Merry Christmas to all of our friends, relatives and fellow cruisers. I must say that we do miss having a White Christmas. Our hometown of Duluth, Minnesota, has had 37 inches of snow so far in December, with snow falling on 19 of the first 23 days of the month.   This is close to a record for the month and more snow is expected on Christmas Eve. When you grow up with snow on Christmas, I think the holiday never seems quite right without it.  In the photo above, Sailor is sitting on the patio at Sunset Bay Marina with palm trees behind the Christmas tree which is surrounded by tropical plants. He would love playing in snow, I’m sure, but it might be a problem finding him in a snow bank since he looks like a polar bear.

Although it would be nice to be in Bimini for Christmas with our friends Cathie and Tom on Interlude, who crossed over from Miami today, there are good things about still being in Florida.  Most important is that we are still in the States and I can take a nonstop flight from West Palm Beach to be in Bethesda when Peter has his surgery.  That trumps crystal blue water and deserted white sand beaches in The Bahamas. The water and beaches will still be there when we arrive in February.

Since we are plugged into shore power at a dock, we have a three foot Christmas tree on the chart table and various other decorations in the salon.  Colored lights are strung outside on the lifelines, the salon roof, and the bimini. In the photos, the outside lights look white, but they are the traditional Christmas colors. Many boats in the marina are decorated with bulbs, but wisely not a single boat in the mooring field is using power for decorations.  Sailor is all decked out for the season, too.  Yes he has grown and is 42 pounds at six months old.

After I uploaded the photo below of our Christmas tree, I noticed something in the picture.  There is a penny on the table in front of the tree.  I know most people will think I’m crazy, but after my dad died in 2003, I started finding dimes in strange places.  A friend told me she found dimes after her dad died so I figured my dad was doing the same for me.  They often showed up when I was having a difficult time with something in my life.  Once I found one on the floorboard of my van after driving several hours from St. Paul to Duluth to visit my mom. Shortly after my mom died in 2011, I found a dime and a penny side by side.  Then, I started finding pennies in odd places.  I should mention that my mom was very frugal and my dad was a bit more generous with money.  I did not place the penny on the table, so was it from my mom?  I choose to think so.

Finally, our good friends Joanne and Jim Hubal filmed a very touching YouTube video with their cat Lovey and dog Holly, called Lovey the Cat’s Christmas Miracle: a special friend comes home for the holidays.