Monthly Archives: February 2023

Changing plans and making adjustments

homemaking, parenting, personal development

I find it helpful to do things as soon as I can, rather than push them off. My thinking is that more things are always coming up, and it’s unlikely there will be a better time than right now to do what needs to be done. I very consciously planned to leave this week’s schedule as empty as possible, since it’s the week prior to the wedding and as I just said, things always come up.

On Sunday, I drove my daughter to Jerusalem with all of her stuff to move into her new home. We picked up an additional load of her things from the place she lives in Jerusalem. Her host mother came out to talk to me and asked me how wedding plans were going. ‘Fine, good,’ I told her.

‘What about Shabbos?’ This is a question that comes from a mother who has married off all her children and understands the work involved for the mother of the bride regarding hosting Shabbos sheva brachos for a large group. People who haven’t been in that situation wouldn’t know how intense it can be!

Personally I feel making sheva brachos is just as much work as the wedding, but in a different way. Some people go away to a hotel-like setting where the sleeping and meal arrangements are taken care of, which is expensive but obviously eliminates a lot of the work. In our case I’m self-catering, so that doesn’t eliminate a lot of the work. 🙂

I told the host mother that it had been a huge issue and I spent hours working it all out, but thankfully we knew where the meals would be held and where all the guests would stay, and since that was the hardest part, it was going well.

Well, sometimes you just have to laugh because two minutes after I finished that conversation, I got a call from a person who had offered to let us use their home for that Shabbos. Since they have a very large dining room, this is where we were going to have all the meals in addition to using three bedrooms to host guests. She asked us, if it wouldn’t be too much pressure, to please find somewhere else since their plans had changed.

In the end this will be better for everyone and it’s good that we’re making the changes. However, it meant a week before the wedding completely redoing every single aspect of my plans for sheva brachos, including the timing and structure of the meals. So much for trying to think ahead and plan ahead so I’m not dealing with things at the last minute! I still don’t have the location for meals set up – there are aspects that make the arrangements complicated – but I trust everything will work out.

My mother-in-law arrived from the US today, and went straight to Jerusalem to stay with my married daughter. This will be my daughter’s last Shabbos before the wedding. She’ll join them for Shabbos lunch (and have one meal with friends, and a third meal will be her Shabbos kallah). All of our single sons over the age of 13 (ie 20, 16, 15, 13) will be spending Shabbos together with them. The boys will pack up everything they need for the wedding, and go from there to the wedding on Sunday.

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I’ve been having increasing pain when standing and walking, and had gotten to the point that I had to sit or lay down after fifteen or thirty minutes of standing. It was making it very challenging to get things done efficiently. (And it didn’t help that our youngest two boys were home sick this week.) I was feeling concerned about how I would manage to stand for wedding pictures, let alone dance at the wedding.

My husband made an appointment for me yesterday with the osteopath that he and our sons have gone to, and he was excellent. It was a very important wedding prep! I was really impressed. He explained that my pelvis had slipped out of alignment, which caused my leg joints to be affected (hence the pain standing), and also caused the lower back and neck pain that I was having. It’s the domino effect – one very small shift happens and it keeps triggering more and more symptoms until you address the core issue.

Though it takes up to a week for the body to release the tension it had been holding, I felt immediate improvement as he was working on me. As soon as I got home, I was able to work in the kitchen for several hours straight, standing the entire time. My lower back was very painful for the first afternoon and all through the last two nights, but that has started releasing as well. It still hurts a lot and it’s hard to sleep with so much back pain, but I’m definitely doing better and I’m super grateful.

It’s hard to believe that there’s hardly any time left until the wedding….our children grow up so fast.

Avivah

Staying busy pre-wedding!

homemaking

On Shabbos I saw someone who upon learning that our daughter’s wedding was two weeks away, exclaimed, “I can’t believe it! How can you look so relaxed when the wedding is so close?”

Thankfully, I’ve been blessed with the ability to compartmentalize and mentally and practically break down big projects into doable steps, and when I do that, things feel very manageable.

Last week I was feeling uncertainty regarding specifics for the Shabbos sheva brachos that we will be hosting. On Wednesday or Thursday I decided where we’ll have the meals and worked out where all our guests would stay. It was a relief to have that finalized in my mind; I had been going back and forth and was mentally feeling worn down by the uncertainty.

Since I’ll be doing all the cooking and baking, I asked my husband to pick up a used freezer from a private seller on his way home from work, which he did on Thursday night. Having the ability to prepare some of the foods in advance will be helpful. Even if I don’t make anything ahead of time, just knowing that it’s a possibility is reassuring!

I made and canned pickled peppers so they’re ready and shelf stable, and am considering making some other pickled salads/relishes that can be made and canned in advance.

I made pickled tilapia for the first time this fall, and our family has liked it a lot. I’m planning to serve it for the third sheva brachos meal, so started a batch a few days ago. Since it’s a ten day process to make it, you have to think ahead if you want to have it. It’s worth making a large batch since it keeps in the fridge for weeks.

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I need to take two of our boys to buy new suits, but otherwise I think we’re set as far as wedding clothing. I did all the other shopping online and was very satisfied with how easy and affordable that was. Time is precious and I’m so glad I didn’t have to run around trying on gowns as I have in the past. The challenge with shopping with the boys is that they’re on opposite schedules so I haven’t yet managed to get them coordinated for a shopping trip. At this point I’m thinking I’ll be better off taking them separately.

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This week I had an evening of appreciation for mothers at the younger boys school. There was a full catered meal, a singer and a stand up comedian. It was nice to see other mothers, and I would have loved to have spoken with them more, but the volume of the dinner music being played made it difficult. I don’t like having to lip read. Nonetheless, the staff really invested in making it an enjoyable evening out and it was a lovely evening.

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Later today I’ll be traveling to a Jordan valley farm to hear Joel Salatin speak. Joel is probably the world’s most famous regenerative farmer, and I’ve followed his work since we were living in the US. I was excited to see that the date he was speaking didn’t conflict with the week of the wedding. It will be two hours of driving and then three hours for the lecture, but I’m really looking forward to it. I’m taking my thirteen and fifteen year old sons, in addition to giving a ride to a few women. My husband was planning to attend but decided that there’s a lot to do now and he doesn’t have the head space to dedicate that time. He’ll hear all about it from the boys and me in any case!

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Tomorrow morning I have a Zoom call scheduled with several foster care social workers. We were very tentatively approached at the beginning of the week about taking a foster child in. He and a sibling need a new placement; a family in Yavneel agreed to take the sibling, so they’re looking for another Yavneel family to take him to facilitate the continued connection of the siblings. My first reaction was absolutely not, it’s just too busy right now with the wedding in a week and a half, then Shabbos sheva brachos, the two days later is Purim, then preparations for Pesach, then tons of hosting for Pesach.

We haven’t ever requested additional foster placements but when something comes to me, I ask myself what Hashem wants of me, and try not to discount something just because the thought of all the effort is daunting. I spent a good bit of time on the phone yesterday with our social worker, wanting to understand what is involved with therapeutic foster care. It’s a very different scenario than what we’ve dealt with in the past. Right now we’re exploring what’s involved, and not ready to make a commitment of any sort yet.

Years ago when I was developing the systematic steps of the Leadership Parenting approach, I integrated what I learned from the work of Dr. Karyn Purvis, whose expertise is on parenting foster and adoptive children (this was prior to me even considering fostering). I loved her work so much (even more than Dr. Gordon Neufeld, who I’ve referenced more than once and who has had a major influence on my thinking about parenting) that I seriously thought about traveling to Texas to study with her personally. Sadly, she passed away before that happened. I was very inspired by her deep respect and understanding of children from ‘hard places’, as she calls them. Thanks to her teachings, I have a decent understanding of the post trauma issues these children deal with. Without this I’d be too intimidated and overwhelmed to consider the possibility.

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For a very long time I’ve dreamed of restoring a piece of barren land using permaculture principles. I never could see how it would be possible, but Hashem is much bigger than I am and He has sent us the amazing opportunity to develop two or three dunam of agricultural land. I can’t say how bursting with happiness I am for the opportunity. We don’t have ownership of all the land but the owners have given us a lot of leeway to plant it as we see appropriate, and we’re making the investment in terms of labor and materials cost.

I’ve been spending a lot of time looking at the land, thinking, thinking, thinking about what to do, while learning about different permaculture strategies and considering how/where to apply them. It’s a lot of thinking right now about what the vision is, how the land will be used, etc, and I don’t yet have clarity on all of that.

We’ve spent the last month focusing on putting up fencing. I think in the next couple of days we (meaning my fifteen year old) can finish all the fencing. It’s been getting done here and there, whenever it worked out for both of us to go out there. Then this week my son made a big push to get it all done. He’s like me, he enjoys seeing significant progress being made and gets a little impatient when things are moving at a snail’s pace.

Once the fencing is done, what will be left to finish enclosing the property will be installing a large gate across the road that leads to the land. For weeks I’ve looked for a used gate of the right dimensions, and finally found one. I made arrangements for someone with a trailer to pick it up for us this evening. Then figuring out how to install tracks and supports will be a another learning project.

So that’s some of what’s going on this week!

Avivah

What to use as a substitute for eggs in baking

frugal strategies, homemaking

Long, long ago I explored veganism, and my recipe notebook still includes different egg substitute options.

Though I use eggs – lots of them, actually! – sometimes I run out and it’s helpful to have options to substitute for them. None of these replace eggs that you’re eating as eggs: hardboiled, omelettes or sunny side up. But they’re great for replacing eggs in baked goods.

With eggs jumping in price and in some countries in short supply, it’s even more helpful to know alternatives.

To determine which replacement will work best in the recipe you’re making, it’s helpful to understand what eggs do in a recipe: they add moisture, they bind the ingredients together, and they add lightness/fluffiness to a recipe. I’ve made a note as to what purpose each replacement serves, so you can match it with the desired results are.

  • 1 T. ground flaxseed and 3 T. water = 1 egg. This forms a gel like substance when blended together. It’s a good binding agent and have a pretty neutral flavor.
  • 1 T. chia seeds + 3 T. water= 1 egg. Like flaxseed, the mixture forms a gel-like substance. I prefer to mix it with water, then blend the mixture, and lastly to add it to the recipe. This is also a good binding agent and has a neutral flavor.
  • 1 T. cornstarch + 3 T. water = 1 egg. This is good as a binder but if you need some fluffiness, it’s not the option to use.
  • 1/4 c. applesauce (preferably unsweetened) = 1 egg. Adds moisture and binds.
  • 1/4 c. mashed banana = 1 egg; use in recipes that the banana flavor will blend with. Adds moisture and binds.
  • 1/4 c. pumpkin puree = 1 egg. Like banana, use in a recipe that the flavor blends well. Adds moisture and binds. I discovered pumpkin as a substitute years ago when I did a no-shop grocery challenge and was forced to look at the items in my pantry with a creative eye.
  • 3 T. aquafaba (water left from cooking chickpeas) = 1 egg. This can be beaten and used as a replacement for beaten egg whites in meringues and mousse.

Avivah

Looking beyond the behavior at the person

parenting, personal development

One day after dropping off my sixteen year old son at the bus stop, I decided to stop in at a supermarket on the way home.

I quickly gathered my items and went to check out, but when I saw the sour face of the cashier, I looked to see what other cashiers were available and considered moving to a different line. She grumbled aloud when I and another woman came to her lane, ‘Why does everyone have to come to my lane?’ (There was only one other lane open, other than the express lane, so it’s not like there were a lot of options!)

She looked in my cart while checking out someone ahead of me, and irritatedly told me to move to the lane for people with up to ten items (I had more than double that).

She huffed and sighed and complained, and I thought to myself, ‘There’s no one who needs a smile as much as someone who has none left to give’, and decided to stay in her lane.

While I was waiting my turn, someone with just a few items asked to go ahead of me and I told her it was fine. The cashier told her – grumpily, of course – to go to another lane that would be shorter (it wouldn’t have been). The woman said to me in an undertone, “Why is she upset what lane I go to, what difference does it make to her?” I told her not to take it personally.

The cashier roughly scanned her few items, and the woman got upset and exclaimed, “Why are you throwing my items around? Please don’t do that!” She was already insulted at how she had been spoken to, and now this was too much for her. I thought to myself how once someone is in a certain mood, they keep acting in a way to attract negative experiences to themselves.

My turn was next, and the cashier didn’t even glance my way. As she began scanning my items, I said with a smile, “Good morning, how are you?”, and she startled. “Are you talking to me?” “Yes, I am! How are you doing today?”

“Not good, everyone is coming to my lane. Why do they have to do that?” (This was obviously a question that she wasn’t expecting an answer to.)

I told her, “Maybe it’s because you look like a nice person so they want to be in your lane.”

“Yes, that’s my problem, I’m too nice. You see how that woman just spoke to me and accused me of throwing her things around?”

It was so interesting to me to hear how differently she perceived herself and her actions, from how others were perceiving her.

Another coworker came over and she grumbled something to the new arrival. Inserting myself into their conversation, I understood that her shoulder had been bothering her for a while. I asked about it, and she said it’s been hurting for months, she’s in pain all day at work scanning items, and that she can’t get an appointment for three months at the health clinic for an orthopedist.

She continued venting how none of the other workers at the store will do anything, they’re all sitting around doing nothing while she’s working away all by herself.

Her coworker told her to take a pain pill or shot, and she said she didn’t want to, that it didn’t help. I agreed that it’s good to take care of the root of the problem rather than cover it up, and suggested an osteopath that I have used for a few of my family members who is reasonably priced and not far from there.

She told me she doesn’t believe in all this stuff, and asked me what he does. We spoke a few minutes more as I shared my experiences, and encouraged her to call to explain her situation and see if he could help her. Making a call doesn’t cost anything.

We ended our conversation with me giving her the number and warmly wishing her a complete recovery. I had so much compassion as I walked away with my groceries, and was glad that I was able to ignore my first thought to stay away from her lane and stuck around long enough to see the person underneath.

Avivah

What the chief financial officer explained after firing 30% of staff, and what we’re doing about it

frugal strategies, homemaking

My husband was hired by a startup in Tel Aviv a year ago. A month after he was hired, a number of people were let go and they closed down one of the two floors they had rented in a large building.

A couple of weeks ago, thirty percent of his coworkers were let go. My husband went in for the special meeting held with the remaining employees to explain what is happening.

The chief financial officer of my husband’s company was one of the first in the Israeli tech space to be interviewed and talk publicly about the assumption there will be an economic recession over a year ago. He now explained that investment money used to go to start ups that were spending money hand over fist. No one wanted a company on a budget; they wanted to see growth.

Now the investment money is looking for companies that are lean, in order to get through the financial dip that is expected. He explained that they are making these cuts in advance, to prepare for what is coming with the hope that the company can make it through. They also have shut down their large spacious offices and are moving into a smaller space. He said that most companies still don’t see what’s on the horizon, they aren’t changing their spending or projections and a lot of them aren’t going to make it.

I was paying attention to what he said a year ago, and I’m paying attention now. Sometimes you don’t want to hear something negative like this, because it makes you feel anxious and worried about what your own future holds. But I try to move beyond my tendency to be avoidant of what I don’t want to hear, and learn from it.

If the chief financial officer is taking steps to buffer the company for an economic downturn by turning to frugal strategies, it seems prudent for us to take steps to buffer our families by doing the same.

Obviously I’d prefer to think we’ll be minimally affected by the economic bumps that are anticipated. Don’t we all?

As uncomfortable as it was to consider, my husband and I had a discussion about what would happen if we were to experience job loss. We decided that it would be prudent to scale our expenses down now. The intention is twofold: to create more savings, and to know that we could live on less if we needed to. It’s much easier and less stressful to do this as a response to a proactive and thoughtful decision than to suddenly and reactively need to cut expenses from a place of deprivation.

Though my husband has been managing the finances for many years, a few months ago we agreed that it’s time for me as the frugality ninja to step up to the helm since I enjoy rather than tolerate the minutiae of money management, and taking the above steps means looking closely at all outgoing money.

It’s taken a lot of time but I’ve been enjoying this purposeful and focused work, and have been gratified by the progress we’re making. Some of my efforts have been on cutting expenses, while sometimes it means spending more money now, so we won’t have to spend it later (eg replacing our old energy guzzler freezer with an energy efficient chest model).

We don’t have any debt other than our mortgage, as I’ve consistently stuck to my hard and fast rule of not spending money that I don’t have. This includes making five weddings in five years. If I did have debt, I would be focusing on getting it paid off.

Here are some steps we’ve taken:

  • cut expenses in different spending categories
  • looked for ways to increase income
  • increased our savings rate
  • paid down a chunk of our mortgage
  • refinanced our mortgage to a set rate
  • took care of non-urgent repairs on our vehicles rather than delay to when they become necessary
  • withdrew pension funds (a recession would affect the stock market) and reinvested the money
  • been generous with charitable giving while we have the ability to do so

Rather than being negative or alarming to think about, considering less cheerful possibilities has helped us make choices that have led us to feel more empowered and relaxed.

Expenses (energy, food, gas) are expected to continue to rise in the coming year – some financial experts say that they’re going to rise significantly. Increased job loss is also being predicted.

I don’t know if that’s what will happen. But I do know that if it does, the combination of rising costs and decreased income isn’t a good match for a relaxed home. I’m sharing some of what we’re doing to proactively buffer our family with you in the hope it will inspire you to take actions that will likewise empower your family.

If you’re already taking actions of this sort, I and other readers would love to hear about it! Please share in the comments. 🙂

Avivah

Our mortgage refinance is complete!

Uncategorized

I’ve been concerned about rising interest rates for a while, and it was this concern that spurred my decision to refinance the portion of our mortgage that wasn’t fixed.

Last week I went into Jerusalem to sign some papers at the bank, and I told the banker I was working with that I had been contemplating doing this since June. She responded that if I had approached her at that point to do a refinance, she would have felt morally wrong to have agreed. She explained that our original loan had amazing terms – the prime rate was 1.9% at the time we got our mortgage – and she would have been protective on our behalf of those terms.

However, with the “rates jumping every day”, she now thinks it’s a good idea.

The prime rate the day that I signed the refinance paperwork was 5.25%. Amazingly, the fixed rate for our refinance is set at 5%. The very first month of our new mortgage payment, we’ll be paying less than if we hadn’t taken this step.

This is due to the unusual financial circumstances now present, called the inverted yield curve, in which the long term interest rates are higher than the short term interest rates (typically it’s the opposite). Basically, the bank is betting the odds that the interest rates on this portion of our loan will go back down and they’ll still make money on us after our refinance.

I’m fine with that. I didn’t do a refinance as a money-saving move – I had assumed I’d be paying more in interest, not less – but as a stabilizing step. There’s growing instability in the economy and I want a predictable mortgage payment every month. For those of you in the US where the standard is fixed mortgages, this is a no-brainer, but in Israel where variable rate mortgages are the norm, this is a big deal.

It took a while for this to be completed. It’s a busy time at the bank, and I was told that a refinance of this sort isn’t a priority for the bank because there’s no new money in it for them. But it’s finally done!

Avivah

About homeschooling and being ‘different’

homeschooling

Many years ago when I was considering homeschooling all of my children, and my oldest was just eight years old, I was worried about what would happen when it was time for shidduchim. I clearly remember asking an experienced homeschooling mother about this during our initial phone call, and now we field calls from others asking the same thing.

Conformity is a big value in my community, and to do something that was so visibly different felt very risky. I was worried that by doing something so untraditional, my children would be written off as suitable candidates for marriage.

The shidduch for my daughter who is currently engaged was suggested almost a year ago, and then was suggested a second time a couple of months ago. The first time I met her mother-in-law, I asked what caused the suggestion to be put on hold initially.

She told me that since her son was raised in the Israeli charedi system, she was concerned that our family was too different. I asked what ‘different’ meant to them. It was very straightforward: my daughter is more comfortable in English than Hebrew, was homeschooled and we live in Yavneel.

I understand the hesitation and I would likely have had the same concerns if the situation were reversed. Cultural differences are real (see my story below), and getting a clear sense of the internal values of a family before meeting them can be hard. Obviously our mechutanim moved beyond the initial concern; our children are a beautiful match and our families are a good match, too!

(Funny story: someone I don’t know called me to suggest an Israeli young woman as a shidduch for my son. I told the caller that as English speakers, culturally someone from an English speaking home would be more suitable. No problem, she says, the young woman knows English well from school. Personality-wise, not a match. Other details, not a match. She had an answer for everything. Until she suddenly asked, “Where do you live?”, and I said “Yavneel”. There was a long pause and she slowly responded, “Ah, it’s really not a match.” I thought it was funny that after all my much more relevant points that it was this superficial detail that meant so little was seen as significant, but relieved to finally be able to end the conversation politely.)

Sometimes people seem surprised to see our kids look so ‘normal’. I find it amusing that they’re so surprised. Do they think my sons walk around chewing on a stalk of hay, dressed in bear skins?

Someone recently visited Yavneel whom I hadn’t seen for thirty years. Her husband had met my teen boys in shul and was impressed by them, and when she came over to visit, she inquired with keen interest as to who my kids married. It wasn’t typical of who she is to care about details like this and I realized she was trying to size up the results of our homeschooling. She was clearly surprised that our kids were all living such ‘normal’ lives, and had made such ‘normal’ shidduchim.

Did I go against social norms by homeschooling my children? Yes. Am I social misfit, or are my kids weird and strange as a result? No, very much not.

Sometimes I reflect on the irony that my children look more mainstream than the children of many families who have gone through the system their entire lives.

When people say someone is ‘different’, sometimes it’s simply descriptive, and other times it’s a pejorative. Regardless of intention, I’ll be the first to agree that I think independently. Doing something because everyone does it isn’t a compelling argument for me. Much more important considerations are if it makes sense to me and is right for my family, which generally is determined by a lot of thought and research.

So many people have told me they’d like to be doing something different than what they’re doing, but they feel bound to live inside the societally defined box they find themselves in. They tell me they’d love to live the way that I do or make the decisions I’ve made, but they can’t.

I understand the discomfort and fear of judgment that comes with stepping outside of societal expectations. Our family has at times come under more scrutiny than others as a result of homeschooling and now because of living in an off-the-beaten-road community. I don’t question if that’s fair or not. It simply is the reality.

Judgments and assessments of who you are are present for everyone to some degree, and there’s a bit more for those of us who have made different choices. It’s annoying at times, but the tradeoff is living a life that I resonate with.

Avivah