My daughter’s stocking, 2016

Posted byMyfanwy TristramPosted inWatercolourTags:,

This is the third year running that I have drawn everything my daughter received from that very generous old fellow, Santa Claus.

It’s a great way to fill the days between Christmas and New Year, and while I know it’s not exactly Cézanne’s Mont Sainte-Victoire, it’s also the closest thing I’ve got to a recurring theme.

If we remove Santa from the equation, it even becomes a great chance for me to meditate on over-indulgence. Yes, since you ask, she is an only child.

As I always draw these images from a photo, they sometimes feel a bit less like drawing and a bit more like copying, especially with all the lettering and branding to be drawn. Still, copying can be educational, a lesson I learned anew by reading Linda Barry’s fabulous book Syllabus this year.

When drawing the contents of an 11-year-old girl’s stocking, what you mainly learn is how to make things look cute, but that’s a valid lesson too.

Click if you’d like to see it larger.

stocking, 2016--by-myfanwy-tristram

And here are the previous years’ ones. As you can see, the quantity of goods, and my concerns, haven’t changed much year on year. Nor, I note, has the time of waking on Christmas morning, sigh.

Everything in my daughter's stocking by Myfanwy Tristram

Christmas Stocking by Myfanwy Tristram

Published by Myfanwy Tristram

I am an illustrator, situated in Brighton on the south coast of England, and with a special interest in comics and graphic memoir. I also work for a non-profit which encourages people to be active in democracy and to exercise rights such as the right to information through FOIA.

69 thoughts on “My daughter’s stocking, 2016”

  5. love this, a beautiful way to remember years (christmas) past but you have a way to go. Santa still leaves a stocking for my 30 year old who would be horrified if he didn’t.

  8. I can relate! I have a 16 year old…..but both she and I don’t want her to grow up. Love the change up of the stocking :).

  12. I so love this idea but I cant draw and it appears by the time I get around to preparing ‘the stocking’ I’m a lot more boring, think I need to buy larger stockings!!

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