved in with us because of a health condition. Long story short…we were exhausted. The words for the song “Silent Night” resonated with us: “sleep in heavenly peace.” We pulled the kids out of bed to take this picture and it was the first time we started to use some technical enhancements to improve the image.
Shannon Top Five
Sydney Top Five
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2005
As you may know, Bob is a big sports fan and likes the TV show Seinfeld. This image was inspired by an episode of Seinfeld called “The Face Painter” from Season 6. The kids had no idea what was going on but they had fun with it…although Adam looks pretty traumatized.
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2006
Many of the Christmas Card ideas were inspired by pop culture. In the early 2000s, the HBO show “The Sopranos” was starting to become popular, and with an Italian last name like Stellato, “fuhgeddaboudit”…it just felt right.
Bob Top Five
Shannon Top Five
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2007
One of our goals was to not repeat themes or concepts so we decided to do our own Christmas cartoon strip. To this day, the kids still do not see the humor in the one. We really started to utilize new software technology and Shannon was able to bring Bob’s silly ideas to life.
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2008
Bob always wanted to be in a movie, but when you can’t make it in Hollywood, Photoshop yourself into the movie poster. And if you are going to do it, pick one of the most classic Christmas movies ever. Shannon nailed the creation of the idea and Adam’s and Sydney’s faces are spot on when compared to the original.
Bob Top Five
Shannon Top Five
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2009
We usually tried to keep politics out of our Christmas cards but whoever did Obama’s campaign poster about “Hope” caught our attention in more ways than one.
Sydney Top Five
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2010
In addition to pop culture, we often like to bring in a little nostalgia to our themes. This one paid homage to classic television game shows (specifically “Hollywood Squares”) infused with our family and other fun Christmas favorites. It was also the first time we introduced our first family pet, Ruby, into our cards.
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2011
Bob had great hopes for this one but the idea didn’t translate as well as expected. You know that funny way you look when you look closely into a reflective ornament…that’s what we were going for here. Bob looks funny but everyone else looks pretty good. Oh well. Fun fact, this is our actual Christmas tree as the background.
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2012
This one took a while for people to get that this was not 16 individual people but rather four duplicates of each us in a various outfits and poses. Shannon’s mom thought this was just some group shot from a party. Photoshop at its finest!.
Bob Top Five
Sydney Top Five
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2013
Another “sign of the times” theme as smartphones with cameras brought about the “selfie” craze, so we thought it would “punny” to work it in. For the record, this is the one and only selfie Bob has ever taken…i.e. collectors item.
Adam Top Five
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2014
Inspired by the rise of new clips on the internet and clickbait, we beefed up our card this year with not only a fun image, but an interesting story to go along with it.
Bob Top Five
Shannon Top Five
Adam Top Five
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2015
Stellato means “starry” in Italian. That fact, combined with a new Star Wars movie “The Force Awakens” which was released in 2015 after a much anticipated 10 year gap created the collision for this idea. In addition, we felt inspired to remind everyone the “Reason for the Season” with the inclusion of the nativity scene.
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2016
ST ELF ATO on the shelf. Celebrating elf culture and family traditions.
Adam Top Five
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2017
The idea of our family as a campy Christmas singing group had been on our list of ideas for long time and after coming across an old collection of record albums from the 70’s, it was a sign that 2017 was the year to go vinyl…you dig?
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2018
We wanted to create the classic movie scene of the slow motion walk away with things exploding behind us while we don’t react to it. So when you look at this one, imagine us in slow motion, walking towards you with your favorite walk-away-from-an-explosion music in your head. As you can tell from the carnage, we were able to destroy many of the worst Christmas villains. You’re welcome America!
Shannon Top Five
Adam Top Five
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2019
This is one of the few Christmas cards over the years that was a straight up family photo without much editing which made Shannon happy. This was taken at The Texas Renaissance Festival. Loosely inspired by the HBO series “Game of Thrones”, Bob, the aloof and uninterested King; Shannon, the overly optimistic Queen; Sydney, the clueless and happy princess and Adam, the serious and angry prince ready for battle.
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2020
Whether young or old, everyone loves Christmas and with this card, we made time travel possible with some next-level photo editing as we all each pictured with a younger version of ourselves. Either we changed a lot through the years or the editing was just that stellar, as some people didn’t realize we took this fun trip down memory lane. The idea was inspired by Ard Gelinck, a Dutch graphic designer who started doing this with celebrities.
Bob Top Five
Sydney Top Five
Adam Top Five
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2021
For the record…yes, we are actually in the pool with our nice clothes on in the winter and the water was around 58 degrees. However, it wasn’t actually snowing. We combined an image we took earlier that year during the Texas deep freeze of 2021. We actually think this is a pretty good shot of the family but it was a physical and mental challenge to get in the water.
And, that’s a wrap!
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We’d love to hear from you! Let us know what you think!