Saturday, December 6, 2025 – Day 480

Saturday, December 6, 2025

Good morning, everyone.

Let’s talk red.

We had so many holiday traditions over the years../some new, some old, and some fleeting…but what mattered most was that we celebrated them together. For so many years, Christmas at 1922 was the anchor. The siblings who lived outside the Chicago area would pack up their families and stay nearly a week. Going from a household of 10 to an extended family of almost 30 wasn’t just “a little more” chaos…it was exponential chaos. But the memories burn bright.

RED CAKE One of those long-standing traditions was red velvet cake. Ms. Sally made her famous red velvet cake every Christmas dinner.

Then came 1976, when Red Dye No. 2 was banned in the U.S. At the time, there wasn’t a readily available replacement. Mars Inc. even stopped producing red M&M’s and didn’t bring them back until 1987. So what happens when people hear a product is banned? Most toss it out.
 Not Ms. Sally. 
She went straight to the grocery store and cleared the shelves of red dye. Nobody was going to interfere with the red velvet cake tradition…not on her watch.

Fast-forward to the mid-90s: red velvet cake still held its rightful place at Christmas dinner. After one of those dinners, a grandchild fell ill a couple hours after loading up on dessert (not dye related). There was a frantic dash up the stairs, hand over mouth, trying desperately to reach the bathroom. It was close… but not quite close enough. Just outside the door, the red velvet cake met the blonde shag carpet.
 Let me tell you…that shade of red is permanent.
 That carpet held the memory of that Christmas for many, many years.

RED SOCKS There was also the red sock tradition, which started with my mom’s brother, Uncle Jim. He was a committed red-sock wearer…every single day, for as long as I can remember. There was no reason behind this quirk…it just was.

When my parents got married, it was Uncle Jim who walked my mom down the aisle, since their father had passed away years earlier. And of course… he wore his bright red socks, proudly on display, for that walk down the church aisle.

My mom told that story countless times over the years, always with affection for her brother. It was one of her favorite memories. After Uncle Jim passed away all his red socks were passed out at his funeral…yes, there were that many. Following that day, the family keeps his memory alive by wearing red socks on special occasions: weddings, Christmas, even funerals. It’s a simple tradition, but a beautiful tribute to a brother my mom truly loved.

RED DRESSES And then there were the red dresses on Christmas morning. My sister Lis and her husband Steve have three girls, and their daughter Katy…the first grandchild…started the trend. On Christmas morning Katy came down the stairs in a red dress and not just any dress, but a Florence Eiseman dress.

After that debut, many of the granddaughters who followed wore red dresses as well. With 14 girls and only 3 boys in the grandchild lineup, those flashes of red were everywhere. It became its own Christmas tradition…bright, festive, and unforgettable.

All these “red” traditions of cakes, socks, dresses…seem small on the surface, but they’re woven into the fabric of who we are as a family. They’re reminders of the people who came before us, the memories we’ve carried forward, and the stories we still tell.

Even now, with life changing in ways I never expected, those traditions still bring me comfort. They remind me that what lasts isn’t the chaos or the carpet stains…it’s the love that showed up year after year, in every shade of red. ❤️

Have a great Saturday. 19 days until Christmas.

Love you guys!❤️

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