When I joined the Tai Chi Center of Madison, I began to learn facts about Chinese culture, such as the Chinese zodiac. 2011 was the year of the Rabbit. I’m a rabbit. I designed my first Chinese zodiac animal. At the time I was attending Princeton Club regularly and I liked the athletic designs found in the gift shop. So I picked the same athletic font and did a circle surrounding a yin yang.
I spent a lot of time researching. Well that’s not true: I just asked Paul. Exactly which side of yin yang is the black and is the fat portion at the top or the bottom? (Clockwise, small to big, small to big, black Yin being on the right.) Once I knew the symbol orientation, I made a rabbit, one ear bent, one straight and positioned him to poke out from the base of the black; hanging out over the edge, his paws holding the white dot.
Once I did the rabbit my fate was basically set to do the entire 12 animals over the next decade. The year 2023 was especially important, because that was my animal / element anniversary: it had been 60 years since the last water rabbit in 1963.
An email arrived from a Tai Chi student, letting me know that the link was broke to my CafePress store and she was wondering if there were any horse designs for 2026. I have the horse posted from twelve years ago, but have updated the year, 2026. I asked her how serious she was about wanting a fire horse and perhaps I could make one for her.
PWS (90) = metal horse; Tim (77) might be a fire dragon or fire snake.
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