Just
as the Colorado town in South Park has its resident schlemiels, the
Springfield of The Simpsons has its very own Jewish clown. Krusty, of
course.Let's reminisce.
Continue reading.
- Zachary Solomon for Jewniverse
Monday, March 3, 2014
Krusty the Clown's Rabbinic Lineage
Just
as the Colorado town in South Park has its resident schlemiels, the
Springfield of The Simpsons has its very own Jewish clown. Krusty, of
course.Let's reminisce.
Continue reading.
- Zachary Solomon for Jewniverse
Monday, February 24, 2014
Six Reasons to Attend Jewish Summer Camp
Reprinted from ReformJudaism.org
Jewish
summer camps fuse the activities, friendships, and communal life of
traditional camps with the Jewish values, role models and culture our
shared heritage. This uniquely immersive experience provides a
confidence-building opportunity in which campers experience joy and
discovery in a communal Jewish setting. Read on for the top six reasons
parents, bubbes, and zaydes everywhere are sending their kids to Jewish
camp.
1. Experiences first, explanations later. Kids are able to ultimately and immediately contribute to their Jewish community at camp. In other realms of Jewish life, they are taught about Jewish communal life and then experience it. At camp, they experience it (at meals, during Shabbat, on the ropes course, in the cabin - everywhere), and the explanations come later. This is a uniquely powerful experience they find nowhere else. Learn more from eJewish Philanthropy.
2. Camp friendships last beyond the summer. After the dirty laundry has been washed and the camp trunk put away, the friendships endure. Camp is one easy entry point into a lifelong Jewish community. As kids grow, opportunities increase to connect with Jewish peers through congregational and national youth group (including NFTY), Israel travel, social justice programs, and much, much more. Many alumni of Jewish camp have found that the friends they make during the summer stick with them through college, young adulthood, and beyond.
3. Immersive Jewish community, 24/7. Campers are exposed to adult Jewish role models, Jewish peers, and Jewish friends from different places. These Jewish connections in every direction are extremely powerful. Campers experience joy in a Jewish community, develop self-confidence as Jews, and forge Jewish connections that stay with them into their lives beyond camp. Nowhere else do campers have the opportunity to experience Judaism infused into daily life and reinforced by a community of exclusively Reform Jewish peers.
Continue reading.
Jewish
summer camps fuse the activities, friendships, and communal life of
traditional camps with the Jewish values, role models and culture our
shared heritage. This uniquely immersive experience provides a
confidence-building opportunity in which campers experience joy and
discovery in a communal Jewish setting. Read on for the top six reasons
parents, bubbes, and zaydes everywhere are sending their kids to Jewish
camp.1. Experiences first, explanations later. Kids are able to ultimately and immediately contribute to their Jewish community at camp. In other realms of Jewish life, they are taught about Jewish communal life and then experience it. At camp, they experience it (at meals, during Shabbat, on the ropes course, in the cabin - everywhere), and the explanations come later. This is a uniquely powerful experience they find nowhere else. Learn more from eJewish Philanthropy.
2. Camp friendships last beyond the summer. After the dirty laundry has been washed and the camp trunk put away, the friendships endure. Camp is one easy entry point into a lifelong Jewish community. As kids grow, opportunities increase to connect with Jewish peers through congregational and national youth group (including NFTY), Israel travel, social justice programs, and much, much more. Many alumni of Jewish camp have found that the friends they make during the summer stick with them through college, young adulthood, and beyond.
3. Immersive Jewish community, 24/7. Campers are exposed to adult Jewish role models, Jewish peers, and Jewish friends from different places. These Jewish connections in every direction are extremely powerful. Campers experience joy in a Jewish community, develop self-confidence as Jews, and forge Jewish connections that stay with them into their lives beyond camp. Nowhere else do campers have the opportunity to experience Judaism infused into daily life and reinforced by a community of exclusively Reform Jewish peers.
Continue reading.
Monday, February 17, 2014
Shalom Sesame: The Website
You may be familiar with the wonderful Shalom Sesame videos. Did you
know that Shalom Sesame also has a fun website with games, videos,
activities and much, much more. Your kids can have hours of fun
learning to read, creating their own stories and videos, learning Hebrew
and of course, seeing their favorite Muppets.
Check it out!
Check it out!
Monday, February 10, 2014
I Was Embarrassed of My Hebrew Name
By Avital Norman Nathman for Raising Kvell
“How do you pronounce it? Ah-vee-tle? Ah-vie-tle?”
“It’s pronounced Ah-vee-TAHL.”
“Ah-vittle?”
“Ah-vee-TAHL.”
“Oh…yeah. I get it. That’s pretty.”
I always dreaded the first day of class from ninth grade on. Because on that first day you had to sit through roll call–where they ran down the list, calling out students one at a time, checking off attendance and putting faces to names. It shouldn’t have been that big of a deal. But my name? It always seemed to cause a stumbling block for folks, at least outside the Jewish community. Before entering the public school system, I attended a Schechter elementary and middle school where the name Avital never caused anyone to bat an eye. But once outside that comfortable Jewish space? There was no telling how my name would be butchered. Usually, teachers would mess it up a few times before I had to pipe up to correct them, drawing the stares of everyone in class.
I grew to really hate that first day of class. Sometimes, I would even daydream about changing my name. What was so special about Avital anyway? I didn’t even have a middle name to fall back on, just the first and last name. Visions of being called Agatha floated through my head (what? I was a voracious reader and Agatha Christie was a favorite of mine through much of high school. And it’s kind of cute, no?). Anything to escape the discomfort of somebody bumbling my actual name. When they couldn’t pronounce it I felt a sense of “otherness”–one that reminded me that I was unlike the other kids who drank milk with their meat sandwiches and went to church on Sundays. At some point, I told people to just call me Avi… it was better that way.
Continue reading.
“How do you pronounce it? Ah-vee-tle? Ah-vie-tle?”“It’s pronounced Ah-vee-TAHL.”
“Ah-vittle?”
“Ah-vee-TAHL.”
“Oh…yeah. I get it. That’s pretty.”
I always dreaded the first day of class from ninth grade on. Because on that first day you had to sit through roll call–where they ran down the list, calling out students one at a time, checking off attendance and putting faces to names. It shouldn’t have been that big of a deal. But my name? It always seemed to cause a stumbling block for folks, at least outside the Jewish community. Before entering the public school system, I attended a Schechter elementary and middle school where the name Avital never caused anyone to bat an eye. But once outside that comfortable Jewish space? There was no telling how my name would be butchered. Usually, teachers would mess it up a few times before I had to pipe up to correct them, drawing the stares of everyone in class.
I grew to really hate that first day of class. Sometimes, I would even daydream about changing my name. What was so special about Avital anyway? I didn’t even have a middle name to fall back on, just the first and last name. Visions of being called Agatha floated through my head (what? I was a voracious reader and Agatha Christie was a favorite of mine through much of high school. And it’s kind of cute, no?). Anything to escape the discomfort of somebody bumbling my actual name. When they couldn’t pronounce it I felt a sense of “otherness”–one that reminded me that I was unlike the other kids who drank milk with their meat sandwiches and went to church on Sundays. At some point, I told people to just call me Avi… it was better that way.
Continue reading.
Monday, February 3, 2014
Mitzvah Notes For Mommy
By Ariel Chesler for Kveller
My
daughter’s preschool teacher has created a daily task in which we, the
parents, write “mitzvah notes” for our children each day. These notes
are meant to describe the ways in which our children are helpful,
cooperative, or did good deeds. The notes are read in class with the
children, who, I am told, are excited to hear and discuss the good
things they have done.
I must admit that when I first learned about this task, I considered it a burden. How, I wondered, could we be expected to come up with a good deed that our 3-year-old did each day? Have you ever met a 3-year-old? I knew it would be far easier to rattle off “not so mitzvah notes,” like so:
She refused to brush her teeth.
She refused to get out of the bath.
She refused to get dressed.
She hit Mommy.
She pushed her sister.
She screamed in my face when I tried to comfort her because I was not Mommy.
She did not eat dinner.
She made leaving the house impossible.
She did not clean up her toys.
She threw herself on the floor because I gave her the pink cup instead of the purple cup.
She made me want to cry.
But then, as my wife and I committed ourselves to the daily task of writing these notes, we began to find the good in our 3-year-old, even though this used to feel like an impossible mission.
Continue reading.
My
daughter’s preschool teacher has created a daily task in which we, the
parents, write “mitzvah notes” for our children each day. These notes
are meant to describe the ways in which our children are helpful,
cooperative, or did good deeds. The notes are read in class with the
children, who, I am told, are excited to hear and discuss the good
things they have done.I must admit that when I first learned about this task, I considered it a burden. How, I wondered, could we be expected to come up with a good deed that our 3-year-old did each day? Have you ever met a 3-year-old? I knew it would be far easier to rattle off “not so mitzvah notes,” like so:
She refused to brush her teeth.
She refused to get out of the bath.
She refused to get dressed.
She hit Mommy.
She pushed her sister.
She screamed in my face when I tried to comfort her because I was not Mommy.
She did not eat dinner.
She made leaving the house impossible.
She did not clean up her toys.
She threw herself on the floor because I gave her the pink cup instead of the purple cup.
She made me want to cry.
But then, as my wife and I committed ourselves to the daily task of writing these notes, we began to find the good in our 3-year-old, even though this used to feel like an impossible mission.
Continue reading.
Monday, January 27, 2014
How Moses Inspires Me to Ask For Help
By Alicia Jo Rabins for Raising Kvell
This post is part of our Torah commentary series through the perspective of a new mom. This is from Parashat Yitro.
Asking
for help does not come naturally to me. I’ve always been independent to
the point of stubbornness. And that worked for me…until I became a mom.
Now, ohmygosh, I need help constantly. And little by little, I’m
learning how to ask for it.
I know you’re dying to know how this connects to this week’s Torah portion, and I promise it will, but first a personal litany of top five motherly vulnerabilities:
1. Diapering technique. It all started when a hospital nurse showed me how to diaper my brand new baby. I watched her expertly fasten the tiny disposable diaper, thinking, how the hell did I get through 35 years without learning this? It seemed like the most basic skill in the world, but also entirely mysterious. Even after my hospital lesson, it took me two weeks to remember which side went in the back.
2. Post-partum help. For two weeks after Sylvie’s birth, my mom stayed in our tiny apartment to help us out, sleeping on our couch and sharing our one bathroom. (Yes, she is amazing.) For the first week, I couldn’t bend over because of my c-section incision, so my mom had to help me put on my underwear. That was humbling enough. By the end of week two, I was slowly healing, but when it was time for my mom to leave, I surprised myself by losing it. I still needed her help. I probably hadn’t cried and begged her not to leave since I was 4 years old. This was not exactly how I’d expected to start off my new life as a mother.
3. Professional help. A month later, we moved across the country with our little baby. Despite the warm welcome of my husband’s friends, I missed my old life terribly. That, plus the financial pressure of moving and looking for work, plus whatever hormonal stuff was going on, was simply too much for me to handle without outside help. It took me six months of googling “postpartum depression” to pick up the phone and call the local hotline and find help. I wish I’d done it earlier.
Continue reading.
This post is part of our Torah commentary series through the perspective of a new mom. This is from Parashat Yitro.
Asking
for help does not come naturally to me. I’ve always been independent to
the point of stubbornness. And that worked for me…until I became a mom.
Now, ohmygosh, I need help constantly. And little by little, I’m
learning how to ask for it.I know you’re dying to know how this connects to this week’s Torah portion, and I promise it will, but first a personal litany of top five motherly vulnerabilities:
1. Diapering technique. It all started when a hospital nurse showed me how to diaper my brand new baby. I watched her expertly fasten the tiny disposable diaper, thinking, how the hell did I get through 35 years without learning this? It seemed like the most basic skill in the world, but also entirely mysterious. Even after my hospital lesson, it took me two weeks to remember which side went in the back.
2. Post-partum help. For two weeks after Sylvie’s birth, my mom stayed in our tiny apartment to help us out, sleeping on our couch and sharing our one bathroom. (Yes, she is amazing.) For the first week, I couldn’t bend over because of my c-section incision, so my mom had to help me put on my underwear. That was humbling enough. By the end of week two, I was slowly healing, but when it was time for my mom to leave, I surprised myself by losing it. I still needed her help. I probably hadn’t cried and begged her not to leave since I was 4 years old. This was not exactly how I’d expected to start off my new life as a mother.
3. Professional help. A month later, we moved across the country with our little baby. Despite the warm welcome of my husband’s friends, I missed my old life terribly. That, plus the financial pressure of moving and looking for work, plus whatever hormonal stuff was going on, was simply too much for me to handle without outside help. It took me six months of googling “postpartum depression” to pick up the phone and call the local hotline and find help. I wish I’d done it earlier.
Continue reading.
Monday, January 20, 2014
Finally a Disney Movie That’s Not About Boy-Girl Love
By Tova Ross for Kveller
Fine,
I admit it: trekking to the movie theater after a day of heavy snow
against my husband’s generally sound advice was not my best plan. But I
had promised our 4-year old that I would take him to the movie theater
for the first time that Saturday night, to see Disney’s Frozen, and I
loved the symmetry between the white-covered world outside and the
premise of the movie featuring a snow queen (which is about as much as I
knew about the plot).
Clad in boots, gloves, and puffy coats, we drove ploddingly to the mall, where I skidded terrifyingly a couple of times and vowed to always take my husband’s advice from then on. But we made it safely and, tickets and popcorn in hand, settled in to enjoy the show.
It was magical. And not just because I loved seeing my adorably inquisitive son’s eyes grow wide with wonder as he took in a new experience with “the biggest TV screen ever,” but because the story itself was a revelation.
Somewhere between re-watching generic princes fall instantly in love with the passive Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella and seeing Ariel giving up her family, mermaid body, and voice for a man she had only glimpsed from afar, I realized–amid the magic of talking forest friends and deliciously evil villains–that Disney films of “olde” have some serious flaws. Chief among them is the idea that love happens at first sight (lust, maybe, but real, lasting love?) and the repetitive obsession with storybook romance as the ubiquitously happy ending. This was driven home to me after watching Mulan, which concludes in the protagonist and her boyfriend sitting down to dinner. My son refused to go to bed. “It can’t be over,” he protested. “Nobody got married yet.”
But Frozen’s central love story is not one between a man and a woman. It’s between two sisters: the elder one, a princess named Elsa enabled with the initially-uncontrollable power to create snow and ice with the flick of a wrist and the younger one, Anna, who adores Elsa and cannot understand how they went from being childhood best friends to strangers in their adolescence and young adulthood. When Anna eventually discovers her sister’s secret power, along with the entire kingdom, Elsa banishes herself and inspires Anna to undertake a mission to retrieve her sister and renew their close bond.
Continue reading.
Fine,
I admit it: trekking to the movie theater after a day of heavy snow
against my husband’s generally sound advice was not my best plan. But I
had promised our 4-year old that I would take him to the movie theater
for the first time that Saturday night, to see Disney’s Frozen, and I
loved the symmetry between the white-covered world outside and the
premise of the movie featuring a snow queen (which is about as much as I
knew about the plot).Clad in boots, gloves, and puffy coats, we drove ploddingly to the mall, where I skidded terrifyingly a couple of times and vowed to always take my husband’s advice from then on. But we made it safely and, tickets and popcorn in hand, settled in to enjoy the show.
It was magical. And not just because I loved seeing my adorably inquisitive son’s eyes grow wide with wonder as he took in a new experience with “the biggest TV screen ever,” but because the story itself was a revelation.
Somewhere between re-watching generic princes fall instantly in love with the passive Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella and seeing Ariel giving up her family, mermaid body, and voice for a man she had only glimpsed from afar, I realized–amid the magic of talking forest friends and deliciously evil villains–that Disney films of “olde” have some serious flaws. Chief among them is the idea that love happens at first sight (lust, maybe, but real, lasting love?) and the repetitive obsession with storybook romance as the ubiquitously happy ending. This was driven home to me after watching Mulan, which concludes in the protagonist and her boyfriend sitting down to dinner. My son refused to go to bed. “It can’t be over,” he protested. “Nobody got married yet.”
But Frozen’s central love story is not one between a man and a woman. It’s between two sisters: the elder one, a princess named Elsa enabled with the initially-uncontrollable power to create snow and ice with the flick of a wrist and the younger one, Anna, who adores Elsa and cannot understand how they went from being childhood best friends to strangers in their adolescence and young adulthood. When Anna eventually discovers her sister’s secret power, along with the entire kingdom, Elsa banishes herself and inspires Anna to undertake a mission to retrieve her sister and renew their close bond.
Continue reading.
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