The Family Portrait

Will young Kate find a way to send her late mother a special Christmas gift in heaven?

When a young patient grieving the death of her sister recognizes the man in a portrait hanging in her office, Dr. Kate Harding, a licensed clinician, is startled, but not entirely surprised. The face in the painting takes her back 20 years to snow-covered Cedar Falls, Kentucky, and to her first Christmas without her mother.

As Christmas approached, young Kate struggled to adjust to life’s changes following the death of her mother. When a conversation with Granny Grace convinced Kate that there was Christmas in heaven, she was determined to get her mother a present - a special gift that would make her mother happy forever.

No one could tell Kate how to get her gift to heaven - not her daddy, not Uncle Luke the medical student, not Aunt Susannah Hope, and not even Pastor Simmons who she was most certain would have the answer. But Kate devises and executes a Christmas Eve plan that forever impacts her life.

Kate’s Christmas is filled with surprises: taking in a runaway girl, a tender exchange of Christmas presents, a meeting with the mysterious Mr. Josh, and finally, a beautiful family Christmas portrait.