Ya’alili

A friend from Newton posted this link to the shul chat list before Pesach.  It’s by a couple of Chabadniks who really potchkee the lyrics, but set it to catchy music.  (I always thought “Ashkenazi” had more music in it than “Sephardi”; now I’m convinced of it.)  My kids and I love it.  I hope [...]

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Lies my teacher told me

Last year, I committed the very great heresy of telling my father that I would discourage any of my children from attending American colleges or universities.  (This from the woman with a bachelor’s and three master’s degrees from American institutions.)  My reason at the time was the overtly hostile attitude toward Israel on many American [...]

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The moralist

David Horovitz, the editor of the Jerusalem Post, never fails to impress me.  His Friday columns, sometimes commentary and insight, sometimes incisive interviews, always inform, always lend perspective to the complexities of life in Israel.  But last Friday’s interview with Asa Kasher, a philosophy professor at Tel Aviv University who has advised the IDF and [...]

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Baruch dayan haemet

Refael Daniel Aryeh ben Tamar, the 16 year old Beit Shemesh boy critically injured in the recent missile attack on a school bus by Gaza terrorists, succumbed to his injuries and passed away yesterday. In slightly better news (but only slightly), the exhaustive joint Shin Bet, IDF, and police investigation into the murder of the [...]

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Peach interprets “Joseph”

Seven-year-old Peach’s new favorite CD is the Cap’n’s recording of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.”  From my perspective, it’s not the most brilliant or textured collaboration of Lloyd-Webber and Rice, but it has some clever lyrics and does some great stuff musically (like have Reuben tell Jacob about Joseph’s “death” in a country-western song, [...]

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Beyond conversion

One of the great sources of chizuk (strength) I have found in my life as a converted Orthodox Jew has been meeting other families where one or both partners are converts to Judaism.  Sometimes they have a Jewish father, like I have, and sometimes they traveled the long and winding road to Judaism without the [...]

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Please pray for Daniel

The 16 year old boy critically injured in last week’s anti-tank missile attack on a school bus in Israel (the son of the lovely people who owned the Chinese restaurant in Beit Shemesh where we used to eat) is fighting for his life in Soroka Hospital in Beer Sheva.  Please pray for Refael Daniel Aryeh [...]

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Exodus story

A number of years ago, my in-laws came to us for Pesach seder.  It was our first seder in our own home (we’d been generously invited out for years), and juggling an infant (Beans was 9 months old), kashering, cooking, and hosting two seders (we had friends over the second night) was beyond anything I’d [...]

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Google Exodus

Four kids home for 2½ weeks.  ‘Nuff said. Here’s a cute thing Aish.com put up for Pesach.  Enjoy.

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Passover Lemon Pie

I stated in an earlier post that I have officially retired from making fancy desserts for Pesach, but I recognize that that doesn’t mean everyone else has.  To this day, I can still remember our friends in Newton who made salmon crunch pie and salads for lunch, followed by cheesecake baked in a coconut macaroon [...]

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The (partially) amended Last Supper

My mother forwarded this via email with the subject line, “They finally got it right.” Well, sort of.  Jesus is still holding a bagel.  And anyone who would eat gefilte fish from a jar would probably also have Mogen David on the table (though that may be what’s in the ewer on the floor in [...]

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The true price of Middle East peace

The online New York Times of 3 April 2011 includes a “diplomatic memo” entitled “In Israel, Time For Peace Offer May Run Out,” by Ethan Bronner. My father forwarded me the link, which had been forwarded to him by a cousin.  (This is what the virtual watercooler conversation has turned into, between St. Louis, Shaftsbury [...]

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City of David, (re)visited

One of the highlights of having relations visiting us in Israel is having the excuse to go out and be tourists.  We live here, we know how blessed we are to live so close to so many amazing historical and archeological sites, yet as it does for most people, life usually gets in the way. [...]

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