Avivah Werner

Category: Parenting

  • Why a family dynamic is constantly evolving

    My husband looked at a family picture of when we had just six children that was temporarily moved to his desk, and commented, “The older half of our family!”

    This past Friday night at the Shabbos table, I looked around at everyone there and thought about how our family has completely changed through the years – not one person sitting there was alive at the time that the above mentioned photo was taken.

    A friend who grew up as almost the youngest of a large family told me that her experience growing up in her family was very different from her older siblings. Now I’m seeing for myself how true that is.

    Younger and older children in a family will always have a different experience growing up in the same home, with the same parents, because things change over time.

    Getting older and more mellow – My husband and I have been parenting for almost thirty years together. We have gotten a lot of experience and consequently are fairly secure as parents, and feel relaxed in our parenting at this stage. We aren’t constantly questioning ourselves and wondering how to deal with different things that come up. We genuinely trust that our kids are awesome people who are going to grow into amazing adults. We know it. We don’t have to work hard to remind ourselves of that, to affirm it, or to agonize over the challenges they experience. We know who we are, what our approach to parenting is, and our relationship with one another is steady and consistent. This is a product of time.

    Living in a different country – Not every family will experience the major moves that we did, but moving to a different country has made a huge difference in what our children experience. Growing up in the US provided different opportunities and challenges than living here in Israel. The children who are now teens in our home moved here as young children eleven years ago. They speak an additional language, they interact with different people, and they have different interests.

    I could give lots of examples of this! Here’s just one: my two oldest boys were excellent baseball players, the top in their leagues. During baseball season, our family spent hours every week attending their games. This activity has been completely absent from our lives from the time we moved to Israel. While their younger brothers have the potential to be just as athletic, there isn’t a framework for that here.

    It’s been interesting for me to notice my homeschooling style evolve, and that has been specifically related to living in Yavneel. Until moving here less than three years ago, I’d self-identified as a ‘relaxed homeschooler’. That meant that we had regular daily academic activities of reading, writing and math, integrated read-alouds of historical fictions, lots of trips and outside activities. This was consistent of our family homeschooling style for almost twenty years, wherever we lived (except the trips – after we moved to Israel we did very few trips).

    Now our boys have opportunities to follow and develop their interests in a way they never could before, and my style has evolved to almost completely unschooling. While they periodically pull out a math workbook at my bequest, that’s no longer an important factor for me. I trust not only their own inner desire to learn, but I trust the external framework provides the possibility of them being able to independently pursue their interests. For example, I mentioned my boys helping someone out with his horse a couple of weeks ago. Well, one son has continued working with the horses daily. Where will it go? I don’t know. But there’s the opportunity to do learn and experience much more.

    My thirteen year old began traveling locally by bus last year when he took a year long sailing course at the Kineret. He’s now expanding his comfort zone and learning to use public transportation to get to RBS, so he can stay in relationship with friends made when we lived there. When someone can get to where he wants to go independent of being driven by a parent, it opens up possibilities. This is something I’m comfortable with in Israel that I would not have allowed in Baltimore due to safety concerns.

    How your family is ‘built’ – Of our oldest five children, three were girls. For years people thought of us as a girl-family, because the presence of our daughters was so significant. When our next six boys joined the family, their presence obviously made a big impact as we had a very busy home with lots of young children. But our older girls remained highly involved and visible in our family life. When our oldest two daughters got married within twelve days of one another five years ago and they weren’t a daily presence anymore, things changed a lot.

    It’s been years since anyone has thought of us as a girl-family! Right now the younger boys are 20, 16, 15, 13, 10 and almost 6. We have a lot of male teen energy. I was watching my fifteen and sixteen year old sons wrestling tonight, and remembering how for years I never allowed wrestling in our home. Now I see it as appropriate and healthy.

    Parents don’t independently create a family atmosphere and impose that on their children. Children are partners in creating the family with their own personalities and interests, too. For years, we enjoyed singing at the Shabbos table. Then we had a few years when our two middle children were the oldest at home on Shabbos, but they didn’t enjoy singing at that stage (now they do) and we naturally sang together less as a family. Our Shabbos meals became much shorter and more discussion-heavy.

    Life continued to evolve and our three teens who are usually home now enjoy singing chazzanus (cantorial music) together when they are getting ready for Shabbos. It’s not my personal style but they enjoy it and it’s a nice thing to hear them enjoying together. Our sixteen year old went to the Friday night tisch of a chassidish rabbi, and heard a beautiful complex tune which he took time to learn well. He taught that song, and another equally complicated song, to the rest of us. Those songs are new to us, but are now becoming staples at our Shabbos table, and we once again have lots of singing at the Shabbos table.

    Not only that, our family itself has expanded, with the addition of four spouses and seven grandchildren (so far). Each of these people have added to our family dynamic, too!

    So life is continually evolving, even at my stage when it would seem that we’ve been doing this so long and you might expect that it’s the same old, same old!

    Avivah

  • A deeply enjoyable trip to Kangaroo Park

    My daughter-in-law consistently plans nice trips for their family every vacation. This summer, they came to visit us after a day trip to Kangaroo Park, a 45 minute drive from us. She told me she was able to buy tickets for a discounted price using a pass that her work offers everyone there, and told me she’s allowed to buy tickets for extended family members if we were interested.

    Since the older boys plan their own trips, and the younger boys are happy to stay local, we really haven’t done many official outings for a long while. Getting tickets at less than half price was a great opportunity, and this is a wonderful place to visit, so I asked my dil1 (my first daughter-in-law) to buy tickets on our behalf. She did, and told me they need to be used by the end of 2022.

    Yesterday ds10 needed to stay home for a blood test and the weather was beautiful, so it was the perfect time to use our tickets! The park was very quiet – one of my favorite things about doing trips as a homeschooling family over the years is that we can go off-season when it’s quiet and relaxing. I don’t enjoy crowds at all.

    The only negative is that ds13 couldn’t join us, because he had planned his first solo trip by bus to Beit Shemesh for that day. He was away for a couple of days and it was very empowering for him to successfully travel alone to a different part of the country. He enjoys staying in touch with friends there and now he won’t be dependent on me driving him to see them. That’s freeing for me, too! I was so glad that ds15 could come with us.

    Right after we got there, they announced that the large parrot aviary was open for fifteen minutes, so we went there. It was interesting but the parrots were shrieking in alarm because they had been given a new plant that they didn’t recognize, and it was very loud.

    The docent told me that in another fifteen minutes, she’d be doing a presentation at the small parrot aviary. That was a highlight for us. Usually each participant is given one skewer with a piece of apple to feed the parrots, but we were the only ones there at first (and even afterwards just one other family of three came in), so we were given two skewers each – and then we got a second round with another eight skewers. Each skewer represented an opportunity to have an interaction feeding a parrot, either on a wooden perch or with one of us serving as the human perch. It was really nice.

    There are 52 kangaroos in a large grassy enclosure, all of whom are very gentle and used to people. There’s an option to buy pellets to feed them, which was fun but more of our time was simply stroking them and being alongside them.

    We took our time there, and sat down next to a group of kangaroos for a long while. It was so pleasant.

    This is a mother kangaroo with a joey in her pouch. It was fascinating to me to learn about the birth and development of a joey inside the pouch. He is born tiny, the size of half a peanut, then climbs into the pouch where he literally gestates for months until he’s ready to climb out.

    I noticed an adolescent male kangaroo engaging in behavior that the docent said the alpha male wouldn’t allow if saw it. I asked the docent what would happen if the alpha male was there. He told me he wouldn’t have to do very much to show his displeasure, since he has such a dominant presence that the teen kangaroo would quickly stop doing what he was doing if the alpha expressed displeasure.

    Even though we have goats of our own, the boys still enjoyed these pygmy goats.

    Ds5 saw this water and quickly peeled off his socks and shoes, rolled up his pants and sat down to enjoy swishing his legs in the water.

    Ds10 and ds5 were having a great time for a long while running up and down a ramp that led to a second floor structure. At one point ds5 ran down the ramp and didn’t go back up. After waiting several minutes for him, I took a quick look around. I found him sitting across from the pond, watching the black swans swimming. Just being in the moment.

    Nowadays our attention spans are much shorter and we expect to be quickly entertained wherever we go, but when in a natural setting like this, gratification isn’t instant and you need to take more time to absorb the experience and let it settle into you. That’s something I really, really appreciated about going when there was hardly anyone there – we could take our time, go at our own pace without distractions and experience the park in the moment.

    This space for inner quiet is something that I deeply appreciate, and I’m so glad we had an opportunity for a trip that was a lot of fun, while also giving us together time, and personal inner quiet time.

    Avivah

  • Training a wild horse and teaching a child boundaries

    Today my husband got a call from someone who owns a couple of horses. He and my husband went horseback riding a while ago, and at that time the guy mentioned that his horses don’t get enough exercise.

    My husband suggested that our boys might be able to help out some time with the horses. Quite a lot of time went by, and finally today the owner reached out to find out if they were available. They were.

    When they got back, I asked what they did. The horses have gotten wild from lack of regular riding and need to be retrained. So the boys can’t ride them right away. They spent their time today standing in the middle of the pen, holding the rope the horse was tied to and having the horse walk in a circle around them. The idea is to teach the horses to go when told to go, and to stop when told to stop. The horses have to learn they can’t do whatever they want, but to do what they’re told. It’s been over a year since the horses have done this, and though they were trained in the past, now need to be reminded of what is expected and then practice those behaviors.

    Since these horse aren’t learning these behaviors for the first time, they should be able to progress fairly quickly from one stage to the next. Next time the boys will ride them inside the pen, and then progress from there until they are riding the horses freely.

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    You know what’s coming, right? I can’t help but see examples of the parenting process everywhere I look!

    When a child isn’t used to having clear expectations and boundaries, he’s going to get wild and misbehave. He’ll be really unpleasant to be around. This behavior isn’t a reflection of the character of a child, but a reflection of the lack of regular ‘training’. I feel very strongly that it’s crucial that children are taught to be respectful. Letting kids do what they want and not taking the time to actively guide them generally comes from a place of not knowing what to do, and for many parents, believing that it’s enough to love them.

    Yes, love is the critical component, but we show our love with our actions. True love means actively giving children clear boundaries and teaching them to be responsible and respectful human beings. While some kids figure it out on their own in spite of their upbringing, it doesn’t generally happen by itself.

    To begin to teach a child who is out of control about boundaries, you can’t begin with major expectations and demands and expect that you’re going to whip them into shape and have them ready to jump when you speak. You have to walk before you can ride. 🙂

    It would have been asking for trouble for my son to hop on top of the horse and try to ride him. The horse wouldn’t have been ready to listen to him. Your child has to be used to listening to you with small things before you can expect him to be responsive to you with big things.

    What do you do when a child is out of control, wild and won’t listen?

    You begin with a teaching process as to what is expected and what is accepted, while simultaneously building the relationship with positive interactions. You start with small interactions as you keep them ‘on a short rope’, keeping them close to you and immediately redirecting them if they get off track. You give them a chance to be successful with the small things, and as they develop self-discipline and respect for what you tell them, you
    gradually lengthen the rope while continuing to build the relationship with positive interactions.

    When your child is clear about boundaries and you have a relationship of trust with one another, you can give them a lot of independence. I give my children a lot of space. You don’t need to micromanage their activities, though periodic redirection as needed is appropriate. But just as it would have been dangerous for my sons to get on those horses today when they were untrained and resistant to authority, it’s asking for problems to give a child independence before they’ve developed the ability to manage themselves and be responsive to the guidance of their parents.

    Avivah

  • Being a goat whisperer, a leader for your children… and it’s all kind of the same

    My husband was sharing with me some extremely positive feedback on one of our son’s from a teacher, and commented that our ‘don’t push or pull, but encourage’ approach seems to have been very effective.

    His choice of words reminded me of an experience I had earlier that same day.

    I had an opportunity to take our three goats to a grassy area to graze and help clear the land. I asked my son to help me lead them to the car, holding on to the collar of each, because I was afraid if I let go of them they’d run away. We loaded them in, got to the field and unloaded them, and then holding the collar, I began to walk with the first goat to the grassy area.

    She balked. She didn’t want to go any further, which was interesting to me since she’s the only one with any experience walking on a leash next to me.

    I couldn’t physically push her to go where I wanted, and I didn’t want to push her.

    I assumed she must be feeling uncertain and anxious in the new location, and chose to let go of her collar rather than force her to walk along next to me. I kept walking. I glanced back after a moment and saw her following close behind. Another minute later, I glanced back again and happily trotting in a line behind me were all three goats. So much for my concern that they’d quickly run away and scatter when they had the opportunity to be in a wide open area.

    I took them to the grassy spot and they started munching away. I was planning to tie their leashes to stakes and leave them there for a few hours to enjoy the juicy green goodness, but while I was there, let them walk around freely.

    Since it was sunny and I had forgotten to bring a sun hat, I went to sit under a shade tree where I could supervise them.

    A minute or two later, they had all followed me to where I was sitting, even though it wasn’t a desirable grazing area. They stayed in one spot as long as I was there, and as soon as I left, they followed. This happened every time I walked further away from what they felt close enough proximity to them was. I felt a bit like a goat whisperer. 🙂

    I’m the primary caretaker for the goats, and when we were out in the fields it was very clear that I’m the one they feel safe with and connected to, and I’m the leader they want to follow. This surprised me because I had expected the dominant goat to be the leader for them.

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    It’s been so interesting for me to experience how principles of respectful relationship are just as relevant with animals as with people.

    The principle I was experiencing was that people – and animals – desire to be with and follow those to whom they feel connected.

    Lead with love, build your emotional connection with your child, give him room to make his own choices rather than tightly control his actions – and chances are very high that you will be the leader he wants to follow.

    Avivah

  • The shul is not a playground – increasing supervision of children at synagogue

    For many, many years, my policy regarding synagogue attendance has been as follows:

    The shul/synagogue is a place for prayer, not a playground. To instill this message, we don’t allow our children to accompany their father to shul until they are old enough to sit next to him and daven for the entire service. We start with short services and gradually allow them to go for the longer ones.

    For years, I met my husband at the end of the Shabbos day davening with all of the kids who were too young to go to shul (ie almost all of them). They could go in to shul at the very end (obviously only if they stood quietly), then enjoy the socialization after it ended – but they absolutely could not be running around and playing during davening time. Obviously not inside the shul, but not outside either.

    I had zero tolerance for my kids running around at shul, and was very clear with our children: If you’re old enough to be at shul, you’re old enough to be davening, and if you don’t want to daven, you shouldn’t be at shul. That wasn’t just talk – that was consistently reinforced by action on my part. It’s worked quite well for our children to realize that going to shul is a privilege, and that prayer is something to value.

    At some point in the last year and a half, we slowly shifted away from this without realizing it. My ten year old loves going to shul, and initially sat next to my husband most of the time. But gradually he noticed other kids playing outside and began to spend more and more time playing outside, too.

    I’m not usually at shul, so it was only recently when I became saw how much time wasn’t being spent inside. Though I feel very strongly that the shul isn’t a place for children to run around without supervision while their fathers are praying, that was exactly our situation! (I must add that my husband frequently checks on our son, and my older sons also keep an eye out for him. But as much as they did, he still needs more than that.)

    So he’s gotten used to a certain degree of unsupervised time. It’s so tempting to let a situation that has developed continue to slide, to turn a blind eye and convince yourself that it’s really not a big deal. But a seemingly unrelated situation inspired me to take some actions on this front.

    A little dog came to visit us during Sukkos. It was cute and absolutely adored my dog, following him everywhere and doing everything he did. (That means he spent a lot of time sitting right next to me or following me since our dog likes to stay close to me.) This new dog truly thought this was his home and we were his new family, as evidenced by his strong guarding behavior of our home and our dog after less than a day.

    I was relieved when we found the owner after three days, but the dog kept coming back to us. I began to feel trapped and resentful of this animal that insisted on making our home his own, and the owner who was happy to let him hang out with us rather than make any effort to keep him at home.

    I took a mental step back when I felt my energy getting negative, and recognized it was time for me to take matters into my own hands instead of waiting for the owner to deal with it. I determined that this dog would no longer get the gratification of interacting with my dog, and as soon as he came, I would put him on a leash outside my gate. Then the owner, who kept saying she was unwilling to tie her dog up or restrain him in any way, would be notified each time that he was waiting to be picked up.

    I felt very calm and relaxed once I decided upon a plan of action, and I consistently carried through. The first day, he came in the morning and evening. I immediately picked him up and tied him up outside; then I notified his owner. The next day, he came two times again. I did the same thing. The third day he came once. Each time his owner took her sweet time getting here – she lives less than a five minute drive from me but it generally took 2 – 3 hours each time to get him. After the third day, he didn’t show up anymore.

    I don’t know if the dog got the message he was no longer going to be able to interact with my dog, or his owner realized it wasn’t going to be fun for her to get called every time he came and have to pick him up, so she decided to supervise/restrain him more rather than letting him run free. But either way, it worked and it reminded me of the power of clear, decisive boundaries that are enforced with calm and kindness.

    It inspired me to take similarly focused actions with my ten year old. His boundaries at shul have gotten too loosely defined and it’s time to redefine them for him. That requires me to clarify for myself what boundaries I’m comfortable with, and then to communicate and reinforce them consistently to him.

    The power of clarity is that it makes it possible to summon the energy to take actions you previously felt too unfocused and consequently worn out to do anything about.

    In the last few days I’ve made the decision to go to shul in order to supervise much more closely when he’s there. The second part of the plan is to preempt his shul attendance by making it more fun and engaging to be home than at shul. That’s much easier said than done! Thinking about it feels daunting in terms of the physical and emotional energy it requires. But being clear on how important this is for him is very helpful.

    I’m hopeful that when he realizes that he’s not getting the gratification that he’s used to, and experiences the consistency of my response, that he will soon get used to and accept the new boundaries.

    Avivah

  • Celebrating our youngest daughter, the value of birthday circles

    What a busy and enjoyable holiday season it’s been!

    Our youngest daughter was born during Sukkos. This year on the day of her birthday, my second daughter (who was visiting with her family for the week) spontaneously suggested we make a special party for her sister, knowing it would mean a lot to her. I told her I thought it was a good idea but I was maxxed out with the nonstop cooking for all the holiday meals and wouldn’t have time to make something on short notice.

    My daughter whipped up a three layer cake with filling and frosting, while my oldest daughter and sixteen year old son composed a grammen (rhyming poem recited aloud to a specific tune). That night after dinner, our birthday girl was surprised when my son performed the grammen, followed by birthday cake.

    My older daughter also prepared a skit for that evening, but the skit participants didn’t feel they had enough time to prepare. We had chosen to make the party the night of her birthday, rather than waiting until the next night when all of our married children would be there with their families. We thought she would appreciate the quieter and more intimate setting, which she did.

    However, with the change in plans with the skit, we decided to push the skit and birthday circle off to the next night, when all of our children would be there.

    The next night, we began by repeating the grammen, since a number of people weren’t present the night before. Then the skit was performed, which was very funny; I was almost crying with laughter!

    Finally, we had our traditional birthday circle, in which each person present shares something they appreciate about the birthday celebrant. My daughter had told me she doesn’t appreciate the joking that sometimes accompanies the circle, so I made an announcement to please not make any comments about anything someone else says and everyone respected that. She afterwards told us how meaningful and special it was for her.

    About birthday circles – as nice as it is to hear people saying good things about you, it can also feel uncomfortable. I think it’s very important to learn to accept positive feedback, to recognize that you’re appreciated, to allow yourself to feel loved and valued, and to sit with the discomfort of listening to all the feedback in the presence of others, without making any comments to minimize what was said, or deflecting the praise.

    For those giving the positive feedback, it’s important to practice seeing the good in others. To learn to express that in an honest and straightforward way is also an unfamiliar skill for many people; there’s a societal discomfort in straightforwardly letting people know that we like them or how they do things.

    Having a yearly opportunity to honor each sibling gives everyone opportunities to practice these skills. We instituted birthday circles when our younger boys were very young, at least twelve years ago. Their early shares were very simple and sometimes silly. As time has gone on, they have evolved into being able to express meaningful and thoughtful feedback for someone else. The older siblings have commented on the quality of their younger brother’s feedback, saying that they didn’t have such well-thought out comments at that age. But they also hadn’t grown up with it for years like their younger siblings!

    I don’t remember exactly when we began this custom and I don’t remember why, but I’m so glad it’s become part of our family culture. When you do something sporadically, it takes a lot of effort to remember to do it and then draft the cooperation of all participants. Since birthday circles are well-entrenched in our family routines, it takes minimal effort; everyone knows what to expect and what their part is. And of course, every person appreciates the opportunity to be the recipient of appreciation each year.

    I encourage you to consider introducing a family tradition that will give family members a regular opportunity to express their appreciation for one another. It’s such a nice thing to be part of.

    Avivah

  • Sending food, sending love

    In my last post, I shared about processing jars of home cooked stews and meats for my boys in a dorm. It’s shelf-stable and they just have to heat it up. In response, someone commented:

    >>The soup/stew solution seems like a really good start, but hard on you.<<

    I appreciated the intent to offer suggestions that would make it easier for me and put the ball in their court.

    My kids are very capable – very. Though I understate my kids’ abilities and capacities when writing about them, I can safely say you won’t find many boys their ages as capable as they are. They can certainly shop and cook for themselves; they don’t need me to help them find a solution for this. Since they don’t have cooking facilities, their solutions are unlikely to be as good as mine, but they aren’t spoiled and have a make-do-with-a-good-attitude ethic.

    But you know what? I want to do this for them. In so many ways, doing this for them says, ‘I love you’. Every time they heat up a jar of food I prepared for them, whether they think of it consciously or not, they’re imbibing some of my love, knowing that I went out of my way because I love them, and connecting to that love.

    I’m not interested in skimping on that. I’m not so busy with more important things in my life that this is a pressure for me, or one more thing to do on my overly full to-do list. I do have a list that doesn’t seem to get much smaller regardless of what I do, but being present for my children and having a relationship with them is high on my list – even if they’re far away and it’s a non-verbal food interaction. Not only is making this food not hard on me, I welcome the opportunity to show them how much they matter to me.

    There are different ways to show love, and people perceive love that is given to them in different ways. For my older son, I know this is meaningful for him. Someone else might say, ‘Meh, nice but it really doesn’t matter much to me.’

    I’m so, so aware of how quickly time goes by, how short the time with our children is. The process of growing up is gradual, a constant spreading of one’s wings and becoming more independent. Independence doesn’t happen suddenly when they go away to school or get married. The relationship with a child changes as they go through increasing levels of independence, and by necessity your active role in their lives shifts.

    We tend to associate food with times we spent with love ones, with warm memories, with feelings of being cared about and taken care of. Good food, served with love, has the ability to reach a person in ways that other things don’t.

    I can give my boys money to buy food if they need to, and I’m glad to do it. But feeling loved through the money for food is more distant than feeling loved by eating the food itself.

    Preparing food so my boys can have a home cooked meal whenever they’re hungry is something I can do for my older son this year. This is when he needs it and especially appreciates it. Next year he’ll be in yeshiva gedolah, where the food is usually much better, so this probably won’t be needed.

    I’m embracing the opportunity that I have now to send my sons love from a distance. It only looks like jars of food sitting on their shelves. But now you know what it really is.

    Avivah

  • How I’m providing nourishing food to our boys in a dorm

    >>I know how you cook and care about feeding your family nourishing meals- how do you “handle” (for lack of better word, handle seems a bit dramatic), your kids’ diets while they are away in their schools?  <<

    We’ve found the meals in Israeli dorms in the past to be decent, with good amounts of protein and fresh produce. It helps that my children aren’t picky eaters. I don’t really worry about their food once they’re out of the house; I assume they’ll make the choices that are right for them and work within the parameters of what’s available. They do appreciate home cooked food much more when they come home, though!

    However, at the current yeshiva both my boys are at, the menu seems to be scaled down; it’s heavy on the starches and light on proteins; there’s hardly any fresh produce. This isn’t a complaint; I think this is typical of yeshiva ketanas, and that the yeshiva high school my boys attended in the past had unusually good food. In any case, we have a situation we haven’t had come up before.

    When I spoke with my sixteen year old son at the end of last week, he mentioned how helpful it was that I sent them with so much tuna, since he eats a can every day.

    I sent it thinking it would be something he would have once in a while, and asked him why he was eating it so often. He explained that if he doesn’t have it a couple of hours after lunch, he’s so hungry he can’t think about anything but eating dinner the entire afternoon. He’s never said anything like this, so I asked him about what and how much he was eating. Since he has a cavity that just started that he wants to heal, he’s trying to avoid processed carbs. That’s the bulk of what is served at his school, and since he’s not able to fill up on bread/pasta/white rice, the small amounts of protein leave him unsatisfied.

    I wondered what I could do about this. What could I send him other than tuna? I wanted him to have foods that would be satiating. Cookies and crackers wouldn’t be helpful, nor would any of the snack foods available in the stores. I couldn’t think of anything that would be filling that doesn’t need refrigeration or involve some kind of preparation.

    Then I had a brainstorm. I asked him if he had room in the dorm for electric burners and a pot. He said he did. I asked if I sent him home canned foods, would he heat them up and eat them? Yes, he would.

    I offered to make him some hearty homemade soups to supplement his diet and asked what he wanted. He requested split pea soup, so that’s what I started with. I made a thick stew with a generous amount of rich broth, to pack in nutrition and calories; he could eat as-is or thin it down for a more typical soup consistency.

    I pressure canned seven liters of the soup, as well as seven pints of chicken wings. When ds15 returned back to yeshiva after Shabbos, he was traveling by bus with just a backpack and therefore could only take only a few of the jars back with him. Ds16 called to tell me that even without being able to heat it up, he enjoyed it at room temperature.

    One jar is four cups of soup, and is enough for both boys to supplement one school lunch. Based on their feedback, though, from now on I’m going to can pint sized jars for them, so they can eat separately according to their schedules. This week I’ll make them some beef stew, and by periodically canning different dishes, they’ll have some variety.

    This Shabbos both boys will be coming home, and I’m planning to send them back to yeshiva with a suitcase containing the burners, pot, and jars of food. They’ll bring the empty jars home for me to reuse. I’m also going to send some fresh vegetables and fruit, and a frozen bottle of raw goat milk. I suggested he buy yogurts and produce at a local store to supplement.

    This is a first for me. Until now, the food served at the dorms has been adequate for all of our boys. In this case, I’m sure they could have found a different solution, but this is one that I feel good about nutritionally. I hope this will be a good solution to keep them nourished from a distance!

    Avivah

  • From expansion to contraction – so many children leaving home at once!

    We’ve been enjoying our summer with lots of guests and activities! For the past few weeks my oldest daughter was staying in the house behind us so on most days we had twice daily visits from her with our grandchildren. Then our second daughter came with her family for Shabbos, joining our 21 year old daughter and all the boys other than ds20 were home (he went back to yeshiva early to get settled in). It was so, so lovely to have Shabbos together with all of them.

    From expansion to contraction – it happens abruptly. On Saturday night, our second daughter’s family left. Sunday morning I took our sixteen and fourteen year old sons to yeshiva in RBS; our 21 year old came along and I dropped her off at a bus stop to Jerusalem. I returned in the evening and learned that our oldest daughter and her family had returned to their home that day. So it’s just me, my husband and the three youngest boys at home now. Two of them will be starting school in a few hours; by the time you read this they’ll already be sitting in their classrooms.

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    Last night I attended the introductory meeting for mothers for my five year old’s class. I was the first mother to arrive, and I had time to say only ‘Hello’ before the teacher exclaimed, “Let me guess whose mother you are!” (She met the students when she came in one day during camp.) I waited for a moment, and she guessed, “Rafael Werner!”

    Right, I told her with a smile. (She accurately guessed all the other mothers who arrived afterwards as well.) “I could tell because he looks just like you.” Isn’t that nice? She’s not the first one to say he looks like me! But she’ll probably be surprised when she eventually learns that he’s not my biological child.

    Afterward the general meeting she commented I had been quiet. I told her I didn’t come to talk, but to hear what she had to say. It’s an hour drive to the school, so it’s a commitment of several hours for me to attend. I make the effort not because I learn anything important for me, but because I want his teacher to know who Rafael’s mother is and to be aware that we’re actively involved in his education.

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    It’s been a long summer but it seems to have gone by so quickly! We chose to keep ds10 and ds5 home for six of the eight week vacation; I enjoyed having them home and at the same time, feel ready for them to go back to school. Not with a sense of, ‘finally, I get time to myself!’ More like, they’ve been filled up by all this time and they’re ready to fully benefit from their time in school, and for the first time I’m sending them without any ambivalence.

    As we did last year, the boys will leave school by 1 pm, returning around 2 pm. This is unusual since the school day is officially over at 2:30 and all the other children stay for the afternoon program, which ends at 5 pm (they would get home close to 6:30 pm). Some of you will remember that we started this arrangement the year before last, when ds10 began attending this school towards the end of the year. We were told this was the only time slot available for transportation for him. Then last year, I told them we would be willing to take that slot again, and at the end of the year filed a formal request for them to be allowed to leave school early.

    So this year we’re doing the same early dismissal for them. 

    Don’t think they come home and I fill their day with lots of enriching activities. I don’t. I don’t ignore them all afternoon, but we made the above choice with the understanding that it’s draining to be in school, and we want them to have the downtime to relax. When I can do activities with them, I do, but I also appreciate that they know how to constructively occupy themselves together. 

    (The most important aspect of this choice is that it’s much harder to be emotionally connected to a child/parents you hardly see, and we like to be around our children and for them to be around us. )

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    My fourteen year old is now attending the same yeshiva as his brother. He’s been homeschooled for most of his life (he attended gan/kindergarten for 18 months after moving to Israel eleven years ago), he’s a very likeable and enjoyable person to spend time with, and it wasn’t easy to think of him leaving for a dorm. I just tried not to think about it. Then a little thing – seeing a bowl of freshly gathered eggs from his coop and thinking he won’t be here to gather them anymore – got me all choked up before he left and it was hard to reel that sadness back in. Sometimes feelings come out unexpectedly sideways.

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    A number of people have asked me why I chose to send a child to yeshiva, when he was excelling in every way when homeschooled. It was a hard decision, and I spent several months thinking about it before bringing it up to my son. When a child is so happy with their lives, when it’s so well-balanced (spiritually and materially) and filled with good things, it’s hard to change anything. Why mess with success?

    I knew that my son could continue in the path he’s on, and would do well. But as I told him, we’re put in this world to grow, not to stay comfortable. I want him to expand as a ben Torah, specifically in reaching higher levels of Torah learning and in connecting with a variety of Torah role models, and that meant sending him somewhere where he could access more opportunities. As much as I strongly value having my children living at home, building relationships with them daily….his spiritual development is even more important to me at this stage of his life.

    We talked about this a lot. He was concerned that the long day of learning would be difficult and stressful; his hesitation was if he was unhappy, then that wouldn’t constitute growth. I suggested he look at being at yeshiva as a different kind of happiness; rather than as giving up everything that makes him happy now, he could focus on the gains he was making. I told him that what he has here now will be waiting for him if he chooses to come back to it, but the opportunity to go to yeshiva at this stage of life will pass.

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    So what will I do with myself now that I’m officially homeschooling just my thirteen year old? I don’t know yet. I do know that I want to be very conscious of spending time with him. The dynamics change every time a child leaves home, and this time the dynamics are shifting in a big way. We’ve never had just one child being homeschooled before. There have always been siblings to do things with.

    Last year, when ds5 began school, I had time in the morning for myself, something I hadn’t had for many years. But I still had two teen boys in and out of the house all day. My bedroom is like Grand Central. I go in there to take a nap, and within a short time everyone follows me. It’s uncanny how that happens. 🙂 During vacation I can easily have five or six of my sons sitting around there at one time. 

    Each time one of our children has moved out, it positively shifts my relationship with the next child in line as they become the oldest in the house and have more time one on one with me. I know how fast time passes, how quickly our children grow up, and I don’t want to get so busy with other activities that I let this time with ds13 slip away.

    What that means practically speaking is that I’m considering scheduling our morning time to ensure that we don’t miss each other, so that our schedules coordinate. This has been a challenge for me and ds13 until recently, as he was a night owl and I get up early. By the time he would get home from shul and daily learning, I’d be ready for my midday rest; he’d be ready to talk late at night when I could hardly keep my eyes open. After his bar mitzva three months ago, he began going to sleep earlier in order to be at shul by 6 am. That has meant that our schedules are much more naturally aligned than they were in the past. 

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    For those of you beginning a new school year, whether at home or at school, I wish you a wonderful start!

    Avivah

  • How my kids are staying busy during vacation

    >>I’m trying to keep everyone happy and occupied during the summer break.  Do you have any good suggestions?  What are your kids doing to keep busy? <<

    I believe the question is directed more towards younger children, so I’ll begin with that. Fortunately, my ten and five year old boys are close friends and so they always have someone to play with. A single child is more easily bored and generally looks for more outside assistance in structuring his time.

    Having a pool makes a huge difference for our two younger boys. They are in and out of the pool all day. Though that results in towels and clothing dropped throughout the house during the day, it’s a worthwhile tradeoff. During the week before Tisha B’Av when they couldn’t use the pool, I opted to send them to camp. Swimming is great exercise, it keeps people cool and during the heat of the summer (and it’s very hot where I live) that means being less irritable. Swimming is the single biggest activity for them. My daughter who lives locally also comes to visit daily with her children, so they join our boys in the pool.

    Otherwise, it’s the usual: including them in meal prep when I’m cooking or baking, reading together, occasionally I’ll play something with them but generally they play on their own. I encourage my kids to occupy themselves, as I think it’s very healthy. They find things to stay busy with around here.

    With a day old chick

    Collecting eggs from the chickens
    View of the chicken coop in the spring

    The shade cloths above all the local parks have been removed due to older kids climbing on them and tearing them, so this summer I haven’t taken them out to parks since it’s too hot without the shade. That means that we’re home most of the time. My husband takes the younger boys to shul most evenings during vacation, and their older brothers have taken them an a couple of hikes, which has been really nice for them.

    I don’t take them to the beach at the Kineret during vacation season, since it’s too crowded. I prefer to take them before and after the summer vacation, and am so grateful that I have that possibility.

    As far as our teens: my sixteen year old is running the yeshivas bein hazmanim at shul for teen boys (until he got married, my 23 year old son did it), and all of our boys ages 13 – 20 spend several hours each morning learning in shul. (My sixteen year old also took on himself to raise all the funds for the program, which wasn’t easy for him but he did a great job and he ‘grew his muscles’, as I call it when they do things that are outside their comfort zone.)

    We’re blessed to live where the older boys have a lot of opportunity for purposeful activity and outdoor fun. All the boys ages 13 and up have as much paid work as they want, and I’m wondering what the people they’re working for are going to do when they go back to yeshiva! They are all good workers and they spend a few hours working every other day or so. We don’t give our sons pocket money so this is a good opportunity for them to earn money for the coming academic term. They schedule their work in a way that they still have time for fun.

    They do a lot of hiking/biking/camping. The friends they go with differ from time to time; for example, this week a friend from yeshiva of my twenty year old son is visiting, so our 13 year old took him on a morning hike to a spring. Then my older son got back from learning, and all three of them went on another hike.

    Meanwhile that same day, ds16 took a group of younger boys on a hike.
    He does this as a community service, since there are no local camps and he sees the boys appreciate the outings. Last week he took them on a bike trip, and this week is taking them all on a hike to a natural spring.

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    This week in yeshivas bein hazmanim, they had a shiur given by a visiting rabbi about how to kosher meat. That was followed by a trip to a farm to see a chicken being butchered and then kashering the meat. The same rabbi gave another shiur about Sukkos and the mitzva of lulav, and then they went out to harvest palm fronds. Hands on learning!

    A couple of days ago I took ds16 and ds13 driving in the dirt roads among the agricultural fields. (Meaning, I let them drive for the first time.) That was such a nice thing to do with them; we all enjoyed it so much! I’ve never done that before, but would love to do it again before their summer vacation ends in a week. In Israel we don’t have the possibility of getting a learner’s permit and then driving with an adult; all driving happens only with paid instructors until a person gets a license. Driving isn’t a very hard thing to do, and practice is what makes a person good at it. But there’s nowhere to do that with a minor here; hence my realization that I could do this in the back roads meant a new opportunity.

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    It’s really nice to see how constructively busy and happy they all are. A vacation is an opportunity to recharge and connect with your family and friends, and I love that they’re doing that. Life is made for happiness and meaning, but too often the day to day grind that has become the norm.

    Someone staying in my vacation apartment commented that living here, I probably never need to go away on vacation. She’s right. I live in a place and in a way that is relaxing and renewing for me, and I have no desire to ‘get away’ at all. My vacation time is special to me because I have all my boys at home, and I cherish that.

    Eleven years ago today, our family left the US to make aliyah. It’s a very wonderful thing to be where we all are after all these years!

    Avivah