All posts by Avivah

Bulk food shopping option for regular shoppers

Intentional Spending

Before I left social media months ago, I was part of a Facebook frugality in Israel group.

In that group, someone mentioned going to a store that sells to smaller storeowners and directly to the retail buyer as well, and finding significant savings. This is a unique shopping opportunity, since almost none of the wholesale stores sell to private individuals.

Naturally, I made a note of the details and put it into my schedule to check it out.

The first time walking into this store was a bit overwhelming. It’s different, and you feel that as soon as you get your shopping cart, which is a heavy duty loading cart. I learned that it’s a good idea to find several discarded boxes and put them on my cart as soon as I go in, to put your small items in, since they would fall off a cart like this. (Empty boxes are discarded as they are unpacked throughout the store.)

Once inside, items are available in standard sizes with a minimum purchase of six or twelve, or in larger sizes just one can be bought. Prices, if listed, are all listed before ma’am (17% sales tax). Lots of things don’t have the price listed, and when I first went in, I wasn’t impressed since I saw items I could buy for less at my local large supermarket chains.

However!! It was worth continuing on past my initial impression, because if you’re a discriminating shopper and you pay attention to item pricing, you can definitely save a lot of money. Just don’t assume that everything will be cheaper. Which is true when you go into any store, really.

When I shopped for my fifteen year old’s bar mitzva, I saved a ton by getting many of the items here. They have almost everything you would get in a regular store, but in bigger quantities. So you’ll find paper goods, cleaning products, drinks, food – but not fresh vegetables or chicken and meat, and there’s a very limited dairy/refrigerator section.

It’s not a store I regularly shop at, since it’s so far away. But when I’m ready for a group buy of staple items, it’s worth the trip. So don’t be quick to dismiss this as an option for you, because even if you don’t have a big family, if you shop with a couple of friends, you can all save money.

Spices – these are available in bags of a kilo, and I haven’t found anywhere cheaper for them. Previously I was buying the largest size spice containers at Osher Ad, but this is definitely a much better price.

Dried fruits, nuts, seeds – also all available in 1 kilo bags, and also good prices. Again, I haven’t found cheaper prices.

Canned goods – you can get flats of twelve of whatever items you usually buy, but that’s more than I can store so I generally don’t get them. They also have 10# cans, which I find more helpful for items I use a lot of like tomato paste, olives, and pickles. (There are all kinds of canned goods in both sizes, I’m just mentioning what I get.)

I used to get vaccuum packed tuna in kilo packaging, but I haven’t seen that for a long time. Then I got the 2 kilo packages of tuna instead, which I didn’t find nearly as useful because there’s just too much in each package, but now that’s no longer in stock either. And it’s been over a year since the canned salmon I used to buy has been available. It definitely makes me wonder. Maybe it’s there at other times than when I’m there. But although it’s not personally as helpful for me, there was still plenty of other canned fish items in different sizes when I last went.

Refrigerator items – there is a built in dairy room that reminds me of the walk through freezers when I used to shop in Amish country, though this is on a very small scale. They have cheeses, butters, large containers of chummus and a few other dips.

Snacks and candy – there is a huge selection of these things, and though I don’t buy any of it, I see it’s a big item for the kiosk owners. (Most of the other shoppers are restaurant or store owners – you can tell if someone is shopping for a store or for themselves by a glance at their cart.)

Condiments – this is interesting, because there is such a huge variety of sizes. For example, you can get a liter container of soy sauce or a five gallon bucket. I like getting the four liter container of vinegar since I use vinegar and baking soda for cleaning, and I rarely see that size in regular retail stores. They have all the sauces that restaurants use in their cooking.

Legumes and grains – they have packages with ten or twelve standard sized units, or you can get 5 kilo bags. Or 25 kilo bags (other than sugar, five kilo is as much as I buy here – but again, with friends, splitting bigger packaging could be a great option).

They also have things like eggs and packaged baked goods. Other than for the bar mitzva, I haven’t bought any of that but the savings were significant then.

I took this picture to show you the biggest sizes available in the very back, but in most of the store the items are packed in a more user friendly way for a family. I didn’t think of taking a picture for you until the end of my shopping, though.

You can find other pictures and videos if you want to get a better sense of it from their FB page, which also has address details. Shimurei Eichut, Holon. (In case you’re wondering, I have no financial links to them and receive no compensation for sharing this information.)

As prices move up, it’s helpful to know there are other shopping options that can help keep your budget in check!

Avivah

Thoughts before Rosh Hashana, changing our future

Parenting, Self-Growth

We stand at the beginning of a new year, at a time when the fate of all humanity will be determined for the year to come.

When I think of the enormity of Rosh Hashana, I consider the year behind us and all that has happened. All of that was determined last Rosh Hashana. And so, if there is something that we would like to be different this year, if there is something that troubles us, this is the time to throw ourselves into prayer and beg G-d that the coming year be different.

I’ve shared about the deep, deep satisfaction and happiness I have when all of my children are together and enjoying one another’s company. I don’t think there’s anything else that brings me that kind of pleasure. I sometimes think about G-d looking down on His children – what would bring Him more pleasure than His children all getting along with one another?

People across the world have become fractured and feel separate from and sometimes even hostile towards those who think differently or make different choices. As hard as it may feel, if we can put those differences aside and instead of seeing a position, look at the person behind it, to value and appreciate the person, if we can have good will towards others and presume they have good intentions towards us – we can change the future.

Because when G-d sees us showing love and compassion for one another, it awakens His compassion for us. We are all imperfect, we all make mistakes and have endless room for growth, but when we come together with a desire for harmony, there is nothing that our loving Father wants to see more than His children getting along.

United we stand, divided we fall. This is true in so many ways. May we all be inscribed for a year of revealed blessing.

I wish for everyone one of you a year of health, blessing, joy in your family relationships, and a feeling of trust and well-being in your inner and outer worlds.

Much love to you all,

Avivah

After a year and a half, both of my youngest children are in school!

Parenting, Trisomy 21

Ds4 has been homeschooling for the last year and a half, and made amazing strides. I haven’t mentioned him for a while, so here’s a quick update.

He’s always been smart – I told his bio parents when I first met them that I was sure he would be! – and now is visibly much more confident and secure than he was when he was last in school (March 2019). His physical development has been fantastic – climbing, running, swimming; a father of a toddler with Trisomy 21 met him in a park and told me he can’t keep his eyes off him, that he was inspired to see a child with Down syndrome move like he does. I get the same kind of comments we hear with ds9 – are you sure he has Down syndrome? The regular kind? Really? But he doesn’t look like it….

All of our kids are very good mediators, and in ds9 he has his own one-on-one private tutor for hours every day. He even taught ds4 to swim this summer.

And now, finally, he’s going to school! He’s really ready in every way. And so am I.

We had hoped to send him to a local multi-age mainstream kindergarten a few minutes from our home, but after two conversations with the teacher, it was clear that she may be a good administrator but warmth and flexibility aren’t her strong points (or maybe they just don’t come across on the phone). Her obvious impatience with me and disinterest in having ds4 in her class caused me to eliminate what seemed like an ideal inclusive option, and instead register him at the special needs school that ds9 attends. It’s more important to me that he be in a place where there is warmth and appreciation of who he is, than to pursue an supposedly inclusive option that would leave him marginalized.

Though there’s an afternoon option that every other child in the kindergarten and school attends, I opted not to send either of them. That would mean them leaving home before 7:30 am and coming home at 6:30pm. Instead, they’ll be leaving school at around 1 and home by 2:15 pm. I’ve been told again and again what a shame it is that they’re missing out on all the extracurricular fun activities, but I’m okay with that. Building relationships takes time, and our connection with them would be negatively impacted if they’re gone all day, every day.

I didn’t send ds4 the first two days of school since he had a mild eye infection. Instead, we inaugurated the first official day of school with a trip to a beach at the Kineret.

There was a homeschool meet up scheduled at that same beach for 10 am and though I would have loved to have met other families, the beach isn’t really a great place if you have modesty concerns. We go early in the mornings when we mostly have the beach to ourselves.

Ds12 swimming

Anyway, ds4 has been asking me for months when he’s going to to school, and was so happy to finally go with ds9 on the van this morning!

After I sent them off, it struck me that for the first time in a year and a half, I could do something without having to be conscious of the presence of a younger child. Though I still have two children homeschooling (12 and 14), parenting teens is very different than young children! It’s such a nice thing to have quiet space that isn’t carved out while my children are present.

Less than 90 minutes after putting them on the van, ds9’s teacher called. She notified me that the students in her class had a 45 minute session with a specialized teacher on the first day of school. That teacher just got a positive covid test, and ds9 will now have to go into quarantine for the next week and a half.

I wryly smiled inside – my quiet time will have to wait a while longer!

I’m grateful that at least ds4 was able to go on the school van for the first time together with ds9. I knew having his older brother’s ongoing presence would make the transition to kindergarten easier on him, but even if it was only one time during this early transition to school period, that still has been helpful for ds4.

And so the school year has begun, kind of!

Avivah

Making homemade grape juice – so easy!

canning, Intentional Spending

I’m fortunate that being in an more agriculturally oriented area, that sometimes I get really good deals on produce. It tends to be feast or famine (like when friends of the farmer picked and shared watermelons left in the field after harvesting with us and many others, and every day for a couple of weeks our boys ate an entire watermelon. Seriously. Every.Single.Day.). It’s not predictable at all. But when it works out, it’s really nice.

Last week I got a great deal on green grapes (free :)). I decided to get more than what I would use for eating during the course of the week, and to experiment with using them for making grape juice.

It’s been a loooong time since I made homemade grape juice. (Nice thing about having a blog is I can check details like this – it’s been twelve years!) And I didn’t know if green grapes would make good juice. But with the price being what it was, it seemed like a worthwhile experiment. 🙂

Ds13 did the first batch, and he did it his way. Though I shared the general instructions with him, he didn’t feel there was any point in heating the grapes before blending them and then straining, so his batch was totally raw. Very fresh tasting. A day later it began to ferment, and then he had fizzy grape juice. I thought that improved the flavor!

But I wanted to do it the traditional way, so I made a batch and then ds12 made the final batch. It was interesting that the color changed when cooked. The raw juice was the color of the green grapes, but the cooked juice had a pinkish hue.

Here’s how complicated making grape juice is: 1) destem the grapes (that’s the most time consuming part). 2) Put them in a pot with some water (I didn’t add too much, but if you wanted it to be less concentrated or added sugar, you could add significantly more water), and sugar if you desire (we didn’t desire :)). 3) Let boil and then continue simmering on low for about fifteen minutes. 4) Mash the grape mixture with a potato masher to release the flavors. (You can also use a food processor but this was easier.) 5) Strain. Voila!

It’s fun to make something that you’re used to thinking of as an item you need to buy at the store.

I don’t have a lot of freezer space for a bunch of bottles, and I had just bought some glass jars the day before, so we decided to preserve the juice so that it would be shelf stable.

I haven’t canned in AGES. I used a couple of recycled juice jars, and all the rest were standard glass jars with pop-top vacuum lids. (These lids vacuum seal when water bathed.) Since I could only fit six jars in the pot and I wanted to go rest, I asked ds13 to finish canning the last jars.

When I woke up, he had cleaned up the kitchen for Shabbos, the jars were not only taken out but had cooled and put on the pantry shelf. He was so excited to show me! It really is gratifying to do something like this; I know that very pleasant productive feeling.

From our free grapes, we made 13.5 liters of sugar-free, all natural grape juice (there are four cups to a liter). We canned 11.5 liters; the two liters of raw juice we didn’t heat process and enjoyed as is. We opened the first bottle that evening for Shabbos kiddush, and all agreed that it was very tasty. We should have enough to get us through the holidays, when we can share it with visiting family!

Avivah

Green Pass restrictions, creating the world we want to live in

Healthy Living, Homeschooling, Self-Growth

Yesterday morning I went to a bris. When the baby cries, the window to heaven is open and it’s an opportune time for prayer. And I prayed for the coming year, that worldwise we experience healing, connection, expansion, safety, and to connect with G-d from a place of abundance (versus suffering).

Then I came home, and read an article that a friend and blog reader sent me regarding the opening of schools on September 1. At times like this I have to work hard not to feel despair at the Orwellian reality that has descended on this world, on this country, that saying the things that were written in this article are considered acceptable.

Background: the Green Pass system states the following: those who have gotten the *poke (explantion of why I use this term below), recovered from the virus or get a negative test result can participate in normative life. Anyone else can live on the edges of society, without being able to work, go to school, or whatever else they’re going to include – they started the process by letting those who met the criteria access cultural events, restaurant dining and the like, but are moving on to limiting access to core needs.

The policies and accompanying coercion are being justified as necessary for the health of society. Is it really about that?

People who got the poke can get the virus. People who got the virus can get it again. People who never got the virus can get the virus. We all know this.

If all those people can catch something and potentially spread it to others, why do two of those groups get a Green Pass, and only one group is barred from inclusion? After all, they are all at risk and they can all potentially put others at risk. Why is it safe for someone in the first two categories to mingle, when they are can also be a carrier of the dreaded disease?

From the article: “[Why should] an unvaccinated student who refuses to be tested should come to school and endanger the other children or the teachers?” he asked. “A sick person should remain at home.”

Does anyone else see the logic that is missing from this assumption? Someone who doesn’t want a test or a poke is not ipso facto sick. A healthy person is not endangering anyone, regardless of what medical procedures he does or doesn’t do. The prevailing narrative has become, get the poke and you’re at no risk and you present no risk. This is factually incorrect. Someone who got the poke isn’t ipso facto healthy, and still has the potential to pass a virus along.

From the article: “If a student refuses to be tested, then obviously he has something to hide. He won’t be vaccinated and also won’t be tested? Maybe the parents want to send him to school so that it’ll be easier for them.”

Every parent sends their child to school because it’s easier for them and they think it’s to the child’s benefit. Obviously, if it wasn’t, they wouldn’t do it. Parents are all sending their kids to school for the same reasons. Why is he sowing suspicion of other parents who have a difference of opinion about the desired course of action? Who does that benefit?

When this article was sent to me, it was with the comment, “Serious breakthrough for homeschoolers.”

I don’t see this as a positive breakthrough of anything. This is a breakdown of a democratic society veering right into totalitarianism.

If someone wants to homeschool, I support that. But to leave parents with no choice but to homeschool, in effect forcing children from school, because they don’t want to comply with very questionable policies that are being passed by a few politicians at 2 am when no one can comment or question them? No. I don’t support that and I certainly don’t celebrate that.

(And if you think that the Ministry of Education is going to approve all these parents who have been forced out of school for homeschooling, you’re greatly mistaken. It’s acceptable for them to drop the ball for over a year on the education of the students they are responsible for, but they aren’t going to be quick to pass the ball to someone else to play with. Make no mistake, they aren’t trying to expand educational options to benefit students, but to force parents into a corner.)

Here’s the paradigm that we’ve all grown up with: if you go along with whatever the government tells you, you’re a good and moral person. If you don’t, you deserve to suffer the full weight of the law. And that makes sense to us, because we see the laws that are passed as something that are necessary for the safety of society, that people who break the law are endangering us.

Is there ever a point that a citizen can question the actions that a government is taking? Has it ever happened that a government has taken actions and imposed policies that weren’t for the well-being of the population they were responsible for?

We’re being told these Green Pass policies are for the safety of society, and as is our habit, we agree that going along with the government decisions is good, that it’s all for our benefit. But what if the presumption that we are working from isn’t accurate? What if the Green Pass system isn’t about public safety, but about forcing compliance? They created a carrot to give to those who did what they wanted, which simultaneously created leverage to discriminate against those who didn’t go along with what was originally a voluntary plan. The result is institutionalized medical segregation.

Is there any point that people can be allowed to have a difference of opinion? Because right now a second class citizenry is rapidly being created, where no benefits will be available to them if they don’t act the way the government demands. We’ve seen how that works. World War II. Communist Russia. China. North Korea. There’s a very long list and it always goes the same way.

Please, please think about where this is going. No matter how strongly you may fear the virus and support these policies, can you take a step back and consider what is happening to the lives of those who feel differently?

Stephen Covey writes, before climbing a ladder, make sure it’s leaning on the right wall. What if we’re climbing a ladder of policies and it’s on the wrong wall, taking us all in the wrong direction?

How successful have all the preventative actions taken been until now, to wipe out the virus?

What if we had helped people eat better, think more positively, destress, feel safe and loved, decreased the financial pressures they felt? What if we had supported immune systems in the many, many ways possible? (That would have included mainstream Western medical options.) Should we continue with policies that are creating enormous ongoing stress for everyone, depressing the immune systems of us all? Should fear and dissension be spread rather than a spirit of working together, of valuing the differences, of assuming good intentions?

Could there have been a different way of handling this situation that might have had more positive outcomes?

The definition of insanity is doing the same things and expecting different results. That’s what is happening. The policies – masking, pokes, lockdowns, arresting those who didn’t comply – didn’t work. Their conclusion? We didn’t do it seriously enough yet, or to enough people.

A mistaken conclusion is never going to bring you the results you want. Let’s hit the child when he doesn’t do what we want. Oh, he’s crying? Hit him harder, that will teach him a lesson. Mainstream thinking is that upping the ante of consequences will make people do what we want.

They can oppress more and more people, create more fear and anxiety. Meanwhile, everyone who falls into line can virtue signal about how they are good and the others are bad. The bad people don’t deserve the benefits of the good people. Unlike the Jews in the Holocaust or the blacks in the pre-civil rights era who suffered from something they couldn’t change, in this case, it’s okay to persecute people because it’s all their fault, they brought it on themselves by their noncompliance.

Blaming the victims is always an effective strategy.

The above approach was never going to work because that’s not how viruses work. Viruses have a natural life cycle, when they surge and when they seem to be gone. They aren’t. They’re just in the down cycle. They don’t go away, they continually mutate and adapt. They’re here to stay.

And whether we like it or not, the world we lived in is gone. It’s never coming back. Now it’s up to us to think about the world we want to create, and how to participate in that. Do you want a discriminatory medical apartheid system to be part of that world?

Avivah

*I’m using the word ‘poke’ as a replacement to something else that will trigger censorship; all recognized substitutes will similarly trigger. I in no way intend it derisively, it’s simply my attempt to find a way to dialogue about issues of the day.

Vision board workshop with my family

Homeschooling, Parenting, Self-Growth

Last night I was planning to do a vision board workshop with the teen girls that I give a Shabbos shiur to, but there was a scheduling conflict so I rescheduled it.

All my family members happened to be home at 5 pm and it occurred to me, why not do a family workshop right now!

Everyone was game, and quickly cleared the table and took out art materials. I put out the pile of collected magazines.

What is a vision board? A vision board is a tool to help a person clarify, visualize and connect emotionally to their desire for the coming year. For this reason I feel it’s especially appropriate to do before Rosh Hashana.

I started by explaining to my family the purpose. Then, each person was to cut out pictures or words that were emotionally resonant for them. They didn’t have to know why something resonated, but just to recognize that something about it felt good to them.

After collecting the images, they are pasted onto a paper to create a collage of good feeling images.

Since each picture is chosen for what it represents to the person himself, no one else can accurately interpret what was chosen without hearing the explanation. Often what it looks like and what is represents to the person are very different. For example, one son chose a picture of pizza with different toppings to represent balance.

Everyone enjoyed the creative experience, but then we had to stop to go in our different directions (shul, bar mitzva lesson, dinner). I went to a small Elul gathering in the fields that was so lovely. Several times I noticed my family members were trying to reach me, and when I finally called back at 10:45 pm, they told me they were waiting for me to come home so we could part 2 together.

I was so touched that they initiated this!

Part 2 is sharing the significance of what they created together with everyone else. This was so incredibly meaningful and powerful.

I wasn’t sure they would feel comfortable with this aspect, and stressed when I explained the process initially that no one had to share if they didn’t want to. It takes courage to set an intention and it can feel vulnerable to envision something with no idea of how or when it can happen. And it can feel even more unsafe to share about those intentions with others.

As nice as the creative process was, sharing about it exponentially deepened the experience. It helped each person further clarify for themselves and for the rest of us what they wanted and their feelings about it.

I was literally in awe of what each person created, to hear the explanation of what each picture and saying chosen meant to him. Even knowing my children as well as I do, I wouldn’t have guessed what many of the pictures represented. So much depth and to hear about what was chosen, what was cut out so it didn’t appear in the vision board…wow.

A few of us want to continue adding to the vision boards today. One came home from davening and by 7:45 am was already looking through the magazines for more images to add. Everyone in our family who was home made a vision board (two aren’t shown), except for ds4 (though he was actively present, including through session 2, which took place from around 11 pm until midnight).

It was a great experience and one that I am so grateful we were able to do together!

Avivah

Are food prices rising?

Intentional Spending

Have any of you checked your grocery receipts and noticed food prices seem to be going up?

I have!

For the most part, I’m not seeing major increases. Well, except for meat at the supermarket I regularly shop at, which went up about 25%, and ground beef hasn’t been available for several months now. The butcher can’t explain why it’s disappeared or why prices jumped like this. I know that’s not the case everywhere, and that increase isn’t typical. What I am consistently noticing are steady smaller increases.

I talked to a couple of people who work in wholesale food sales, who both told me that prices are “jumping” at the wholesale level. I’m always interested in the behind the scenes understanding of what’s going on, so I asked each of they could explain what is causing the prices to increase.

One didn’t know (but he told me if there was something I wanted, to buy more of it than I would usually buy to offset the ongoing price increases), but the other told me that shipping costs are dramatically rising, that costs have shipping containers have gone from less than $3000 for a load to several times that. Those shipping costs have to be passed on to the consumer, which means…higher food costs.

And that’s not affecting just food. A few weeks ago at the housewares store I spoke to the owner while I was checking out. Literally as I was at the checkout, they increased the price of my item by five shekels. When I asked why, they told me their shipping costs are rising and they are raising the prices on every item by five shekels.

Then a week later I went into one of my favorite nurseries, and noticed that plants that were 25 shekels the week before were now 37, and that every single plant had increased in cost. This time the owner was busy and I didn’t ask him why everything had gone up so much.

I found it interesting. But while the food wholesalers were very clear about their concern, increases take time to trickle down to the retail market, and maybe it’s not yet so noticeable that prices are moving up?

And this was also interesting – the US has announced that it will be increasing food stamp benefits by 25% on October 1. To me it seems that those making the decisions expect retail prices to rise and are preparing the recipients accordingly.

What does that mean practically? One super helpful strategy for keeping a food budget in check is buying the sales. If you have a freezer, you might want to buy some extra chicken or meat at today’s prices, which may be tomorrow’s sale prices. You might want to buy a bit more of the foods that you already eat, particularly those that are non-perishables. If the prices go up more, you’ll save money; if prices don’t move up any further (let’s hope!), you’ll still be eating the same groceries you would have eaten anyway!

I’m curious about if you’re seeing anything like this where you live. My impression is that prices are rising faster in other parts of the world than Israel. Have you noticed food increases, and if so, what kind of increases?

Avivah

The process of transition and letting yourself have your feelings

Parenting, Self-Growth

The wedding was beautiful, the sheva brachos were wonderful – it could not have been more lovely in any way!

At the end of Shabbos sheva brachos, a close friend of my son came over to me and asked me, “Do you know anything about psychology?” (I’m guessing it was probably because when my son spoke he said how he didn’t need the support of anyone else during the dating process because he was able to talk to me about everything.)

“Maybe a tiny drop. Why?”

“What to you do when you have to say goodbye to a close friend?” he wanted to know.

I could see the heaviness in his eyes. “You have to let yourself feel sad,” I told him.

Then I shared with him about how emotional I had been the week before. (I told you about my waterworks already.) That as happy as you are for the person getting married, you recognize and feel the loss of the current relationship with them, and it’s important to recognize it and let yourself feel the sadness.

Painting – my inner sadness (dark grey) when surrounded by external joy of the engagement (orange/red), and finding my own flow and happiness (shades of teal) as I participate in the happiness all around

The next day I was driving my fifteen year old to the bus stop the next morning, he told me, “I caught something from you at the wedding.”

Puzzled, I asked him what he meant.

“Being emotional.”

He said he was feeling a lot of sadness during the wedding, that it felt like saying goodbye to his brother.

And again, I said, you have to let yourself feel it. You can’t squash your feelings down because they don’t go away. They just come out unexpectedly in different directions.

The day of the final sheva brachos, I went to the shiva of a friend. As I told her, it’s a gift in Judaism that there’s a transition period between major life events and the step after that event. When a close family member dies, the person doesn’t go back to day to day life as soon as the funeral is over. There’s a week long period to process the loss of the loved one.

Joyous events also need emotional transition time. When someone gets married, he has daily celebrations for him for the week following the wedding. As valuable as this is for the new couple to support their transition to married life, it’s also important for those who love them, to have a bit more time to be with them and more gradually let go.

We made the final sheva brachos in Yavneel, and I really wanted to speak. (Actually, I wanted to speak at the Shabbos sheva brachos but was concerned that my emotions were too close to the surface and might bubble up and keep me from saying what I wanted to say. )

However, it’s not the norm for women to speak at sheva brachos and I was less comfortable speaking in front of the Yavneel community crowd versus the family crowd on Shabbos. My husband knew I was very uncomfortable about speaking when the rav was there, and simply went over to ask if it was okay. He said it was fine, and so I did.

This was important to me, because I felt it was meaningful to my son and new daughter-in-law. And it was also valuable for me in my own process as a mother, to share some of my appreciation about who my son is, and thank Hashem for His incredible kindness to our family, in bringing yet another wonderful person into our family.

I share this because there are so many feelings when a close family member gets married, and often people feel guilty for not being wholeheartedly happy about it. It’s completely normal to have those mixed feelings, and it’s important to find a way to give those feelings space, in order to process them and then release them.

Avivah

Ten year aliyah anniversary

aliyah

Can you believe that today marks ten years since our family arrived in Israel?

It’s been a full decade, and here you’ve lived through a lot with me. Through tons of challenge – tons! – and lots of nachas, too.

Three married children, three spouses joining the family, three granddaughters, two grandsons, two grandchildren on the way…and now the wedding tomorrow.

It’s particularly poignant to me to be celebrating the wedding of our fourth child at this time. He was 12.5 when we made aliyah, and was the child who had the hardest time leaving his friends. And somehow, he completely put himself forward into a new life, new culture, new language, becoming successfully integrated into Israeli culture while maintaining his American qualities.

Coming with a large family of so many older children wasn’t recommended, and I wouldn’t tell anyone else to follow in our footsteps. It seemed crazy to a lot of people but it made sense to me. (My husband, not so much! He went along with me because he said my decisions until that point were always good ones and one day he knew he would say it was the right thing, so he agreed even though he didn’t want to move.)

It was a hard transition, but we all agree that we’re so happy and grateful for the life that we have now.

If there’s something you really want to do, but you’re afraid, think about the payoff down the road. In the short term change can be daunting, but if you really feel there’s something that will qualitatively change your life, then I’d encourage you to listen to that inner voice.

Avivah

An emotional last Shabbos with my son before the wedding

Parenting

I’ve been a bit emotionally disconnected from the wedding plans for most of the engagement period, which hasn’t been my experience with our past weddings.

But I’ve made up for it this Shabbos. 🙂

Wow, what an amazing and emotional Shabbos. I held all my emotion about my son getting married in until now but now it’s bursting out all over.

The original plan was to celebrate his aufruf at his yeshiva in Jerusalem, and everyone twelve and above in our family would go there. But then we talked about it just a week ago, and he said what he would enjoy more was a special Shabbos at home with all of his siblings.

So we had everyone (ie all the married and single kids) here for the entire Shabbos. It was so nice. And it helped all of us get into the wedding spirit. Generally the bride’s side does a lot more of the wedding preparations, and we all agreed it’s harder to get into the mood when you’re kind of on the sidelines.

I didn’t start crying until I gave my son a bracha (blessing) on Friday night – that triggered him to start tearing up, and we just stood there hugging each other, crying. So much emotion. And it continued through all of Shabbos – I kept getting these huge waves of emotion when I looked at him. Everything is a ‘last’ as a single – the last bracha, the last time he put Yirmi to bed, the last time going to shul with his brothers, the last breakfast together, the last time taking him to the bus to Jerusalem.

Our family tradition is that for a person’s birthday, we go around in a circle and each person shares something they appreciate about the birthday celebrant. At our third Shabbos meal, we did a circle for my son, to give everyone a chance to share something about him.

When my turn first came around, I couldn’t initially speak because I was too choked up, and my oldest son said, “I don’t understand why you’re crying. Your son is getting married, that’s a happy thing.”

Yes, it really is a happy thing. We want our children to become independent, to do the things that are meaningful for them and to live the lives they want to lead. I truly celebrate that, and I couldn’t feel more happy that my son is marrying such a special person. They are a beautiful couple.

At the same time, every new beginning is the end of something else. That’s where there is the sadness, the feeling of loss. A loss of the relationship as it is right now.

I was emotional when my oldest son got married, but I didn’t know then how much things would change after he got married. Now I know. The saying goes, “You aren’t losing a son, you’re gaining a daughter. “And that’s true. But it’s also true that once your child gets married, your relationship is different. This is particularly true when a son gets married.

This son is one of the most remarkable people I’ve ever met – he’s a natural leader, charismatic, extremely kind, with a huge heart and appreciation of every person. It’s not for nothing that so many people think he’s his best friend. When shadchanim asked me to describe him, I always muted my description of him, because to describe him accurately would seem like an exaggeration.

When he was in shidduchim, I considered sharing about the process but didn’t know how to write about it without it seeming like I was bragging, which I wasn’t. There were very generous and very impressive suggestions that were made, that were a huge honor to have been offered. That was all a reflection of him. As the one handling the shidduchim, it was a lot to manage.

Someone recently called to tell me her experience in working with him at camp, and said ‘he’s larger than life’. Yes, he is. He has been given a lot of gifts and uses them well, but remains humble and down to earth.

Despite all his busyness, all his friends and activities, he makes us feel there’s nowhere he’d rather be than at home, and no one he’d rather spend time with than us. He’s been a huge positive force in our family, and I’ll miss him. We all will.

And so, with all the happiness, there are a lot of tears.

Avivah