This Christmas the Texas daughter and her family will not be coming this way for the holidays so I went to Austin for a pre-Noel visit. I wanted to make sure she didn’t miss anything not being in California. We talked about doing some of our traditional things, maybe go to the Nutcracker or a Christmas concert. But in keeping with the spirit of Austin, a city proud of its weirdness, we opted for new traditions.

First was a Julia Child dinner party where guests were urged to bring recipes from Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Our hosts dressed as Julia and Paul, one in polyester knit dress and high heels and his partner in goatee and beret. We dined on dishes awash in butter and cheese and trilled “bon appetit’ in our most flamboyant Julia voices while visions of the real Julia flashed on a big screen next to a Christmas tree.

At another Austin holiday gala we mingled with the pretty people in a cocktail lounge of a downtown hotel where the bar stools are made out of hairy white cowhide. When she lived in San Francisco daughter Sam and her sisters and girlfriends would put on their holiday glitz and take over a bar in one of the city’s hotels. Not yet having a core group in Austin she invited a random mix of women she met through her book club, the neighborhood, the gym and a stepmothers group to dress in their merriest and meet for drinks. They showed up and brought friends. I was the token import, dressed in Wine Country casual and wishing for a pair of cowboy boots.

She’ll be fine in Texas for Christmas. Her new Austin ways mix well with a number of California holiday favorites. She’s made her grandmother’s Russian tea cookies. For Christmas dinner she’ll make the family spinach and walnut salad, as well as some new dish “from Julia.”

Her tree is decorated with familiar ornaments. I spotted the tiny rocking horse made out of red felt that her grandmother gave her when she was two. And she still has the music box covered with Santa elves from when she was a baby. It’s pretty beat up but still produces a jaunty “Jingle Bells.”

Christmas is not always so portable. There were two Christmases that I spent without any family. They were the years my husband and I lived in Germany and although our daughters were in California I looked forward to the two of us having a cozy, festive holiday in Europe. The first Christmas my husband, flying from Nairobi to Frankfurt, ended up stuck at an airport in London, leaving me with the cat. Some friends took pity and asked me to dinner, and the traveler got back late that night but in time for dessert.

Another Christmas the two of us took the train to Italy to a small mountain village where it snowed and was perfectly festive until Santa took a slip on the ice outside the hotel on Christmas Eve. A cab driver, heaped in holiday good will, took him down the mountain to a hospital to have x-rays on his back. He was okay but they kept him overnight for observation and I returned to the hotel to drink Chianti with the ghosts of Christmas past.

This year the family will be at home for Christmas, both in California and Texas. And God bless us everyone for Skype.

Susan Swartz is an author and journalist in Sebastopol, Ca. You can also read her at www.juicytomatoes.com and hear her Another Voice commentary on KRCB-FM radio on Fridays. Email is susan@juicytomatoes.com