With 2009 coming to a close, we’re feeling a little nostalgic. That’s why for our final contest of the year, we want photos that give us the warm-and-fuzzies. The theme? Togetherness. Interpret it however you’d like.

Here’s how the contest works: Send your submissions by noon on Wednesday, December 16, and our judges will pick the best shots to advance to the reader-voting round. Then we’ll open it up to you, the reader, to select a favorite. The winner will be published in the February issue of The Washingtonian.

Photos—one per e-mail—should be sent to [email protected]. Be sure to include the photographer’s name, phone number, e-mail address, and place of residence, along with a sentence or two describing the photo and explaining why it fits the theme. Photos should be 300 dpi and at least four by six inches. And remember, both the photographer and the photo’s subject need to be from the Washington area, which includes the Maryland and Virginia suburbs.