Important Xander things

1) Xander spoke his first full sentence! "Please water with ice."

2) He kept saying what we thought was "money" whenever we drove in the car, and he would act angry. Then inside the house he showed us the toy Mini Cooper Jonathan had given him, and explained to us that that's what he meant by "money." He'd been upset that he hadn't been able to ride in the Mini, and had been forced to sit in the Toyota! Jonathan was near beaming.

3) We went to a Simchat Torah celebration tonight. He was fascinated by the band, danced with tons of people and clutched his plush Torah everywhere. At one point he even pulled out his toy saxaphone-shaped kazoo and joined in with the music.

Oh yes, also at Simchat Torah? A woman I hadn't seen since summer asked me how far along I was. I told her 14 weeks. Her mouth dropped open: "I thought you were six months!"

For Marleena

Who just recently sent me an email asking, "How is Xander's music?"

Behold, the child music prodigy. :)

Long-overdue pictures

So this first batch is from I think over three weeks ago. We went to a place called Totter's Otterville in Kentucky. It was a fun alternative to the Cinci Children's Museum, but was a little run-down for my taste. Xander had a fabulous time nonetheless.

Very excited to be stacking in the play store.

Inspecting the mailbox for lost letters.

Focusing on shunting balls into tubes.

Water play is paramount.

Magnetic fishing outside.

King Tut lives!

Then there was Yom Kippur:

Our little family.

Helping me off the bima after the end of services.

Showers are so relaxing.

Videos to be posted tomorrow.

Things that are happy

1) Xander stopped throwing up! Who knows why he started, but two days ago he was a mess. As were we, as was our house. Thankfully he feels better now, so we're all sleeping. The only downside is that we're monumentally behind on laundry because we had to put bedding, blankets, clothing, small rugs, stuffed animals, etc in the washer.

2) I finished all my homework, including reading The Merchant of Venice for my Converts in Literature class. I'd somehow managed to miss it before in all my previous Shakespeare experience. I have to admit, I wasn't such a fan of it. It will be very interesting to discuss, though.

3) Antonio is here for an inpromptu visit! Between him, Maura, and Xander's friend Yasha (who was visiting for Sukkot) it's been a very full house.

4) The third novel in the Rashi's Daughter's trilogy is quite good! Or, at least, not bad. I loved the first book but thought the second was only so-so (it got too soap-opera-y for my taste). The third is in-between. It goes back to the less sensationalized narrative and includes a whole lotta Talmud. The part I found hard was that by this point in the series, Rashi has like a dozen children and grandchildren, all who are named repeatedly in the story. I had to keep referring back to the family tree listed in the beginning of the book, which made for frustrating reading. But it was definitely a fun read, worthy of being a vacation day book.

5) The nausea has almost disappeared! As well it should, seeing as I'm 14 weeks. Thank goodness. We were starting to invest good money in ginger ale purchases.

Also, I've now downloaded all the pictures on the camera. Watch for a new picture post soon.

Random blabbing.

Oy. The High Holidays are barely over, and I'm already feeling behind on schoolwork. I hate that we had so much work assigned over the "break." I'm making a good dent, but not quite there yet.

Yom Kippur went well though! People liked my sermons. I sang Kol Nidre three times. I don't think the tune was perfect, but at least it was consistent. My mom gave me a really simple piece of advice that worked wonders for my voice: open my mouth wider when singing. I think I was able to project a lot more and hit stronger notes.

Xander and Jonathan were the life of the congregational parties, as usual. The best was when Xander came up onto the bima at the end of services, when we were doing Havdalah (blessings that end Shabbat). He climbs behind me, points to the ark and says really loudly - "TO-WAH!" People cracked up. Then he proceeded to point to the shofar blower, hold his hand in a fist in front of his mouth and go, "boo boo!" in his best imitation of the last shofar call. The congregation ate it up with a spoon.

His vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds, I can't even list the amount of new words he's picked up. But his sense of humor is growing along with it - for example, today Maura handed him a grape, and asked if he could say, "grape." He shook his head no. Jonathan said to her, "R's are hard." So Maura turned back to Xander and said, "Can you say, 'gwape'?" He giggled and said, "Fun-nny!" We all thought it was very funny too. :)

Remember all the trouble we were having with teeth-brushing? Visiting Holly did wonders: I copied what she did with Gregory, and now we ask him whether he wants to go "eee" first or "aah" first, and we brush his teeth accordingly (if that sounds weird, make the sounds in an exaggerated fashion with your mouth open and you see that you get all the teeth that way!)

My World of the Talmud class is increasingly awesome. Today was Roman history in a nutshell. Why do we need to know about the Romans? For interfaith work, when people talk about Jesus, we can't say, "oh, we didn't do it, the Romans did" without understanding a little about their system of law. We can't explain Masada or Bar Kochba or the Maccabees or any other Jewish history without knowing the greater context. We can't lead trips to Israel and talk about many of the sites without knowing where they came from. So today was pure Rome day. Next class will be Jews in the Roman Empire, generally.

In honor of Sukkot, I thought this was really interesting: Sukkah City, NYC 2010. Talk about re-imagining the rules! And in a more controversial subject, this article is about mezuzahs on NY doorways. I don't know, that last woman quoted rubbed me wrong... I feel it's appropriating someone else's religion. What do you all think?

And now, I'm falling over in front of the computer and should get offline... lilah tov.

Oh yes, something else....

I was so overwhelmed by High Holidays, I completely forgot to post this ultrasound picture from a couple weeks ago.



Everything looks fine and healthy. I mainly wanted the ultrasound because I'm so big for 13 weeks that I wanted to be sure we weren't having twins! (We're not. I'm just huge.) Since Xander was "Wiggle," we're calling this one "Squiggle."

My life this week: wipes, cat tails, clothes and tricycles

Have I written before about Xander's obsession with wipes? We're starting to joke that the child is OCD. He gets up in the morning, he asks for a wipe. He wipes his face, my face, Bear's face, the wall. You name it, he wipes it. I think he likes their coolness, because when one dries out, he asks for another. Yesterday after dinner he wanted one, and I said sure, meaning to go upstairs with him in a moment. Instead he raced off to the staircase. I quietly followed, and saw that he went straight to his room, climbed up his changing table, sat on it, reached for the wipes container, took one out, climbed back down, and was getting ready to go back downstairs.

This is the same child who, when I wasn't getting him food fast enough, climbed up on the kitchen chair, clambered up to sit on the counter, opened the cabinet door, took out the beef jerky, climbed back down and presented it to me on the couch. I was so impressed with his ingenuity I let him have it. It was hilarious though, because Simcha kept trying to steal it from his hand. And after Xander was done, he was going to feed him some!

Those two are becoming problematic, they're much too good friends.... Xander will open the basement door or the screen door outside if Simcha meows at him. Simcha lets him use his tail as a train track (picture the toy train running up and down the cat's back, and then Simcha swishing his tail so that Xander has a new track to follow). Both of them play tag with each other. I swear, we don't need a dog at this point. The 15-pound tabby fits the bill.

Speaking of bills, I got away with a relatively small one when I went clothes shopping yesterday. ME! Clothes shopping! It was a dire necessity, as I had no nice maternity clothes to wear for upcoming services this weekend. So my friend Rachel and I drove an hour and a bit, almost up to Columbus, to the Motherhood Maternity outlet store. Then back to Hebron, KY for the maternity section at the GAP outlet for casual clothes. I literally spent all day shopping, but at least now I won't have to keep wearing the same outfits every week. Rachel's one-year old did pretty well in the backseat, most likely because she kept stuffing him with raisins to keep him happy.

I wasn't the only one who made out like a bandit yesterday, either. When I got home Xander was playing with a bunch of new toys that Angela's friend had passed on to him. They're moving soon so are weeding out their toy collection. Apparently when they were visiting, he got on the 7 year-old's old tricycle and was pedaling like a pro! The mom said he could have it, so we're going to pick it up tomorrow. I see many, many rides around the block in my future.

Also, Jonathan emailed this to me, and I thought I would share: this link takes you to a demonstration of a classic physic experiment called a Ruben's Tube, which visually shows you sound waves. Mr. Yeend from 12th grade physics would be so proud that I actually paid attention to something, and could understand what was going on!

For all you People of the Book, g'mar chatimah tovah. For all you people of all other books, happy Tuesday!

Rosh Hashanah... and lots of other pics

Me leading services.

Tashlich is when we throw our "sins" into the water, in the form of bread crumbs. Xander thinks we're feeding the ducks.

DUCKS!!!!!!!!!

Relaxing in the hotel with Bear after a long day helping Mommy at synagogue.

Back at home, we went shopping in the kitchen.....

And cuddled with Simcha. Both their faces are so peaceful!

Two minutes later, Simcha starts to look a bit put out.






Playing outside. His shirt says, "My parents are exhausted."





Driving a car just like a big person!





Ending the week with storytime before bed.

All hail husbands

Rosh Hashanah was a success, I learned the Hebrew, services ended, we came home.

Unfortunately, we opened the kitchen door to find that a cat had had diarrhea all OVER the kitchen. I had to back right out because I couldn't stand the smell in the house. So while I played with Xander in the backyard, Jonathan spent half an hour spot-cleaning. And then afterwards he mopped.

Hence my subject line - all hail husbands.

Oh yes, and in other news? The repetition has started. Last I was getting annoyed with Simcha's meowing so told him to "shut up." Guess what Xander's new pet phrase is? Yep. Guess I'm gonna be more careful from now on!

Shana tovah

Erev (evening) Rosh Hashanah service is DONE! Amazing that all the work of Hebrew practicing, learning songs, writing a sermon, perfecting transitions, and more is all over in an hour. Almost sad in a way.

But I shouldn't fear. There's a two hour service tomorrow. Which includes me reading two prayer book pages worth of unvocalized Torah (aka the whole Akedah, the story of Isaac's binding, without vowels). I think I may need to take a page from Xander's choo-choo obsession. I think I can... I think I can... I think I can!

How a child can change your view of the world (by Jonathan)

I was just about to cross a Rail Road crossing when the familiar flashing lights and clanging bells sounded. I stopped just in time to keep the big red and white striped arms from coming down on the hood of the car. I looked down the tracks and saw a freight train that went on further than I could see. I knew I was in for a long, long wait here.

Two years ago this would have irritated me to no end. I might have even considered turning around in the hope I could circumvent the train. But I had Xander in the car with me and that changed everything. I pointed down the track so he could see the glowing light in the middle of a monstrously long gray and yellow snake shimmering in the mid day sun.

“Look Xander, it’s a TRAIN!” He followed my finger down the track and saw the mechanical beast lumbering down its path.

“CHOOO CHOOO!!!” he squealed while craning his neck to see. I don’t think he had ever seen a train up close in real life before. His intake has mostly been YouTube videos and episodes of Thomas the Train.

When the train finally started crossing in front of us, only a few feet from our car, he was in stunned awe. He sat there; eyes fixed forward watching the mechanical leviathan lumber and clank past us. There was total silence in the car. Nothing needed to be said. We were, from Xander’s point of view, watching one of the most amazing things on the planet.

It was incredible to me. I can’t remember the last time I looked at a train that way. I read about and know from first-hand experience how much harder kids can make life. But then, there are these moments that somehow make up for so much that you sacrifice. Is it worth it in the end? It was that day.

Pics of the visit with Holly!

Click here for a slideshow of pics of my visit with Holly. The boys had SO much fun together, it's easy to see in their faces.

And if you don't like the link, here they are embedded in the site. Enjoy!




Visit with Holly

Reading

I think that this article is fascinating: Does Your Language Shape How You Think? The one class I regret not taking in college is Linguistics. But the way people think, and how language shapes worldview, has always fascinated me. The article is long, but very much worth reading.

So last week I finished two books on my list, sent by Gwen in a long-ago package. Harem by Dora Levy Mossanen was only okay. It was about three generations of women in Persia, the mom in the Jewish quarter, the daughter in the royal harem, and the granddaughter in court. It was an intriguing premise, but had way too much magical realism in it for me to fully get into the time period. I wouldn't recommend it.

On the other hand, The World to Come by Dara Horn was nothing short of amazing. I can't say enough good things about it. So I won't: I'll let the Amazon review say it for me.

Following in the footsteps of her breakout debut In the Image, Dara Horn's second novel, The World to Come, is an intoxicating combination of mystery, spirituality, redemption, piety, and passion. Using a real-life art heist as her starting point, Horn traces the life and times of several characters, including Russian-born artist Marc Chagall, the New Jersey-based Ziskind family, and the "already-weres" and "not-yets" who roam an eternal world that exists outside the boundaries of life on earth.

At the center of the story is Benjamin Ziskind, a former child prodigy who now spends his days writing questions for a television trivia show. After Ben's twin sister Sara forces him to attend a singles cocktail party at a Jewish museum, Ben spots Over Vitebsk, a Chagall sketch that once hung in the twins' childhood home. Convinced the painting was wrongfully taken from his family, Ben steals the work of art and enlists his twin to create a forgery to replace the stolen Chagall. What follows is a series of interwoven stories that trace the life and times of the famous painting, and the fate of those who come into contact with it.

From a Jewish orphanage in 1920s Soviet Russia to a junior high school in Newark, New Jersey, with a stop in the jungles of Da Nang, Vietnam, Horn takes readers on an amazing journey through the sacred and the profane elements of the human condition. It is this expertly rendered juxtaposition of the spiritual with the secular that makes The World to Come so profound, and so compelling to readers. As we learn near the end of the beautiful tale, "The real world to come is down below--the world, in the future, as you create it."

Her language was also beautiful in itself, reminiscent of Michael Ondaatje. Read The English Patient just for the way he describes a peach. Dara Horn is a worthy successor.

Sharing my inner geek

Remember the class I helped create, World of the Talmud? Well, to no one's shock and surprise, it's my favorite class this semester, hands down. Let me share with you some detail about why.

When Jews want to know about the time of the rabbis (think 70-400CE, approx.), they usually study the rabbinic literature, like Talmud and all the other non-Talmudic contemporary sources. BUT, I (and therefore the professor) protested, that's so insular! What else do we know?

So yesterday, the prof went over all our other sources of knowledge of Judaism in this time period:

1) Pagan literature, like Hellenistic philosophers. Written in Greek and Latin
2) Patristic lit, or stuff recorded by the early Church fathers, in Greek, Latin, and Syriac
3) Roman legal sources, when they mention the Jews in their law codes
4) Egyptian papyri
5) Stone and bronze inscriptions, mostly from synagogue plaques and funerary epitaphs
6) Archeological sources, usually old synagogues

We can learn so much from this stuff, often that contradicts what the Jewish literature tells us. For example: from rabbinic sources we learn about the Bar Kochba revolt in 135 CE. Jews fought a worthwhile and highly successful guerrilla war against the Romans until they lost in the end. Rabbi Akiva and a bunch of other famous rabbis were martyred, and Jews were kicked out of Jerusalem once and for all. It was the last time they had an independent state til 1948. The holiday Lag B'Omer commemorates it.

But yesterday we looked at two other sources: Dio Cassius, a Roman historian, and Eusebius, a Bishop in Caesaria. Basically they gave a wholly different account - they said that the Jews were ridiculously outnumbered, it was a losing battle the whole time, and that thousands upon thousands were slaughtered for no reason other than the Jews' stubbornness. In order to reconstruct history, we have to look at all the sources in context.

Another example: the Talmud never talks about women having any power in the larger communities, it portrays the synagogue and community life as very patriarchal. But in synagogue inscriptions from Greece and Asia Minor, a lot of them reference women's names with the translation for "leader" or "benefactor." So which was right? Were the titles honorific or real? There's support for both arguments. We looked at some data which supports that women in the Diaspora did have power - we read a Church historian's summary of the death of Hypatia, a prominent woman philosopher who was killed by Christians in the late 300s for teaching Greek pagan philosophy. The theory goes, Hypatia was a woman who obviously had power, otherwise her story wouldn't have been recorded by the church. All these Greek Jews lived in a pagan environment. We know that they acculturated, since some synagogues have mosiacs of Helios and other gods inlaid in their floors .. so why wouldn't their temples have female leaders like the Greeks did?

And last but certainly not least, a third example of how learning about non-Jewish sources can add to our understanding. The Talmud, for the most part, is pretty anti-conversion. It divides the world into categories of Jews and non-Jews. Yet, inscriptions from the 3rd century have very clear categories of people who donated money to the temple: Jews, converts, and something called "God-fearers." These were people who were Jewish sympathizers, but who hadn't officially converted. It makes me think: today we have Jews and Jewish converts (though it isn't polite to point them out as such). But we don't have a word for those intermarried couples where the spouse hasn't converted but comes to temple. Or for the non-Jewish parent who still enrolls their kid in religious school. The ancients did have a word, "God-fearers." But the rabbis didn't approve of it, so they didn't even include it in their own personal literature. We only find it - albeit in spades - in external sources. How much do we today self-censor, and why don't we have similar categories in outreach?

Just some food for thought, courtesy of World of Talmud.

Who needs coffee when one has a screaming child?

Xander's birthday is October 7th. So as of today, I can officially say that he turns two "next month." That makes a WHOLE LOTTA sense, because he exemplified the "terrible two" phrase today in spades.

He was up at 6:15am like usual. The deal is, one of us takes him into his room to play, read books, etc, for a little while, then the other one gets up at around 7am and we all hang out and get dressed for the day, then go down to breakfast. This morning started off like any other, except that Xander wanted to play with his Duplo (think bigger Lego). This was fine, we had no problem with it. Except that today, like any other day, we always make him clean up his toys before we leave his room to go downstairs. Usually it's a fun game and his room is cleaned in five minutes flat.

Uh-uh. Not this morning.

For almost twenty minutes, there was no cleaning. But there was: A screaming fit. A crying jag. A desperate plea for hugs. A time-out. More whining to play with something else. More crying and pathetic puppy eyes. We didn't give in, and finally, after nearly a half hour, he started to - very sulkily - pick up all his Duplo and put them back. Only then could we go down to breakfast.

God it was a long morning.