The Story Behind the Design

PATHWAYS



Many of my designs are created for a special occasion for friends and family members.  When our son graduated from Virginia Military Institute, I designed "Graduate" for him.  Our sons are amazing young men, and are so supportive of my business so it was an honor to create something especially for him. When his younger brother graduated from Penn State University he asked if I was going to design something for him and my answer was "of course!"

We actually didn't think he would graduate.  No...not because he was lazy or disinterested...he was serving his country.  As a family we've gone through 4 deployments with the boys.  Joshua was in the midst of his college career when he volunteered for deployment. His reasoning in addition to serving his country was "the other guys have wives and children" so he figured that would enable at least one of the guys to stay at home with his family.

The first time he was gone over a 1 year.  The second time was about a year  and a half.  Several months of that was spent on the other side of the country for training, then over a year on the actual deployment.  Each time he came home we figured he would decide to skip college and get on with a job, but each time he came home he went back on campus and picked up where he left off.  I actually thought about naming the design "Long Time Coming!", but thought "Pathways" sounded classier.

Each time he lamented that he was the "old guy on campus", but each time he worked hard and did better than he had the previous semester.

The design represents the pathways he's taken in his life.  He's always been one to scare the bejeebers out of me by jumping off the deck or the roof of the shed as a child, then the fast motorcyles and bungee jumping off a bridge in Bulgaria while he was on leave.  (yep...we've got video of that one!).  He's still a bit of an adrenaline junkie, but he's matured with a beautiful wife and 2 very precious little ones and has a career in Federal Law Enforcement.  The colors represent the countries he's been in and of course you can see the paths aren't straight, but that's my boy!