“It’s something that when you start, you don’t know how it will grow,” he said.
Bobosky, who is also founder and chair of the Naperville Century Art Walk, made the decision early on to make each card contemporary, with many of them reflecting what was going on in popular culture that year.
His card for 1968 was psychedelic, and the one in 1971 featured peace signs. “Jonathan Livingston Seagull” (one of the bestselling books of its day) flies across 1973 while “Grease” was the word (neatly crossed through and replaced with “peace”) in 1978.
Naperville’s sesquicentennial graces the cover for 1980, with the message inside reading, “A Merry Christmas and a Nifty One Fifty,” the slogan Bobosky coined for the event. In 1982, E.T. was pasted onto the card and everyone was wished an “Extra Terrific” Christmas.
In 1992, the family said “Cheers” with a photo from the popular TV show. In 1999, when everyone was concerned about moving into the new millennium, a tree branch showed baubles with Y2K 2000 and Y6G for 1999, which refers to the six grandchildren the couple had by then. In 2006, Barack Obama in a Santa hat declared “Yes We Can” wish you a Merry Christmas; 10 years later, a cartoon bear celebrated the historic Chicago Cubs World Series win, each card including a “W” for win stamp.
The first year Brand and his wife, Mary Ann, a former teacher and now president of Advocates Building Communities, sent out 50 cards. That number has grown to 700 as the couple got more and more active in the community over the years.
The process for producing the cards may be simpler these days, but Mary Ann is still responsible for addressing, filling and stamping them.
For their very first card, Bobosky drew the fireplace of their home adorned with one large stocking, one smaller stocking and a tiny one for their then new baby, Courtney. On the inside cover, recipients found a Polaroid photo of the 3-month-old hanging precariously from a stocking.
“I was out of shot holding her toe,” Mary Ann said. “Not sure how I thought that would help if she fell!”
Turns out that wasn’t the most difficult thing about that year’s card. Bobosky used silk screen printing to make each card individually. Each color had to be applied separately, which meant 150 separate procedures to make the whole batch.
Mary Ann’s favorite card is from 1972. It was a family photo decoupaged onto a mount.
“Decoupage was one of my hobbies back then,” she said. “It involved burning the edges of the paper, so everyone was slightly different. I remember the kids watching Brand burn those cards. By then he was president of the Jaycees, so the list had grown to 200. It took him two weeks to make them all!”
As well as reflecting the stories of the day, the cards also show how the family grew. Two years after Courtney made her debut, sister Whitney made her first appearance. Brother Blake sat between the girls on the fireplace in 1970 and Shelby completed the family in the 1974 card.
To mark the 25th card in 1989, Bobosky replicated the first one with a fold out featuring favorites from over the years. Family occasions from weddings to anniversaries are often celebrated in designs.
“By 2001 we had eight grandchildren aged 8 and under,” he said, “so that year’s card reflected that.”
Bobosky says he doesn’t start thinking about each card until Thanksgiving. This year’s card includes a photo of the couple sitting in front of a pile of toilet paper; the message “we wish you a Merry Christmas and a COVID Free Year!”
“I try to make it contemporary or an announcement of something happening in our family,” he said. “I don’t send them out until Dec. 15, but each year we get up to 40 returned to sender because people have either moved or died. A number of people have been on our list for 55 years.”
Bobosky says the cards are just something he and his wife do.
“As long as I have the health, the interest and the capacity to do it I’ll carry on,” he said. “I think there is some talent there so I might as well use it. If you’re going to wish people well, there’s no better time you can do it. I’m old school. There’s nothing like sitting down and reading the print.”
Of course, looking back through the scrapbook brings back great memories for the couple.
“It’s a way to celebrate the festival of Christ through good tidings, so I’d hate to see it wane,” he said.
The family was fortunate to get together in January, shortly before the pandemic started. Courtney and her family live in Florida, Shelby and hers in Dallas, Blake and his in Batavia and Whitney and hers in Munich, Germany. The entire clan enjoyed a trip to Disneyland, apart from grandson August who is in the military.
“We haven’t been together at Christmas for maybe 15 years,” Bobosky said, “so it’s nice to look back on a time when we were all together.”
To quote a line from one of his favorite Christmas songs, Bobosky’s looking forward to a “White Christmas,” with every Christmas card he writes.
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