Depending on how online you are, you might recall Demi Adejuyigbe’s annual September videos. Starting in 2016, he made a video each September 21st, set to the song “September” by Earth, Wind and Fire. Here’s the first one. There wasn’t much to it, but then on September 21, 2017 he put out one that was a little more involved, and with each passing year the production grew more elaborate. He put out his last one on September 21, 2021, and it could best be described as over the top.

Okay, but it’s December. So, why am I talking about September? Well, it’s because lately I have found myself thinking of Demi Adejuyigbe who one time made a pretty simple September 21st video, and how that led to him now having to put out a video each September 21st, and to somehow top his previous year’s video. No one was requiring that he do this, but once he started the tradition he felt like he had to do this, and it led to a tremendous amount of pressure to produce this creative masterpiece which had a pretty firm deadline. You can’t release a September 21st video on October 15th. Anyway, this is about Christmas cards.

So, for kind of awhile now Ron and I have been sending out a photo Christmas card to our friends and family each December. That’s nothing unusual. Lots of people do this. At first our cards were pretty standard. Then one year we decided to do a funny photo card. Just like when Demi Adejuyigbe posted that video on September 21, 2016 a tradition was born. Again, no one was demanding it of us, but suddenly we felt the need to stage a funny photo for our Christmas card each year.

Let me tell you something about creating a funny Christmas card. They take some work. First off is the creative brainstorming that goes into figuring out what funny scene we are going to attempt to depict in our card. Then there’s the ordering and assembling of props. The year we decided to photograph me “skiing” in the living room we had to search through a very crowded garage hunting first for fake snow (aka styrofoam packing peanuts) and then a leaf blower. Traditional Christmas photo cards do not require a leaf blower.

Last year who knows what the neighbors thought when they saw us repeatedly running across the backyard. They couldn’t see the Yeti we were running from because he hadn’t been Photoshopped into the image yet. That was even more work that our overly elaborate Christmas card required.

Anyway, this year has been a lot. I try not to bore you to tears by writing about it nonstop, but the transforming of the house next door into the perfect place for Ron’s parents has consumed a lot of our time and energy. We may not be physically swinging the hammers ourselves, but somehow most days we feel as exhausted as if we have been building a house from scratch.

So, this year we decided maybe we could just do what normal people do and slap a regular photo of ourselves on a card and call it a day. Here’s the problem, the great house project of 2024 has consumed so much of our time, we have exactly one photo of the two of us from this year. We were going to use that until we looked at it, and decided we really didn’t like it at all. The lighting is less than ideal casting weird shadows on our faces. It’s a terrible picture, and no amount of tweaks have succeeded in turning it into something we feel comfortable mailing out to everyone we know.

It’s December 3rd as I write this, nearly December 4th and as of right now we still don’t know what we’re doing for a Christmas card. We could try for a normal photo like everyone else, but then we still have to take the picture, and that too will involve some thought. Our brains are so fried by thoughts of the house next door, that even something that simple is too much to handle. Even once we snap a picture there’s still the matter of getting the cards printed and then shipped out. Simple things to do, or they would be if we weren’t so overwhelmed with everything.

This past Friday we had company over. My sister and her family were down visiting from Maine, and an old friend made the trip over from PA for dinner. It was a little bit more chaos in what has been a very chaotic year. It also would have been an ideal time to have someone snap a nice photo of the two of us. Did we think of this? Of course we did not. Our fried brains are not thinking of much of anything.

So, yes we probably will send out a Christmas card this year. No, it will probably not be funny. No, I still don’t know what it will look like or when it will go out.

— Alissa

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Weekly Inspiration

What I’m Reading: Everyone on this Train is a Suspect by Benjamin Stevenson

What I’m Watching: Fall Guy

What I’m Listening to: “Together at Christmas” by moe

Find out more about my books at alissagrosso.com

Find out more about my digital art at alissacarin.com

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My apologies for the typos and such this post is almost certainly riddled with.