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I love Christmas traditions…from the food to the presents to the tree…how each family has our own traditions…locked into our memory.

I remember Christmases in Ohio…where I was born…where I did my earliest growing…I remember our aluminum Christmas tree with rotating colors…I remember cold…I remember snowing.

I remember sipping hot chocolate watching those tiny marshmallows floating on the top…I remember opening our presents…with our Christmas stockings as backdrop.

I remember celebrating family traditions…customs I hold dear…I remember taking a moment to remember family members who are missing and those no longer here.

And then I moved to Florida…where I’d be blessed to see my own family grow…where we celebrate Christmas in the Florida winter…without the cold…without the snow.

Florida…where our blended family formed new traditions….did I mention…there’s no snow…where on Christmas Eve instead of eating turkey…we order pizza…from Dominoes.  

Florida…where we can look at multi-colored Christmas lights without ever donning cold weather gear…where the weather is so balmy flowers of every color bloom all year.

We were in a nursery searching for flowers when Deborah stopped…her face a mixture of happy and sad.. “Whenever I see pansies,” she said, “it makes me think of Dad.”

Deborah’s dad was born around Christmas Day…the day when her owns destiny was cast…and, after a long and happy life, it was around Christmas Day he passed.

For her there are always mixed feelings when Christmas season dawns…she is happy to remember her dad…but sad that he is gone.

So what flowers did we choose?  The decision wasn’t hard…Deborah took them home and planted her dad’s pansies in our yard…

Christmas in Florida is certainly different than all my Christmases long ago…as our blended family mixes old with new traditions in the absence of cold and snow…

But it is our traditions…old and new…I hope our family will forever happily remember…

Like celebrating with pizza on Christmas Eve…

and growing pansies in December.