Happy Mother’s Day to all the wonderful mothers out there, especially my own mother and my wife!

The dragon kids are another year older for my annual Mother’s Day card for my wife. Over the last few years I’ve been forced to start thinking about what I’m going to do for these as the kids get even older (how dare they) and eventually “leave the nest”. So far, I’ve tried to make the theme for each card a reference either to a specific thing we did as a family (a place we went, an adventure we went on) or a general reference to activites we do (or used to do, like skiing) or some life milestones. We didn’t go on any notable adventures all together last year (that’s becoming increasingly difficult), but there is a major milestone coming up about a month after Mother’s Day this year: our youngest kid is graduating high school. I know it’s coming, I have for a while, obviously, but I still can’t fathom it. I don’t feel old enough to be at this stage of life. While I’m excited for the potential each of our kids has for their futures (which is mixed with huge amounts of anxiety for and about them), and I’m excited for my potential extra time to really focus on pursuing this dream of making art, I don’t know what’s coming next. Even though each year brought mini milestones and changes, they were always variations of the same thing. Soon, they will all be adults and school will be over. Family gatherings and adventures will be different. Dynamics will change. The “material” I use as inspirations for these cards will be very different, if it can exist at all. I’ve definitely been spending a lot of time thinking and reminiscing over the last few years, thinking about how many moments are left ahead of me versus are behind me.

I’ve also given some thought to how to age the boys over the years, particularly this year. My style has changed somewhat, my skills have improved. They’re still “kids” to us and always will be, but they are undeniably older (all of them will be legally/technically adults later this year; two of them already are). I figured it was time to push things a little more with more adult bodies/silhouettes, bigger horns, longer tails, and starting to sprinkle in some more textures (my favorite).

It’s been a few years, but I’m feeling the urge to post all the Mother’s Day cards, all 21 of them (I somehow missed 2008 and I don’t know why, but it bothers me). In addition to seeing how my skills have improved and how I’ve evolved the way I draw these characters, it’s personally a fun thing for me to do because of a certain magic art making has for me: looking at my old art unlocks memories, feelings, and sensations I had when I was making it. I remember the first time I noticed it. I was in junior high school I believe, and a classmate had asked me to draw the Duke Blue Devils logo for him (I can’t remember if he offered to pay me or not. We weren’t super close friends or anything, but he asked and I did it). I sketched it out in pencil in front of the tv, then broke out some inking pens of some kind to ink my lines. It almost startled me that as I traced over the lines I could remember exactly what was going on on tv, exactly what words were spoken, what commercials aired, etc, when I made the lines the first time. It was cool. I never figured out how to use that to my advantage in school (like retracing doodles I made during class to help me remember things for a test), but it has been a great way to remember sometimes mundane things that bring some extra joy and perspective to life. I intionally drew many of these cards to capitalize on this weird phenomenon, since I’m not sure how long the actual memory effect lasts. I wanted to capture the overall vibe I felt at the various stages of our kids growing up, something about their personalities or what was going on, as well as the specific things we did, so that when I look back at them, I can remember something a little more in depth than what a photograph might capture.

Anywhat, here’s a little retrospective:

2004 (child number 1, when I thought using color was a good idea for these, and the only one to feature my wife. This is where you can really see the evolution of the way I have drawn these characters)

2005 (outside)

2005 (inside)

2006 (outside) (child number 2 has joined us)

2006 (Inside)

2007 (there is…another…)

2009 (with the blanekts my talented wife knitted/crocheted for each of them when they were born)

2010 (they used to love getting into the art supplies I wasn’t really using at this stage. I never cleaned the walls and doors of their artwork, either)

2011

2012 (skiing/snowboarding was a big family activity for us for many years. After covid, as life got busier and more expensive, I’m sadly the only one that still goes. It was usually a hassle to get them geared up and out the door, at least one of them would put up a fight and make things extra frustrating, but I loved sharing the lifts with them and chasing them as they barreled fearlessly down the mountain in their brightly colored snow gear)

2013 (this is how I remember what year we got a dog)

2014 (we live on a mountain and raised our kids from early ages hiking it)

2015 (a favorite sign on one of our favorite trails on the mountain we live on-the kids said it looked like a face)

2016 (our kids went through the scout program, and our oldest became an Eagle, like me. Hanging out by the firepit they built near our garden was always fun)

2017 (we are surrounded by mountains, one of which is extremely popular and of great significance to my wife from her childhood. We used to try to hike it at least once a year and the kids would build a mini cairn – much smaller than this one – in memory of her mom and uncle, who she used to hike it with)

2018 (another favorite spot on the trails near our home: this rotted out hollow tree. We always stopped for a picture, even after they all got too big to fit inside)

2019 (at some point, I started specifically looking for potential card inspiration when we were out doing things so I could take very specific reference pictures. This was another nature trail relatively nearby, but not a mountain to summit)

2020 (without much question, the most memorable event of 2019 for our family – remember these usually reference something from the previous year – was our 4 day trip to Quebec in October. We had a ton of fun, it was really the first real vacation we have taken (most of our “vacations” are trips to places to hike, and while we did plenty of walking and we camped instead of staying in a hotel, this was a very different trip). One of our favorite spots was the waterfalls in the town we stayed in, Levis, at the Parc des Chutes de la Chaudiere. It was a beautiful place, and our family photo there was our 2019 xmas card.)

2021 (we took to walks much closer to home during the pandemic. On one of our routes, there’s a giant pile of boulders (assembled by heavy equipment in a logging area) that my wife and youngest started referring to as “The Troll Cairn” (the youngest has loved cairns since he was significantly smaller than the tree he has sprouted into). We happened to go to that spot on one of our walks, and all the boys (and myself and the dog) climbed up on top to sit for a bit. My wife snapped a few pictures, and the lighting was really nice, so it’s what I ended up using for the card. It’s better than drawing everyone in masks)

2022 (one of the fallouts of the pandemic is that we didn’t go out on as many adventures as we once did, and the ones we did were very close to home. The kids did remote schooling for longer than most due to one of them being high risk, and one of the results of that was everyone spending more time with their faces in screens. At least they still communicate with us)

2023 (this year’s card was inspired by a local trip we took with my wife’s visiting sister and husband to a working farm with some really nice walking trails. Not far in, we spotted this absolutely gargantuan pine tree, that our tree-loving middle son had to go see. To be fair, the rest of us thought it was pretty awesome too. I did a fair amount of climbing (and falling out of) trees growing up, and I’ve always loved the massive ones. I still daydream about living in either an Ewok/Wookie style tree house, or a house/tower that is shaped like a tree that I could live inside. Visiting the redwoods and giant sequoias on the west coast of the US is a dream of mine…but there is some danger I wouldn’t ever leave.)

2024 (this year’s card references our somewhat last minute weekend camping trip to Acadia National Park in Maine the previous year. We drove 5ish hours late Friday night, arrived in a lightning and thunder storm, spent Saturday at the park with a drive up Cadillac Mountain at the end. Sunday we detoured on our way home through The White Mountains to hike a trail with some of the largest trees in New England. It was a lot for one weekend on short notice, but awesome and memorable, which is what matters.)

I hope you enjoyed that little trip down memory lane, though probably not as much as I did. I’ve always struggled with the concept of time. It marches on, things change, but I mostly feel the same, as if mere moments have passed rather than decades.

Once again, a very Happy Mother’s Day to my awesome wife and amazing mother, and all the other mom’s in my life.