What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it?

In 2010, I made xmas photo. In 2011, I made metaphorical things—that were intentionally symbolic of relationships and history. In 2012, I made ice cream. In 2013, I made design. In 2014, I made “my room”. In 2015, I made the last line of Ice Cream Travel Guide, literally. In 2016, I made my annual holiday video. In 2017, I made another annual holiday video. In 2018, I made scones (from the Tartine cookbook)!

Well, of course, literally, the last thing I made as popcorn as a snack for myself as I idly worked on my penultimate day for my job. My stomach rumbled and I craved some salty snack. Knowing what would happen if I tore open any packages, I decided to make something…perhaps more healthy. Chris had procured some fancy popcorn kernels now stored in ziploc bags in a fancy cardboard box. I used one of our fancy saucepans. Dunked some olive oil—likely went rancid. Then popped 2 kernels in and covered the pot, following some recipe out there that said this was the best way to make popcorn. Waited until a kernel popped then I poured in a quarter cup of the kernels. Then once the popping slowed down to one every ten seconds, I poured it into a bowl. And ate it.

But really, what I made was a holiday video. Proud! Like every year, I suddenly realize that it’s holiday video time just before Thanksgiving. It’s time to think of the concept. A meme?! A viral video? A message that I want to say?

This year after debating two approaches—one of which was a version of the Peloton ad. Instead for ease of use (and decreasing the burden of acting), we decided on Succession, a VERY GOOD show from HBO. But then began a collection of clips and photos. Being a lifelong collector of photos and videos (of my life), I already had a lot in store. I asked my dad to get the DVDs that contained digital versions of the many home videos. Unfortunately, Chris didn’t have that much of anything from his childhood. So I cobbled together videos and clips in iMovie. In studying the title credits for Succession, I realized that there was an old VHS filter and large flashes for transitions. iMovie was limited in that respect. For a moment, I considered using Adobe Premiere Pro, even to the extent of downloading a trial. But when faced with the immense app, I could not bring myself to use it, especially in figuring out everything that I needed to know.

So I decided to just use iMovie.

Over the course of a week, I clipped videos and photos (and took the audio track from the Succession clip). For all videos and photos “before us”, I made it black and white with the old movie filter. Then I added some title words to emulate Succession as much as possible, but instead of a collection of words…I just used our names and locations where we lived. (although I just realized that I left out Pittsburgh, PA…ugh!)

Then I played it over and over again until it was done.

As always, we created a top ten list of things…and then carefully selected a group of recipients!

And then done!