Making of "Birthday Thanks"

Every year around my kid's birthdays I find my mind drifting to "This time X years ago I'd be _____!" -with whatever I was doing pre, post or during their births.  Being pregnant and giving birth still seems insane to me and I can't believe I did it (TWICE!) so I enjoy reflecting and being glad I'm not back there now!  I reasoned I couldn't be the only mom that does this, and although it was a bit of a niche joke, it would really resonate with those who got it!

Sometimes I get a layout in my head that I just can't shake.  With this I wanted to capture the disorganization of a little kids party.  All the foldup chairs come out and moms sit together watching the kids runs everywhere.  Unfortunately for me, this meant drawing something I hate drawing -characters sitting!  What seemed like a quick 2 paneller turned into a bit of an anatomy nightmare!

For the characters, I knew I wanted Bunny (the pug mom) in there for solidarity and then I needed a pregnant character for the punchline.  It seemed fun to bring the starry eyed pregnant Lemur back from a previous comic, plus she was sitting, so win-win!

I tried my best not to include Vincent's age in the comic, because I want the kids to be somewhat timeless, but the joke didn't land as well without it.  I have his age as 6 in the bios in the book, so I figure he'll just be 6 forever (Simpsons style!)

The banner reveal actually happened by accident!  When I copied it to the 1st panel from the 2nd, the speech bubbles hid the message perfectly!  

I had some trouble figuring out what to do with Fran's eyes in the last panel.  I wanted her looking knowingly at Bunny, but it could be misinterpreted as her being a bit of a bitch by looking directly at Lemur mom!  I ended up with her gazing contentedly up into the air, completely oblivious to Lemur mom's discomfort.

All in all, this one was a huge pain in the butt, but at least I have some sitting poses I can copy and paste into future strips!  -As long as I remember they are here! (I often forget!) 😅