Submitted by Evelyn C. McDonald
August 3, 2016 3:00 p.m.
In 2010, my granddaughter visited me for what we fondly called Grandma Camp. It was a good way for her to get away from her little brother. She loves animals so we spent time at the Cats Angels store. On the way out of the cats’ area, I noticed a cat at the window. She looked to be pointing at the sign asking for cat food. A beautiful cat with a great expression, I thought, wouldn’t she look good in a calendar. I mentioned the idea to my pet sitter, Nancy Douglas. She thought it was a good one. Beth Hackney agreed and asked Jan Cote-Merow to help me get the project going.
I took a lot of the photos the first year. Nancy helped me with one photo session and I learned something critical about kittens. They are really hard to photograph. Nancy put a couple of books about cats on the top of a box and placed a lovely little kitten on them. She posed well until I went to click the shutter then she moved. We repeated this process until I was ready to scream. I had just told Nancy that this wasn’t going to work when I turned around and there she was in a perfect pose.
We got bids from various printers and started the project with John Carvalho. Kay Penner helped me think up titles for each photo. We called the calendar The Purr-fect Cats of Cats Angels. It looked good and sold moderately well. That began a series of calendars that for the past few years have been printed by Amelia Island Graphics.
Last year Pat Glassbrenner and I decided to try something new. We set up a photo contest and Scott Moore managed it for us, recruiting the judges from the Island Art Association. The winning photo graced the cover and the top four were featured on single pages. Other pages were filled with multiple cat photos. Kay and I found quotes on cats from various sources to put on the pages.
This year’s contest is underway now. Information and application forms are available at the Cats Angels store and photos can be sent to [email protected]. Submission fee is $5 a photo and photos have to be of cats that are from Cats Angels. The deadline is the end of August.
The calendar has been a labor of love for me. It’s gratifying to complete a project that helps the organization and is fun to do. If you can’t contribute a photo, you can buy a calendar. They are only $10 and help further the good work of the organization.
Evelyn McDonald moved to Fernandina Beach from the Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C. in 2006. She is a chair of Arts & Culture Nassau, a city commission charged with support of the arts in Nassau County. She serves on FSCJ’s Curriculum Committee for the Center for Lifelong Learning. She is also the chair of the Dean’s Council for the Carpenter Library at the UNF. Ms. McDonald has MS in Technology Management from the University of Maryland’s University College and a BA in Spanish from the University of Michigan.