Maconochie Christmas Cards

Reindeer. Nog. Capades. The story behind a decade's worth of Maconochie family Christmas cards.

Dec 14, 2023

I’m a creative director by trade, and for as long as I can remember, I’ve made my own Christmas cards. An early version featured me trying to play cards in my apartment with a bunch of reindeer pinatas (“They never let poor Ryan play in any reindeer games”) while another treated the North Pole as if it was its own Christmas-centric colony for which I created wrapping paper, gift cards, “Cane-billed Reserve” red wine and “Arctic Canary Lemoncello Nectar” in addition to the Christmas card itself.

2001 - “They Never Let Poor Ryan Play in Any Reindeer Games”

Cane-billed Reserve red wine and Arctic Canary Lemoncello Nectar

When Jen and I had kids, the whole card-making process started to take on a life of its own with costumes, props, and concepts that were debated well in advance of Halloween. I never liked the idea of a traditional family portrait being slapped on a holiday postcard, and luckily Jen was game for these festive experiments.

I’ve been putting my family through this circus for over 10 years now, and with each passing year, a little more teen resistance creeps in. The kids are all remarkably talented actors for these scenes, but they still get impatient if their involvement extends beyond about ten minutes. Fortunately, the ideating and wardrobe hunting and production preparation takes up 95% of the time, and I literally only need them to show up for a few minutes and work their magic.

I want to add that I work with photographers and retouchers all the time for a living, and their skill set and knowledge of lighting and lensing and a million other technical inputs far surpasses my own. Since this has been a personal passion project with my family, I’ve elected to take these duties on myself and it may be apparent that I’ve cut a lot of corners, improvised a lot of techniques, and relied a ton on Photoshop to achieve the end results. They aren’t always perfect, but I’m proud of the time capsule that has been created.

I’m not sure how much longer I can keep it going, so here’s a few stories and outtakes from the making of these cards.

2023 - Home Alone

We are big fans of the film director, John Hughes, and with our kids’ ages, the timing finally felt right to recreate the holiday classic, “Home Alone.” Ilias does a pretty convincing Kevin McCallister, and the rest of us are depicted rushing through O’Hare airport where Jen is literally the spitting image of Catherine O’Hara. Miraculously, all these outfits were found in one thrift store run. Everyone was photographed individually and Photoshopped together. For the headline, I wanted to say something long-winded and sappy about not forgetting family during the holidays, but Jen nailed it by suggesting that we simply pick up a key line from the gangster in the movie who said, “Merry Christmas, Ya Filthy Animals.”

2022 - We Mush You a Merry Christmas

The newest addition to our family—our dog, Trixie—inspired our mushing concept. Everyone was photographed individually for this image—including Trixie, Chase and Chester—and I composed everything in Photoshop. I had to chase Trixie around my backyard as she was only a couple month old puppy. For Chase and Chester, I wanted to make them look like they were going in a particular direction so I lured them with some cat food. There was no dog sled. Instead, each person was photographed leaning on or holding onto a barstool from our kitchen.

2021 - National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation

We watch this movie at least three times every holiday season and it was a ton of fun to recreate the famous heist scene at the end of the movie. The hardest part was figuring out who was going to play who. Jen and I were no-brainers for Ellen and Clark, but I felt like if I stuck with the traditional characters for the kids they wouldn’t be that distinctive and recognizable. Ilias ended up making a genius Cousin Eddie, and Ava and Gus were very entertaining as the Shirley’s. The background of this image featured some fun details from the movie such as the torched Christmas tree and a replica of the wrapping paper design of Aunt Bethany’s gift wrapped cat present. Our neighbor, Stacy, lent us the fur coat. We bought Jen’s blouse, Gus’ PJs and the red bow which was actually about a quarter of that size, but I enlarged it in Photoshop. Everything else we owned. I photographed this in batches—Jen and I were one photo, Gus, Ava and Ilias were photographed separately. A key aspect of this scene of the movie is that Ellen is actually clutching Clark’s crotch at this particular instant. We photographed that as well and debated which version to mail to friends and family. Ultimately, I felt that since the was the holidays and a lot of kids end up seeing these cards that we should send out the PG version. Back of the card read, “The Maconochie’s hope your holiday is a beaut!”

2020 - Quarantine Carolers

Nobody wants to linger on the holiday experience from 2020, but it did inspire this idea of some PPE-bedecked carolers. We bought the Victorian caroler costumes and rediculous face shields which I affixed to the inside of all the top hats. Each person was photographed separately and composited together in post. The overall look took inspiration from holiday song books from the early 1900s including some amusing lingo I discovered on playbills from those times such as “enthuzimuzzy,” “gigglemugs,” and “jammiest bits of jam.” The back of the card featured an invented song list of Covid-centric carols.

2019 - Norman Rockwell, Saturday Evening Post

I’ve always admired Norman Rockwell’s craftsmanship and uncanny ability to convey an entire story with a single image. He has so many holiday-centric scenes that we considered emulating, but ultimately we chose to recreate a winterized version of one of his iconic scenes that shows an entire family amidst a summer road trip. This was also a nice parallel to our family’s move back to Chicago. Each person was photographed individually and from the same angle in my backyard. I tried my best to have each pose say a little something about the individual. This comes across best with the kids. Gus is hanging with the cats which is a reflection of real life where the cats literally seek him out and sleep with him every night. Ava was eleven at the time and absorbed to a good degree with her phone. Five year old Ilias was his wild man self sticking his head out the window. We actually had all this wardrobe. I believe I found the image of Wagoneer online and fell in love with this blue and brown colorway. I gave everything a slight painterly effect and made it look like a Saturday Evening Post cover. The back of the card featured an article about the year’s pursuits written with 30s-era verbiage.

2018 - Motown

We had moved back to Detroit a few months prior, so it seemed fitting to leverage the Motown vibe. I researched a bunch of album covers and images from this era and liked this particular dance move from The Temptations that felt distinct to the era. Each person was shot individually in our basement from the same angle. I tried my best to recreate stage lighting by turning off all the lights in the basement but then using a single really bright directional light on the subject. We bought—and returned—all these outfits.

2017 - Sleigh Station

I can’t recall where the hell I came up with this idea to create a holiday-ized version of an old gas station. As odd as it sounds, I’ve always loved the look of these old stations, and the 1940s-era attendant outfits, and the iconic simplicity of the graphics from Texaco, Marathon, Standard, Shell, 76, Sunoco, Gulf, Mobil, Esso, 76—I could keep going but I’ll stop. At some point, the idea of refueling a sleigh came to mind and we just ran with it. I stumbled across a pic of the Dockery Service Station in Cleveland, Mississippi and loved how it was already colored in a festive fashion. We bought all the white outfits and adorned them with some red and blue duct tape. Jen did a great job with her and Ava’s period-centric hairstyles, and Ava looks totally convincing as she feeds the reindeer even though she was feeding thin air. A nice touch was that the back of this card featured a coupon for a $12.25 oil change for your own sleigh.

2016 - Joy to the World Series

This is my favorite of the bunch. The Chicago Cubs had just won the World Series a few weeks prior and I knew I had to do something with the Cubs, but couldn’t figure out a way to bring it back to Christmas. Their miraculous game 7 win seemed to rely on a little divine intervention, and at some point I came up with this sacreligious idea of recreating a nativity scene where I swap baby Jesus for the World Series trophy. Jen and I posed as Mary and Joseph. The kids were the Three Kings. A glimpse of an illuminated Wrigley Field sits off in the distance like the star of Bethlehem. The long since deceased Harry Caray makes an appearance as cherub hoisting the W flag over the whole scene. To help hold all this together, I researched many Renaissance paintings that depict the nativity scene from Da Vinci to Veronese, but our image most closely resembles a Baroque era painting by Philippe de Champaigne called Adoration of the Shepherds. I matched some of the composition and dramatic lighting. All this was shot in my basement using bright construction lights in a pitch black setting. I bought pieces of cloth and literally sewed the costumes together. My brilliant friend, Molly, saw the image and instantly came up with the line that puts this one over the top with, “Joy to the World Series.” I mailed one of these cards to Cubs owners, Tom Ricketts, but never heard back.

2015 - The Nog Makers

My love for egg nog inspired this concept which is part dairy farmer, part Willy Wonka. We bought some kids lab coats, nurse hats, aprons and a bunch of random chemistry parts from American Science and Surplus which is such a fun store to poke around in. Shot each person indvidually in our kitchen. The giant vats of nog are actually beer growlers that I enlarged in the backgroud. We only had about eight of the smaller bottles that make up the assembly line, so that was shot in chunks and stitched together. I regret getting too cute with the headline on this one as I nog-ified our last name by changing it from “Maconochie” to “Maconoghie” and many people thought it was a typo or thought that was acutally how you spell my last name.

2014 - Maconochie’s On Ice

This is my second favorite, and first appearance of Ilias. Everyone nailed their part in this recreation of a Stars on Ice show. Ilias laughed on cue as I literally hoisted him up like this with one hand. Ava was actually leaning over a small table with pillows, but her and Gus make it look like they literally performed this spinning move on the ice. Jen’s convincingly gliding in unison with me. I believe we were leaning against the back of a chair to achieve this dramatic slant. We had all these outfits—including the toy sword—and I shot this all in my basement.

2013 - Maconochie Ski Team

I was in charge of coordinating our holiday office party this year and the theme we selected was “apres ski” which ended up being an absolute blast. For that party, I had bought some Nordic gear like a vintage ski sweater, goggles, cap, etc. I decided to run with a similar ski theme for our family holiday card. Each person was shot separately in my basement where I basically had them stand on top of—or fall off of—a chair. Hints of each personality are evident. Jen is graceful and confident up front. Gus is an out-of-control whirlwind of jubilant activity. Ava is acrobatic and controlled. I’m trying to keep up and charging ahead.

2012 - Family Ornaments

This was the first year in our new house in Chicago. The photography isn’t that wonderful, but it gets the point across. Each person basiscally turned into an ornament that resembled some aspect of themselves. Ava riding her fairy tale unicorn. Gus driving his train. Jen in her fancy car. Rebel Ryan on his old motorcycle. Everyone wore their own clothes and this all photographed in about 15 minutes.

2011 - Deck the Halls

We were living in Palos Park, which is a suburb of Chicago, and one of the features of this house was this incredible limestone fireplace which made a great backdrop for our card. We dressed traditionally, but the pose was anything but. This is actually composed of a bunch of different images where each person was shot individually from the same angle but at different positions high up on a ladder. The holly and stockings and fire inside the fireplace were also shot separately and all Photoshopped together into a single composition to make it look like we were standing on top of each other to deck the halls.