Herding Cats

This is what D uses to describe our kids. This exactly sums up what it is like to take our kids out anywhere. Usually our biggest outing is to a park these days. Currently the park is across the street from our house and getting to and from is a project as all three kids have their own agenda when heading out. S is all over the place sometimes leading the pack or sometimes digressing to their antics or leading them astray. Y wants to stop and look at every car on the street, thankfully there are not that many and M looks at everything and goes everywhere......She takes after S. This is the short version. They all feel a need to go up all the stairs we pass, inspect any utility doors left open and anything else they can find. This park is literally two minutes from the house, but I think it takes us anywhere from 10-30min. each way! So now that you have all this information you will understand when I say, I have no idea what possesed me to take all three kids to Jerusalem's largest mall today by myself during one of the busiest times of the year.

This is the week of Pesach(Passover) we have Passover Sedar first night and then there is an interim week and then we celebrate the final night and rejoice that the next day we will all be eating carbs again! I mean we all rejoice that we are free and no longer slaves in Egypt. So in between while we are forgoing bread and all things that involve flour, almost the entire country is on vacation. About the only people who are working are those in the service industry. Now on top of all this we are in the middle of a heat wave. So you tell me where you think everyone is going. Yup, the mall. Malka Mall is an American style mall, size and all, so for those of you who have kids you know what the potential is for losing said kid in the mall. Now stupid me, here I go with three kids and no stroller. Our stroller died and we are waiting for Grammy and Grandpa to bring us a new one, G-d Bless them! We have been like this for a while and it makes life a challenge. BUT I did have a reason for going. The kids needed new shoes. This was not a gee maybe it is time get Larry, Mo and Curly shoes, this was, Larry's toes are sticking out literally of the old ones and Mo needs to be in something not her brothers hand me downs and fortunately, we can put Curly off for another month.

When I have visions of taking the kids out, I envision ths scenario where they want to walk and cooperate and we will look like everyone else at the mall and no one runs off and everone listens. If only that were true......The easiest part of this was getting on and off the bus. From the get go the only one willing to walk is S, Mr. and Mrs. busy are too tired. And they have to stop and look at everything. And now we are in major traffic so Y just wants to sit and watch all the cars. I almost stopped right there and gave up on the shoe quest. But this was the only day to do this and S really needed shoes before he goes back to school from vacation and everything in our yeshuv is closed this week. So after some help from a very nice woman we make it in. Time for lunch. We hit the grocery store, all malls in Israel have one. It is pretty cool. We get OJ cottage cheese and potato chips, not the best, but not the worst. We did not do fruit because of a whole lot of kosher issues which I will not go into. So we finally get through the store after searching for only Kosher for Passover food and getting through the loads of people who are buying last minute stuff for barbecues, we find a spot to sit. I won't even go into lunch, but suffice to say it is its own project and although it can be annoying, I am grateful that this Israeli woman made it her business to give me a hand. Then it is off to the shoe store, where everything is on sale, but doesnt apply to us. Oh boy! After what seems like an eternity I get two of three kids shoes. Like I said we put off Curly (Y) because he could make do with his. As it is for two pairs of shoes I had to drop about the equivalent of $100 U.S.! Gack! We usually we skip the name brand stores and head for the outlets, but getting to the mall was about all I could manage today. So we get ready to leave and S is gone. In his new shoes of course. So we use the box and I pay for them. But he is no where to be found. At this point I felt like calling D and asking how he felt about just scaling ourselves back to two kids. Think of the money we could save! Meanwhile I am still trying to drag, carry, nudge, the other two to walk and preferably in the direction I need to go. After making rounds in nearby stores I find him with two women. He was at the other end of the mall.....looking for me........So of course I say thank you and tell him, if he had not left he would not need to look for me. And we have discussion 9 million about not wandering off as Y wanders off and is captured by the same two women who by now are probably ready to call Child Services and report me as an incompetent parent. Time to go home. Back down two floors and out the door. By this time I am pretty much carrying both kids on and off, mostly on until we get to the bus. Then we get everyone home, M is asleep and the other two are almost there. But do you think everyone could stick with the program? Nope. The minute we are all off the bus I am missing Y. He stopped to look at the 16 passenger van and blended in with tire it was so big! The whole thing probably took us about 5 hours and I still had to whip up a quick dinner! I told D the next time I want to spend that much money for that much aggravation I will flush the money down the toilet and beat my head against the wall. Or I could do what D suggested which is to take them out one at a time and leave the other two home with him.

Welcome to Beitar Illit

Well we are finally moved, but I wont say settled although we are getting there. We have moved for the 3rd time this year. Hopefullly this will be our last for a while. We are now living 40min. SW of Jerusalem. We are back out in the "disputed West Bank" but it doesnt feel like it. It is a quick trip to Jerusalem, the busses run every 20min. and we live in a city that has its own intercity bus system. The town is about 37,000 and growing by the minute. We live in a new section that is still being developed and in fact our building is not even finished yet and we are still awaiting the arrival of a few of the neighbors. Living here is once again different from every place else have lived in Israel. First we live in a building that has one entrance, we used to have our own entrance. And although technically it has fewer units than in Jerusalem, we went from 20-8, because it is a building instead of 2 long rows of apts. it feels bigger and closer living space. We are also on one long street with all buildings and a row behind us too. Which is similar to our Karnei set up but their were only 4 units to a building there and again everyone had their own entrance. Still we our apt. is brand new and is 4 bedrooms plus a storage closet on the floor below and we have some green space downstairs and a nice big patio. Moving into a brandnew place has had its challenges too though. Like the fact that we had to have the plumbing fixed becaues if we ran the washing machine or drained the bath tub, everything flooded. Fortunately it got taken care of pretty quickly. There are also no freebies. No left over closets (In Israel, there are not the traditional American closets with a door and bar or a walk-in. Here we have to buy something free standing that is a pain to take down and put back together again. Ours needs to be re-assmebled and I feel like humpty dumpty right now....) And since the kitchen is brand new it only comes with the bottom row of cabinets. That means that we need to get more.
However, since it is new, it doesnt look like a 70's throwback, everything is nice and new and it is had a lot of natural light. Yeah! And it is big!

S is in school and it sounds like he is making friends already. They are very patient with his lack of hebrew and I have been told by another parent that use the bi-lingual kids to translate for him. We are very please with his teachers and are happy to have someone so willing to work with us and him.

We made it through a very busy Purim. Purim is the story of Queen Esther and Mordecai who save the Jewish people from Hamans evil plot to destroy the Jews. It is a big dress up holiday, although we did not dress up this year, just the kids. Purim is a very joyous holiday with lots of eating and dressing up. We also trade baskets of food and nosh designed to add joy to a persons Purim Meal. I managed to make homemade cookies, but not the challah I hoped to. Hopefully we will have photos posted soon. S went as Peter Pan and Y and M went as clowns. We spent part in our new home which was very nice and we got meet some people in the neighborhood. Then for second day which is pretty much only celebrated in Jerusalem we went in and had Purim meal with our previous neighbors from our Jerusalem neighborhood. We really had a good time and we had a chance to also visit with some other friends. We got home around midnight and a good time was had by all!

We are now gearing up for Pesach which will begin at the end of the week. We have been frantically trying to finish unpacking and clean and finish eating all our bread, pasta, etc. in order to get the house cleaned and ready for Pesach. We will be having our friends from Tsfat this year. They recently moved to Modiin and so now we are hosting instead of going to them. We are really looking forward to it. Pesach, otherwise known as Passover, is when the Jews were brought our of Egypt and freed from being slaves by Pharaoh. This begins the saga of crossing the Red Sea, spending 40 years in the dessert and receiving the 10 commandments, before finally being let into Israel. Because the Jews fled Egypt in the night and quickly the bread did not rise, but turned into crackers. To commemerate this we eat on unlevened things for a week straight. So for carb addicts like me, it is a loooong week. We try not have it in our homes, we dont eat it and we dont buy it. This means no pasta, bread, donuts, cookies, cake, etc. unless itis made with matzoh meal or potato flour. We basically make do with out. we eat a lot of meat, fruit and veggies and dairy. For those who are considered Ashkenazi, which means they hail from Eastern Europe we also hold no, beans or corn, so no peanutbutter and well no corn. It is a looooong week in our house. We are sacrificing and scarfing down all the GS cookies and cadburry mini eggs my mom just sent in a group effort to get rid of such things from our house! Since most candy in the US is made with cornsyrup that is also forbidden for the week. Fortunately there are a lot of replacements though.

As side from getting moved, settled and getting S into school we are doing fine. We have had guests just about every shabbos we have been here which has been wonderful, it has given us a chance to catch up with a few people we have not seen in a while.

All 3 monkeys have had growth spurts and we will be shoe shopping during Pesach vacation. S out grew his just in time to start school and he looks like a pauper as his toes are practically sticking out! Everyone seems to have gotten taller too....We are thankful for the stock pile of hand-me downs we have so that we can keep up with our little bean sprouts! They are also getting smarter by the minute. S has mastered the refrigerator lock like a pro, and the dynamic duo have figured out how to use a chair to get into just about anything you can imagine. We thought taller counters would solve a lot of problems, but the kids just got smarter! It is hard to believe that the wonder twins will be celebrating birthday #2 soon. Y still thrives on being a baby and is our resident finger sucker and snuggler. M is more independent like her oldest brother and is enjoying being a girl and being such a big one at that! Speaking of independance....Now we know that S has a good sense of direction, but he really proved it when I was late to pick him up one day and I got there and he was gone. After an organzied search by the school and a call to the "bus driver" (a mini van that can be arranged to take kids to and from school)to make sure he did not go home that way, we found him at home waiting for me. This is not a walk across the street. His school is actually a good 20-25min. walk for an average adult. He made it in 25! When I pick him up, he is always too tired to walk and we always take the city bus home. What is really amazing is that he did not dawdle or stop to look at anything, he just went home. Fortunately D was there waiting for him and he wanted to know where I was and why I went to pick him up.......Now he takes the Cherry van (It is a maroon colored mini-van) home from school like a majority of the other kids.

I am also excited to announce that my sister is expecting and there will be another little boy on the Schulz side of the family. Leaving our little M as the reigning princess. We are most excited to welcome baby Najdek in August. I think it is great that our nephew will have a sibling and that my sister will experience that endless of joy of two children. Nothing like the sounds of..."No, mine!, You play with that! Leave me alone!" and other joyous sounds of sibling rivalry. :) Revenge will be mine.......all mine......ha ha ha(read evil laugh). Seriously, I love my sister and I just would not want to be the only one to know that joy of having more than one kid under the roof. Besides I am sure she will do great!

In other upcoming news, my in-laws will be here begining of May and we are looking forward to their upcoming visit. S is particularly excited to see his Grammy as they have begun having little baking sessions when she is here. Grandpa will also be making appearance this spring which will be nice. He usually only comes once a year in the fall, so we are happy to see him this spring too. M will be happy to have her rocking chair buddy here again too! Then we will be having a house guest for about 6 weeks from May to mid-June. Dit will be doing a number of things while she is camped out under our roof, one of which is to work with autistic children, something she would like to proffesionaly. So we plan to see quite a bit of Av at the same time.

And currently during Pesach vacation we hope to get a visit in to our friends down south who live on a moshave and have enough animals to constitute their own petting zoo. Complete with goats, chickens, dogs and cats. We know them our days in Karnei and we look forward to seeing them soon. We also hope to get up North this spring to see the new home of our friends Shosh and kids. Which is about 10min north of Tsfat.

This covers everything through the end of June so if you dont hear from again until then you will know why!

Chag Semeach to those who celebrate Pesach and Happy Spring to rest of you!

keyboards, Explosions and Life, Oh MY!

This week has been busy and crazy both weather wise and life wise. On Shabbos it was nice enough to get all the kids to the park. Yeah!!!! Since then the weather has gone downhill and we are now back to freezing our buns off! Although thankfully it is only raining not snowing. Well due to the lovely weather everyone is getting cabin fever. It seems that even if it is nice and we dont make it out, everyone is OK. Probably because they can still play on the merpesset(deck) out back. But when it rains the kids all get a little nutty. This is where the keyboard story comes in. Yesterday morning I was on the computer in the bedroom when the phone rang. I was going to ignore it, but after listening to the answering machine I discovered that I needed to answer the phone. Well one phone call led to another right behind it. Meanwhile Curly and Mo were still in the bedroom unbeknownst to me. When I looked back to check on them, what should my wondering see, but two tiny babies gleefully pulling everysingle key off the laptop keyboard. I wanted to pass out and barf all at the same time and I am pretty sure that the shriek I let out was heard by the people in the neighboring town over! I sent S over to get D to see what damage control could be done and I am grateful to say that we were able to replace almost all the keys. Some dont work quite right and eventually we are probably going to have to cough up $100 to replace the keyboard, but thankfully we can get by for now.

As if that wasnt enough excitement for oneday, I took S with me to check out an apartment in an area outside the city in a place called Brechfeld in Moddiin Elite. It is about an hour by bus from Jerusalem. So off S and I go running to catch the bus. This means catching one in the neighborhood to get where we need to catch the bus the Brechfeld. Fortunately we caught the first bus on time but of course missed the second to Brechfeld by minutes. Grrrr.....but OK even if we catch the 2nd one 45min. later we should still make our apointment on time. In theory.... About 3 minuted before the next bus is due to arrive we had a total Jerusalem, Israeli experience. We are standing at the bus when in Hebrew a police officer starts moving everyone down the street. So of course I am with it and know something is up, but I want to know more details so I ask for the english version. Answer, there is a suspicious object in the area and they are moving everyone down the street. We go to the end of the block and of course silly me I am thinking the bus is still going to come down the street, it will just stop further down. But No.......of course not, they are closing the whole street! OK no problem I think to myself, they will get rid of this thing and then we will get the bus a few minutes late. Wrong again. They did two controlled explosions of the mysterious objects as S andn I about 100 other people stood around watching. It was actually fascinating and the first one they did, I could really feel it! It really surprised me. Were the mystery items really bombs? I doubt it. It looked like someone for got their bags. I could see them lifting things out with a stick type thing and it looked clothes and a plastic bag. (Besides this really is not so uncommon, we know someone who had a personal experience with this. One of our friends have a child who left his school bag in the park. It was a smaller town than Jerusalem and a neighborhood park so the police went dutifully from door to door trying to figure out if the bag belonged to anyone. By the time the parents figured out what was going on and what the question was and that the bag belonged to them, it was too late and one little back pack belonging to a 4 year old was blown to smitherines. Thus sparing the good people of the city from the dangers of a 4 year old's school bag.) So anyway, back to our story...45min. later they finally re-open the street. Did the bus come? NO! The street was closed so long that the bus was rerouted and we had to wait for another one. During this half an hour wait it started to get cloudy, then it proceeded to rain and then hail! Fortunately we managed to stay dry under the bus shelter, but we were sure cold! We did finally make it to our apt. to see the apt. and it was worth the trip but we are still debating the neighborhood. I wont go into it here as it would take to long and be too confusing to explain. When we finally land I will let everyone know where we are. Suffice to say that yesterday was a long, strange day.

Today the cabin fever continued so after a whole day of being ready to strangle my kids I finally hauled everyone to the park at 5:30pm in the freezing cold so they could sit in the wet sand for a half an hour and dig in the dirt until it got dark. Am I a good mommy or what?! And the scary thing is, it is only Tuesday! If this keeps up I am going to need a lot of tea and lot of chocolate to get through the week!

Hope your week is going better than mine!

Here we go again!

Well I finally have a few minutes to update the world and don't you know, the topic has not changed! It is snowing, AGAIN!!!!! OK, seriously, I loved the snow last month. It was fun and happy and reminded me of my happy childhood with marshmallows and hot cocoa and a big fire. I was thrilled to take the kids out in it and build a snowman. But a second time, this is too much! We live in Israel!!!! A big sunny desert right?!! Actually the desert part is only partially true, that only accounts for the southern part of the country. But we are known as the land of eternal SUNSHINE, NOT SNOW!!!!! I am freezing my everloving buns off here! And this time it was all wet and sloppy and here is S going, why can't we go out in it? Forget it! I did not have energy to dress three kids in 6 layers for 10 minutes of slogging in huge puddles so we could go back in and turn the house into a lake from all the wet clothes. Am I a great mom or what?! I did however, have to go out myself to run errands today. Fortunately the city was prepared this time so the roads were plowed and most of the businesses were open and the busses were running. The other thing that was really great was that we got our organic grocery order today. And early to boot, maybe we should have snow more often.......Nah! We usually get our order anywhere from 5-8pm, but today we got it nice and early at around 3:30p. It really was awesome. I was truly afraid that the driver would not make it due to the weather and terror would ensue over the house as we are usually pretty empty by Tues. since everything is weekly. Although I did pick up some staples while out just in case, including a container of peanut butter. Our house is not a pretty picture when it lacks bread and peanut butter. Like mother, like kids, what can I say? It is the one thing they got from me!

Other than freezing our ecole's off, it is business as usual at the house of J5 where chaos reigns. What is really interesting is that most people seem to enjoy this. The last two months have been quite busy for us actually. It seems that while between Channukah and the end of the month everyone took a break from socializing, starting Jan. 1, we have had everyone through our door. We started off with Av coming to stay with us for the month of Jan. which was great and also brought with it a few of her friends visiting. Then after Av moved out, last week NB came and stayed the week with us in order to finish her radio project with D so she could count it as part of this year's school credit instead of the following year as it all has to be done by March. They have not been able to make their weekly visit due to weather and other things beyond their control. In between we have had a couple of the guys from Kollel pop in to eat lunch with us as the house is heated, not always the case with the Kollel, the neighbors washing machine broke so we were one of 3 families that volunteered to share, plus one of the single guys, Sm, from D's kollel who is with out washer pops in now and again to borrow ours, at our invitation, of course, then we have assorted friends who come to use the internet and finally we have one of Av's friend's from Seattle we have "adopted" Dit who also pops in and out from time to time and tends to come to us for advice. Dit also gave me my first nickname, she decided my full name is too much to say and has shortened it to the first 3 letters, it is actually pretty cute. We find that we rarely have a quiet day or night anymore, but we love the socialization and of course the kids suck up the extra attention like a dog with a bone! We know our kids are cute, they are our kids afterall.....But I had to laugh when Sm came by a with a friend for a visit one Shabbos afternoon and the first thing his friend said was, "Oh my gosh, your kids are so cute!" He had been here all of 5 seconds! And we wonder why our kids act so attention deprived when it is just us! We just can't keep up with all the outside feedback. Because we are far from organized here it always surprises me that at times we get a large amount of foot traffic here. But one day our friend and teacher of S was here using the internet during one of our busy times and was the last to leave. She said to me that it is great that everyone feels so at home here, regardless of personality, background or otherwise. It was such a huge compliment because we really had, had an assorment of people through during the time she was here. It really has been a privelege for us to play host, den mother, teacher, friend and neighbor to so many people.When we lived in P-town we were the hot spot on Shabbos because we were one of 3 or 4 families that lived closest to Shul and after I had Shmuely I was not able to take him, so we had everyone over. It was something we really enjoyed. Living in Jerusalem has really given us that sense of purpose and belonging again. We have really enjoyed it these past months. However, as most of you know this is only temporary and we will be moving in a few short weeks. I hope that in our new place, which will please G-d be very long term or permanent, we will also be able to connect and reach out to so many different people there as well.

Winter Wonderland Continues....

OK, it is Thursday night and I am back at it again! To be fair, M was crying because she was cold last night and settled right down once she was in bed with us. The snowy weather continued today. Although today it was mostly sunny skies, just cold, but the snow did start melting. :( I managed to get the twins into S's old shoes today so we could all go out and enjoy the snow. Yes, I do have more photos. We just stayed on our block but we were out for about another half hour today. It was really pretty today. M kept eating the snow, she reminded me of my sister! S had a snow ball fight with the neighbor boys and it was very cute. Y just took it all in as is his nature. They did manage to get busses going today, although I have no idea what stores were open if any, beyond the grocery stores and makolets (local neighborhood stores.) I did go out and do my weekly shopping today and it went fine. No, major gaps in the shelves, etc. They were out of a few things, but not surprising on a Thursday evening.

So in continuation of my goals from last night, I finally decided that if I never put into writing the things I wanted to do, I would have no hope of every accomplishing them. But if it is in writing, then I have a list that I can refer to and I can check things off when I finish them. Although I am not such an organized person, when I do finally make lists, I love having them and love seeing my chores/goals crossed off and completed. So I created my lists in hopes that as I refer back to them I will force myself to take more time to pursue my goals so that I can check them off my list. It is a silly way of doing things, but hey we all gotta have a goal right? It is 10:37pm here and I have lost all train of thought. Perhaps it will come back at a later date. A good day/night to all.

Walkin' In a Winter Wonderland.......

That is a sentence I never thought I would use here in Israel, but sure enough it happened! It all just goes to show that the old saying, "never say never, " is true. This morning we woke up at 9:00am to a suprise visit from the snow fairy! Apparantly it had only started snowing at 8:00am, but it was perfect timing for us. We usually never sleep so late, but I guess we must have all sensed that today was a good day to sleep in! D still went into Kollel today, but he went late and brought a couple of friends home for lunch to eat in a warm heated house instead of at the Kollel. Today was a B.Y.O.H (Bring your own heater) day. Most apts. in Israel do not have central heating. Thank you G-d, we do! We are really using it!

To say that Jerusalem is not prepared for snow is an understatement! Everyone is in a panic and apparantly people have been at the stores stocking up like mad for the "big storm." We have had about 6 inche of snow and it looks about like East County (Multnomah County, Gresham, Oregon, U.S.A.) when they get a dusting there. Slushy side roads but clear main roads and side walks filled with wet slushy stuff and lots of mud puddles. Now the response here in Jerusalem to a forecast of snow: school was closed early yesterday (Tuesday) before a flake even touched the ground just because it was a possibility. Today all cars have been asked to stay off the road unless absolutely necessary to go out, there are no busses running today, period; and the taxis although out, are few and far between. Also, all major businesses were closed except grocery stores and mini marts. You would think we were in the mild of a midwest blizzard! Although to be fair the winds are pretty strong and we did see a few downed trees.

Our friend Av has been staying with us this past month as she just got back into the country the end of December. So she helped me bundle of the kids and take them out. We took Y and M out while S got himself ready. We layered them up as much as possible then put plastic bags on their feet. They lasted about 10min, long enough to experience snow and for me to get pictures. I then took S up to the park where we saw a few snowmen and even one with a carrot nose! S loved it and we even took pictures of it. We, and by that I mean, I built a very small baby snowman and then used rocks for eyes and a seed pod for the nose. And although I did not think he was so impressed by it, later I heard him telling his grammy all about it. He also wanted to build a big one but then got distracted by the play equipment which is a big structure made out to be a ship. All in all we lasted about a half hour which is pretty good considering it was raining and we were in tennis shoes. Tonight Av and I went for a walk and it was really pretty to see all the snow on the ground. It deffinitely brought back memories of home and all the cold snowy nights we spent laying bed praying that the snow would last long enough for school to be canceled for the next week!

Since I am up blogging I will take the opportunity to catch up from the past month. I really wanted to do a nice begining of 2008 thoughtful blog, but time and energy seem to be lacking although I did start one. I think it might even be a whole 8 lines. So instead I will try to do a breeze through now.

The end of Dec. Av arrived to stay with us after officialy making Aliyah(becoming an Israeli citizen). She has been a huge help and we have all enjoyed her company even if she does keep reminding us that at the young age of 34+ we are deffinitely "OLD"! When did that happen? We often get a laugh when we are talking about movies and realizing that what she saw at 13 we saw at 28.......wah, wah, wah......But seriously we enjoy having her here and it is working fine. She may be moving in a week and we will miss her, but we also understand the need for her to be on her own and not wanting to live with three wild indians and their chieftans all the time!

The begining of the New Year has had me thinking of goals and life and milestones. Some of this had to do with sitting in a government office for an hour by myself. Hey anything to pass the time!
So I finally decided to make a list of anything I ever wanted to do and catergorized them into long term and short term goals. Like I said, I had a lot of time on my hands. So one of the things I wanted to do was learn how to knit. And guess what? I started! My friend M taught me about two weeks ago and I am trying to find time to work on it. I think I have 8 lines done! I am hoping it will be a scarf for S, if I keep going at the current rate I am sure it will be ready by next winter! The other thing I am doing now is reading Wicked. Although this was not a goal, it is something I started last October, as in 2006, but could not seem to stay awake through. It might have had something to do with being sleep deprived and dealing with 6mo. old twins and a toddler. I am excited to find that it is much better now that I can stay awake! I am also relieved to see that I can still read a book that is considered an actual novel and not just a 200 hundred page romance/mystery novel. I was begining to worry about myself and my intelligence level.... I am about half way through and really enjoying it. It is really interesting to see all the thought that Gregory Maguire(the author) put into this additional story of the Wizard of Oz. I know some of it comes from the entire series by L. Frank Baum, but some is pure creative liscensing from the author and I like it. Speaking of thoughts I will save mine for another time as I have a fussy M right now! No rest for the weary mother of a busy crew!

Weather Report

It Snowed! Hopefully photos will follow!

The Right to Play G-d

The last couple of weeks D and I have actually been conscious enough to watch movies once the kids are in bed. We watched 'Idiocracy' and 'Gattaca'. These are both futuristic movies that focus on the intelligence level man kind.

'Idiocracy' came out in January 2007 and stars Luke Wilson. It was created by Mike Judge, creator of King of the Hill and Beavis and Butthead. Luke Wilson and co-star are cyrogenically frozen in time for 500 years due to a military experiment that went 499 years too long. The world has gone to waste, the average intillegence is about that of Beavis and Butthead and The Constitution is a thing of the past. Everything is run by corporate sponsors including the government. If you can get past the 'idiocracy' of the movie you will see that is quite intelligent. Basically it states that while all the high IQ folks quite having kids because of "intelligent" decisions, the environment, finances, etc. All the stupid people were breeding like bunnies and took over the world. It is an interesting idea and to some extent we see that here in Israel. Only it is religious vs. non-religious and guess who is having the most kids and guess who will get the most votes in 10-20 years? It is an interesting idea.

On the polar opposite is 'Gattaca.' This is an intelligent movie that sets itself in the near future. It is an all star cast, that was nominated for several awards most of them art and music. The idea is that everyone genetically creates a child by picking out the best traits of both parents. People are tracked by their DNA and are labeled Valid or In-valid. In-valids are children who are created naturally. They are society's outcasts, they live in segregated groups, can't hold a job beyond janitor and can't have a relationship except with another in-valid. This is the story of one In-valid man who buys the identity of a Valid who was injured in an accident and is now paralyzed from the waist down. They move in together and so begins the elaborate charade of one becoming the other and the threat of discovery.

These two movies have led to a lot of discussion about "the right to play G-d." All too often we here the comments "they should never have children!" or "I hope they are done!" There have even been discussions about sterilizing those who are not perceived as being capable of parenting. In other words, drug users, those with a low IQ, and so on. Who are we to decide who has the right to have children and those who do not. My closest friends came from families who would not have "made the cut."

If we were to follow to the logic of 'Idiocracy' I have a friend who would be working at a low-level job married to a moron instead of in a highly skilled profession. I know another story where if drug users were sterilized a wonderful couple, now clean and sober, would have been denied parenthood. The examples are endless and I think I made my point.

On the other hand if we go with the theory of 'Gattaca', all genetically created people should live a certain life, a certain life expectancy and so on. This is much like real life, come from a good family, do all the right things and nothing can go wrong. So how do we have kids who come from the "right" families wind up doing the wrong thing? I have a friend who was about as low as one can get, into drugs, belonged to a gang, and so on. This person came from an average middle class family, good parents and so on. What happened I asked one day? The answer, "I simply made the wrong friends." And that was all it took.

While I admit that I am just as guilty as anybody of deciding who should and should not be reproducing, I am trying to mend my ways. I have come to realize that those born of adversity often come out on top because they have the most to gain and the least to lose by striving for more. They are also used to working harder just to get through the day. Those who come from a comfortable life are sometimes afraid to reach higher and lose out on the comfort they already know. This doesn't mean that I wish every child to be born to poverty or drug abusing parents or worse. My wish would be that all children are born to good families, with plenty to eat, clothes to wear and parents who love them with all their heart. But G-d has given all people free will for a reason and that is so that they can decide whether or not they want to bring children into this world. And for those people who bring children into this world "by accident, " well G-d has a plan for this world and all who are in it. Just because we don't understand everything that happens in this world doesn't mean there isn't a reason for it. For those things we must rely on whatever we believe gets us through, be it G-d, Fate, or something else.

Organics revisited

Well I have been meaning to do a follow up for sometime now and tonight is as good as any. In my last blog I briefly mentioned that we had taken a leap to the dark side and are now almost 100% organic. This does not include going out to eat, the Brooklyn Bakery (probably the best bakery in all of Israel because it is American style!), and a few occasional treats. We have been doing this for about 4 weeks now and I have made a lot of disoveries in the process.

The Pro's are that everything tastes better. The spices have more zip, the bread is wheatie and crunchy with flax seed and nuts, the chicken looks like chicken and has not been man handled into oblivion and tastes like....chicken! The fruit is sweeter and I don't have scrub all the pesticides off. I can just make sure they are dirt free! And futher more, the kids eat almost all of it. The only things they have vetoed are the plain yogurt and the whole wheat crackers. We nixed the yogurt and I keep the crackers. The granolas bars are awesome and I have staked claim to them as there are only 6 to a box and D only gets them when I am feeling generous and the kids don't even think to ask as they know these are Eema's breakfast!

I also like that I don't have to worry about all the hidden sugar, what is there is minimal and is plainly stated. There are no "natural flavorings" to hide sugar in.

The fact that certain individuals in the family have better behavior when they are not hopped up on additives and sugar.

I am learning to make everything from scratch.

I get my groceries delivered right to my door!

The downside:
Cost, cost, cost........but I am getting used to it and since D is doing some tutoring on the side right now it is not affecting our budget.

I have to make everything from scratch. More time, mess and energy and it sucks what little creativity I have right up! This also means that when I miss calculate how much everyone will eat, we get anarchy when there is not enough. Fortunately we have our handy back up of peanutbutter sandwhiches.

I feel like I am living my life in the kitchen.

So really the pros' much outweigh the cons'. I never thought I would go organic, but the benefits have been really rewarding. We have also been discussing the reason for the costs, which is that because pesticides and cheap fillers are not being used, there is higher risk and greater loss in the fresh produce and with products like cookies, etc. You have the fact that their costs are higher, but also that you can't sneak in cheap subsidized fillers so it costs more to use real ingredients. And since I feel that I am living in the kitchen I am going to take a lesson from a friend of mine and make all the meals in one night freeze it and re-heat at meal time. She used to do this when she worked full time and the kids were little. This way she always came home to fresh home cooked meals with out the exhaustion and mess. Now her kids are older and can help out more so they make it as they go. I have done this to some extent already on and off and when I do it, it works great! My favorite is with pancakes. I have given up cold cereal since the kids can eat like 2-3 bowls in one sitting and be hungry in an hour. Not worth the cost or the time. We now do oatmeal and pancakes. When the pancakes are pre-made they heat up quick and the clean up is minimal. With oatmeal I don't do it ahead of time, but it does heat up quickly and it is filling. Although I am thinking of keeping cold cereal for Shabbat as a treat. Overall, I am proud of myself for making the effort to switch eating habits, but I have a long way to go as sometimes our meals are smaller. I think pre-making things will help that though.

What we have discovered is that despite ourselves, we are now part of the elite food snobs. It makes us sound more elitist now that, "we keep organic...." It really is not something we do because we think it is, "the only way" we do it because it is tastier and because it is one more way to stay one up on the kids! And truly that is the bottome line isn't it! ;)

*Disclaimer: Note to all of you who tend to send us junk food from time to time, please don't think we have given up all our bad habits. While we are trying to shield the kids from the dangers of horribly processed mystery food, we figure it is too late for us!

In other food news, for those of you who know me well, you know I am a peanut butter addict and that when I am preggers I can keep Skippy operating all on my own. Well it would seem that the peanut butter gene has been passed to M. If ever there is a tub of peanut butter within' her grasp she will stick her hand in and start scooping it out in globs. Last week she got to the end of the tub while I was in the kitchen cleaning up. She looked about like Winnie the Pooh with his head stuck in the honey jar, only she had her whole hand in there and peanut butter from head to toe! Like mother like daughter!

PG Tips

I have now discoverd why the English are so bent on their tea. It is what coffee and beer are to those of the Pacific Northwest. For ages I have avoided caffeine because it is usually causes a host of unpleasan side affects. However, the majority of the population in my husband's Kollel is British and boy do they know tea. For months he had been raving about it and guarding his stash, a gift from a friend, like an Oregonian with a latte. Well after a sleepless night with the kids I had to try it. Wow! Thank you G_d! I could function again! That was Tetley's, you know the one they advertise as a party gift to the losers on Jeopardy. Well let me tell you, that is no loser parting gift, I was thinking I would love to be a loser on that show just to get a year's supply of it! And then we had friends bring us back tea after a visit home to England. They brought us PG Tips, now think double latte instead of single. This tea company is the Starbucks of the Northwest, including their own line of merchandise. The glorious thing about PG Tips is that it has all the caffeine I could ever need, brews in 5 minutes start to finish and doesn't require a fancy machine. Add whole milk and sugar and you have an instant buzz that will last at least until 2 or 3:00p at which time I switch to chai tea which only has half the caffeine. The downside to this nirvana, we can't find it here. We have to get our fix direct from England. This means begging our beloved British friends to bring us back a stash everytime they go. Now two weeks later we are down to single digit numbers and trying to find our next hit. After all those years of learning about the Boston Tea Party I now understand why the Brits were so ticked when their tea was dumped over board! If someone dumped my PG Tips in the ocean I would want to shoot them too!

The Festival of Lights

This year Chanukkah for us seems to be pretty rushed. Hurry up and light, open gifts, eat and get the kids to bed. At around 4:30p we can already hear the Lone Ranger music playing mentally in the background as we try to get everything done with out a melt down. But last night we had a moment of peace. We went our for pizza as a special treat for Channukah and for the first day of the new hebrew month. On the way home we stopped to look at all the Menorahs (Chanukkiah) lit in the windows and in door way entrances. It is traditional for a Channukiah to be lit in a window or in the entrance of a door so that all can see it who pass by. Since we live in Jerusalem and there are numerous aparment buildings, one tradition is to place the Menorah at the entrance of the apartment building, each family having their own and it is put in a glass case kind of like a fancy aquarium. People also put them in their windows too. Some families also have a tradition of lighting one Menorah for each member of the family so one window can be crowded by 6 or 7 or more Channukiahs. Walking home it was so peaceful and beautiful to see all the lights glowing and seeing families gathered around lighting candles. S and I had fun looking to see who could find the next place with a Chanukkiah in it. It reminded me of all the years of going to look at holiday lights with my family back home. Jerusalem is such a busy place but it seemed for just that moment in time that all was still and peaceful and pure. Happy Holidays no matter what you celebrate!

This and that and all that jazz!

Well we have had a lot going on and nothing all at the same time. I can't seem to remember what I want to write about when I have time so I am going to try and force it out of my head now. First of all November started out with a visit from my in-laws which went very well. D and I got to go out on a real date to a real restaraunt with no kids! Needless to say there were a lot of jokes before we left the house! I told them it was like being in high school again, asking if we can go out on a date and asking how late we can be out! It worked out really well though, Grammy and S made pancakes for dinner and the kids settled down and went to sleep nicely. M spent the whole time camped in the rocking chair with grandpa have long talks and reading stories. It was really sweet and S had a great time playing pirates with Grammy on the back porch. I think she did great at keeping up.

Lately we have had a lot of Shabbos guests and D is building a radio with our friend SB's daughter for a school project so we get to see them every week! M is in love with their little dog Fritz. He is 6mo. old approx. and he and M play so cute together! She squeaks when he is there and gets all excited.

In other news we have totally gone organic. Yes, I know this is shocking after my last post on the topic, but I have to admit, S's behavior is ultimately so much better after we chopped the sugar and switched. We are not purists as I did mention we went for donuts for first night Channukah and I do buy other treats when occasion calls for it, but over all we are doing organic and I have to say, if nothing else, it takes so much better! The flavors are much stronger and I love being able to just rinse the fruits and veggies with out wondering if I got all the pesticides off.

OK it is 3:00am and I can't remember anything else about anything else! Happy Hannukah!

Our little Diva!

M is becoming our little fashion diva lately. She now is very specific on what she wears and won't get dressed unless it is what she wants to wear. The other day I went to put her in a dress that she just would not wear. I gave her two choices, she could either get dressed and come with us to get donuts for first night Chanukkah or she could stay home with abba. Both were met with a "nah" which means no. And I am sure I heard a "I don wanna! "Then she got up and walked out of the room. So out of frustration I said, "Do you want to wear a new dress?" (I had been saving this since it is a size 2) To this she turns right around comes back in and gets dressed! I even took pictures. Today she would only wear jeans and a short sleeve button down shirt. I have to admit for 1 & 1/2 she has good taste! I hope it lasts.

Hacked!!

My email address was hacked and taken away by scammers, I am not in Canada or beset by robbers but if you still want to send $1200 call me and get my real life address!! You would not belive the number the phone calls I have received from old friends all over the world. Just know dont send any more emails to my yahoo account since I cant get in and some scumbag will read them instead
(posted by D by order of A)

Here is the text of the scam email:

Hi,
I am in a hurry writing you this message,Cos i don't have much time on the pc here,so i have to brief you my present situation which requires your urgent response..Actually, I had a trip to canada two days ago but unfortunately for me all my money got stolen at the hotel where i lodged due to a robbery incident that happened in the hotel.I had been so restless since last night cos i have been without any money i am even oweing the hotel here as well moreover the Hotel's telephone lines here got dissconnected by the robbers and they are trying to get them fixed back.I have access to only emails at the library because my mobile cant work here so i didnt bring it along,please i want you to help me with money so please can you send me $1200 so i can return back i would refund it back to you as soon as i get home,I am so confused right now and dont know what to do,you can have it sent through western union but My passport is with the Embassy here so not sure if i can use my name to collect it now,But you can send it directly to the western union manager here and i would get it through her, I have already spoken to her,so will get it immediately its sent but let me know if you can helpme then i will make findings.please let me hear from you so i can collect her full name and address where you can send the money to today please.Its really urgent for me as i dont know what to do right now than to leave here soonest you send it to me and i'll pay you back immediately i get home..Thanks alot for your kindness,
I will really appreciate your quick response.

Alina

Getting Dressed

I have no time to write and am way behind, but had to put this down before it is forgotten. S is of the age now where he wants to pick what to wear. This has been going on for a year or so and often the end result are the strange looks we get from people who wonder, "who is dressing that kid?!" Most of you know that our kid wears a hat and coat no matter what the weather, even in the middle of summer and he refuses to wear shorts. This has nothing to do with the neighborhood we live in. All the kids here wear shorts. We have decided this is because he wants to dress like D, who doesn't wear shorts because he spends most of his time in Kollel wear shorts are not appropriate. So what is the latest? Grammy D got him a Thomas outfit. Shorts overalls with matching shirt. I told her I didn't know if he would wear it, but bring it along and we will see what happens. So earlier this month when they were here, she brought is along. She took it out, got him all excited, cut the tags and we put it on. Wow, he was so excited sporting that new outfit! Then he looked down...."I need pants!" he said. So now he wears his Thomas shorts overalls with long pants over them. We need to take lots of pictures so we can post them at his Bar Mitzvah! And people look at us like we are crazy! We try to explain that it is not our fault, but who are you going to believe an almost 4 year old, or his parents!

Violation of My Personal Space!

It is 1:30am here and I have been up at a friend's house cooking and getting our meals ready for Shabbat. Only the top element in our oven currently works so I have been using a friend's oven to cook. So tonight when I went to put in the chicken we got the idea to cook together it was really fun. So how was I rewarded for being prepared and not leaving everything to the last minute? There was a SNAKE on our front stairs. At first I did not notice as it was well concealed just the tail hung out and I was hopeful that it was a shoelace, then I looked from up above at the top of the stairs as it was second from the top and I still just could not decide. Finaly I did what any rational person would do, I went in and made my husband get dressed and go dispose of the little beast! Fortunately he was awake. I told him it was either a shoe lace or a snake and he better get out there and take care of it! He did not like the idea of getting dressed for a shoelace, but when I went out again it was moving! Oh Yucky! My space has been invaded by a small, scaly, creature with no fur and no feet! My kids play on those stairs! They play on that walk way! How am I supposed to relax out there when some slithering creepy crawly could be slurking aournd! Now D pushed that snake off the stairs and into the property below, however, it had the nerve to climb the stairs! I have no idea where it might be now. And to make matters worse I still had to make a second trip back to my friend M.St. to retrieve the rest of my cooking. I was so scared of running into that little wee beastie, let me tell you! Fortunately Frankie the cat has befriended us and do you know when we called him, because we wanted him to kill the wretched creature, he came! And he was standing guard at the top of the stairs when I came back. I have always been a bit annoyed with Frankie because he is always pestering us, but maybe Frankie is not so bad after all. I hav been totally violated and I am holding the snake 100% responsible for that. Maybe not that I have written about it I can sleep. They say that writing is good therapy. But I am still traumatized! Icky! Icky! Yucky!!!!!!!!

The Human Race

I have a lot of catching up to do, but I am not sure I have the energy tonight. So before this becomes completely irrelevant I want to get it posted. In my last blog I mentioned we came back from a weekend stay in Beit Shemesh and we all had a little bug. Well that was not to be then end of our sick days. In fact we would all be collectively sick for about 2 weeks! A few days after we came back from Beit Shemesh I came down with Mastisitis or a plugged milk duct. I woke up on that Wed. morning at 3:00am with chills and sore milk duct area. Once D figured out how bad I was we were up at the urgent care in minutes. Fortunately we live minutes from even walking. We asked the neighbors to watch our kids. I got sick on the final days of High Holidays at the begining of Simchat Torah. This where my commentary on the human race comes in. The urgent care unit is completely run by Arabs so that Jews don't have to work during the holidays. The same is true on Shabbat. In this day and age there is obviously a lot of tension between Jews and Arabs. It has been an on going war for the last 3,000 years or so and I don't imagine that Condoleza Rice or the Bush Administration can really solve these issues in a few summit meetings. Come on folks this isn't Scooby Doo, mystery sovled in 20 min.! So I was amazed that my medical care would be from "the opposition." The medical care there was excellent. I wound up having to go up every 8 hours for an anti-biotic I.V. drip from Wed. until Sunday AM. I had the same doctor for all but two of those visits. That man worked hard and played to a full house! In the evening after the holiday ended and right before Shabbat and right after there was no room to even wait in the waiting room it was so full. Yet my doctor was very thorough and very respectful and very competent from the first visit until his last visit on shift. In the end my final wrap up came from a different doctor. I wish that this harmony that I witnessed in the Urgent Care could be the way the world runs. It was truly a melting pot of the human race. Jews, both religious and non-religious, Arabs, and people who did not fit either category. Yet, the staff, was courteous and respectful to everyone and each person got the same care and the same treatment. In the waiting room there was not seperate seating, everyone waited together and those who were the worst were offered seats by those who were capable of standing. While it is wonderful see that people shine the brightest under difficult circumstances, I wish that human beings would be that compassionate under the best of circumstances too.

Everything But the Kitchen Sink!

Basically this is a quick blog that covers our life in a nutshell over the last month. At the end of August we got moved into our new apartment. It is 4 doors down from where we were this summer. It saved in moving costs, but unfortunately it turns out it is also a temporary situation. When we agreed to move in we were warned that the owners were trying to sell, but they expected it to take a while, turns out they had a potential buyer before we could even move in. But we are here for 6 months. This gives us enough time to unpack, catch our breath and think about our next move. Otherwise, it is nice and S has two neighbor boys to play with. We still have not gotten him into school, a bit challenging for all involved, but we are making do. In between getting moved and settled we have been celebrating the High Holidays starting with Rosh Hashana and now we are preparing to end a month's worth of activities with Simchat Torah.

The High Holidays are always enjoyable but hectic. We go from holiday to Shabbat a few days to prepare for the next holiday and then it is Shabbas again. Rosh Hashana was great We had one couple who stayed by us from D's Kollel which was really nice. They are newly married and we had wanted to go the wedding but it was in England and out of our budget. It gave me time to get to know her and that was nice. We also had two other couples who were in and out. One was our regular friends from up the hill that we see regularly and the other couple, also in the Kollel live in Bet Shemesh and have an almost 3 and almost 1 yr. S. and the 3 year old girl got along great and we just spent this past Shabbas at their house. A welcome break for all of us. We spent the first days of Sukkos at home and then out to Bet Shemesh where we stayed until Sunday night and went to a concert. The concert was 2 days we just went to the first, and consisted of main stream religious bands. Think Amy Grant and the like. Really a lot of fun and free too! It was the first time D and I have been to something like this since we have been here and it was great to have another couple to hang out with.

Sukkos was also really nice this year. Since our back porch was too small for our Sukka we put it up in the parking lot, which just got lots of comments of "so your the ones with the sukkah up there..." but nobody minded. It just meant a lot more running back and forth then we would have liked, but it was good exercise. We slept the first two nights out there, but then we were out in Beit Shemesh and then we got a little bug so that was that. But the night before I took S to Geula a religious neighborhood in Jerusalem so we could check out all the vendors selling Sukkah decorations it is a lot like checking out Chirstmas decorations in the season. It was really neat. Sukkot is really the decorating holiday, but instead of a tree we do a whole sukkah. One of these days I want to put up some of my old Christmas ornaments. I had my Cotton Bowl ornament already to go until somebody who shal remain nameless, but has the initials SJ broke it! Grrrrr....... In perspective it is just an ornament but still......I made him feel really guilty. Worked better than yelling or otherwise.

D is home one more week so I will try to get as much done as possible in catching up with chores and recovering from the holidays. Then we will be getting ready for my in-laws to come at the end of the month.

The kids are doing well all things considered and we are happy that S has friends on the block to play with. Although he tends to wander off and the other two boys are quite good at staying in their boundaries. The good thing is they tend to let me know when he has wandered off yet again. The good thing is he knows where he is going and I know where he goes and he usually comes back right away so we are just trying to be patient. And I do mean "Trying"! or maybe he is just trying my patience.........

Y is learning to use a spoon and should be feeding himself soon! At least that is what I am hoping for! He continues to be a whirling dirvish and a busy boy and his curls are growing in nicely. We have posted our latest picks so if you need the link again contact me off line.

M is up and running and very proud of her new found independance. She loves stairs and I have to watch her like a hawk when we are outside as she will head for the stairs up to the parking lot.

I think that covers everything up until now and I will hopefully be back on line more regularly with regular events and updates.

More on Veggies.....

I bet you all think you are pretty smart and think you know where carrots come from. So did we until S informed us that we were wrong! We were recently having a dinner discussion and D asked S, "where do carrots come from?" S: "From the rabbit!" We of course assumed that he got this from one of his stories where a rabbit sells carrots, or who knows! No we explained, they come from the ground. Then Av who was having dinner with us said, " He means in Winnie the Pooh!" " Oh of course!" We said! Because in Winnie the Pooh who grows the carrots, Rabbit! So while all of you people out there really thought carrots came from the ground, rest assured that you are wrong! According to S, they come from Rabbit and he won't be convinced otherwise!

In other news, the million dollar question has been answered. But we still don't have a million dollars. However, we do have a 6 mo. lease on a 3.5 bedroom 1.5 bath apt.! Hurray! It even has a nice big porch, known as a mirpeset in Israel. Although they are trying to sell and the lease will go in 6mo. increments, we feel this will give us time to find something more permanent in the neighborhood which is totally full right now. In fact the entire Jerusalem area is full and the only stuff available is the stuff that nobody wants! So for at least the next 6mo. we know we have good neighbors, a good landlord and a good place to be. And the great thing is, it is about 4 doors down from where we are now, so no moving van needed! And we get to keep enjoying all the things that we liked about living here over the summer!

Just a little up date!

Just wanted to let you all know that our Princess Puff Puff is walking! Hurray! She has been working on it for about 2 weeks now, but over Shabbat this week she really got it down. She is still not %100 like Y, but she is doing pretty good! They are getting so big! Yesterday in an act of desperation I took out the blow up pool and let the kids go for it. They had a blast. Although I learned my lesson, must have swimmy diapers on at all times! I thought I would let them go free, no, big mess! Very bad idea! I had been putting off taking out the pool as I did not think it would fit on our "front porch" (I use this term very loosely. ) And I was right, it didn't, but it fit just enough and the neighbors downstairs did not mind a little water coming down. In fact it seems we even can use some of the space downstairs for it, but having it upstairs lets me do more and still keep an eye on them. We are in the middle of a horrid heat wave that is making us all think about praying for snow! So I think we will be keeping the pool filled this week until it settles down.