Florida is the same as it ever was. Long stretches of flat freeway, a startling abundance of enormous pickup trucks, boats buzzing the intercoastal waterways, and a heat that makes you sigh and turn up the air.

We arrive at my grandmother's apartment on Baking Day armed with groceries. The kitchen is a mad hum of activity, and we dive in. We chop, grate, grease, mix, fry, bake, taste, direct, help, argue, laugh. And talk. Our stories overlap, our voices raised to be heard over one another and the machinery of food. We move easily around one another from the sink to the stove to the table and back. As always, we end with an informal dinner together and enough kosher food to serve a small army.

Our seder traditionally is a small army. Between relatives and friends, we average thirty people a year. We do the kosher baking; the caterers take care of the rest. It's a religious ceremony, but more than that, it's a chance to be with family we rarely get to see.

Over the last year and change, four cousins have had children. Included among them are my second cousin and his wife. As the Wife is already a mother to Bijoux the Civil Disobedience Dog, I wonder how they will handle an heir and a spare, as it were, and guess that the dog might miss out this year.

As we join the growing crowd in the event room, it's immediately evident how wrong I've been to assume that Second Cousin and Wife might choose one bundle over the other. There, tucked securely in the Wife's arms, is Not Bijoux: an apricot toy poodle with a jeweled barrette holding back the bangs from its tiny face. The Wife greets me serenely and hands me the dog in one smooth motion. Bijoux, the original Civil Disobedience Dog, has gone to the great seder in the sky, and Bailey is the heir with the hair.

This year, the dog is not even concealed in a designer pet carrier, but included in introductions as a member of the family. It's a coup de chienne. My grandmother, weakened by age and infirmity, is not the formidable adversary she once was, and the Wife has, in a way, won by default. But perhaps not knowing about the dog is almost as good as not having the dog there at all.

The baby, we learn, is upstairs with the nanny. She will make an appearance later in the evening.

Bailey weighs a total of six pounds. My cat is heavier. She sits silently in my arms, eyes tracking the Wife as we talk. She was heartbroken when Bijoux died, she tells me, and I murmur sympathies, thinking of Cricket. We eventually take our seats, and the Wife puts Bailey on her lap. Apparently, she is the heir to the chair, as well.

The seder is wonderful chaos. The parents get up quietly and tend to their babies, who interrupt the proceedings with enthusiastic almost-speech. People at the far end of the tables talk amongst themselves. Second Cousin raises his voice, cracks jokes, steers our unwieldy ship through the ceremony.

When we break for dinner, the Wife appears with the world's most beautiful baby. She looks like a painting of a baby, with round cheeks, soft dark hair, and enormous dark eyes. She's wearing a pale-green taffeta dress with a pink ribbon sash. Like the dog, she doesn't make a sound, only rests in her mother's arms and observes.

The seder winds down. Goodbyes are exchanged. I lean over Bailey to kiss the Wife and wish her a safe journey home. And now I know: the dog will never be in question again.

Just don't tell my grandmother.

My balloon is finally beginning to droop.

I woke on the morning of my birthday to find the balloon tied to my hotel room door. The whole floor must have heard my delighted laugh. I took it with me to my parents' room, then out to lunch, then to the airport, tied to my backpack, floating above me.

At security, I put the balloon on the conveyer belt, still tied to the backpack. The attendant weighed it down gently with a pocket-change-sized bin and sent it through. It bobbed gently next to me as I put on my boots.

I walked to my gate. People stared and pointed and smiled. A few wished me happy birthday. The flight attendants smiled when I boarded, then a plane full of people, all amused by my balloon. I untied the ribbons from my pack and put the balloon carefully into an overhead compartment. Would it still be a balloon after a few hours at 30,000 feet?

When we landed in Boston, I popped the compartment and took out my balloon, as floaty and happy as ever, and tied it to my backpack again. As I left the plane, I got surprised laughter from the flight crew. They hadn't expected the balloon to survive the pressure changes, but there it was. They wished me a happy birthday.

Seatmate, an utter angel, was waiting at the baggage claim with cold spring water and a Special K bar. (We call them crack bars because they're so addictive.) We put the balloon in his car and brought it back to my place. Since then, the balloon has been bouncing around my bedroom, drifting in the drafts near the ceiling.

It's finally beginning to droop. Another day and it will be an empty mylar package. But that's a lot of happiness out of one simple balloon.

Thank you, Mom and Dad.