#36Reasons - Thanksgiving

Today is 36 days until my 36th birthday.
For the next thirty-six days, I will be seeking out a daily reason to say the Shehecheyanu blessing, a blessing said for new or unique experiences. 

Today is Thanksgiving.
Each year, we say this blessing to thank God for enabling us to be together, to celebrate, to be thankful on the day of giving thanks.

There are many people who would object to this custom. "Thanksgiving isn't a Jewish holiday!" I've been told.

It might not be a strictly Jewish holiday, of course, but what could be better...a holiday celebrating gratitude and giving. A holiday that asks us to count our blessings and feel contentment with what we have. And of course, there's a big family meal involved. As an American Jew, I'm so pleased to be able to be a part of this American AND Jewish custom.

And so each year we say shehecheyanu.

This year I have so much to be thankful for. I can't even begin to enumerate all the things that fill my life with such blessing. I can only say, simply, "thank You."

Blessed are You, our God, Ruler of the World, who has created us with hearts open to gratitude, formed us with the ability to be aware of our blessings, and brought us to a day in which we can celebrate those blessings.

This year, we embarked on what we hope will be a new family tradition. Read about it here.

36 Reasons to Say Shehecheyanu

It just so happens that 36 days from Thursday is my 36th birthday.

Thirty-six is a really important Jewish number. You've probably heard of the way that the number 18 is special for Jews, right? The Hebrew letters that are used to illustrate the number 18 spell "chai," which means "life." Thirty-six? Double-life. It doesn't get any better than that. (Until you're 72...)

I've been musing for a while about the proper bloggy way to celebrate my 36th birthday. I've run through many different ideas, and finally, with the help of my dear friend, Anne, came up with this.

36 Reasons to Say Shehecheyanu.

Shehecheyanu is the blessing that is said for a joyous occasion, for the first time you do something (ever, or just in a season - the first time you EVER ski is a shehecheyanu moment. If you're a regular skier, you might say shehecheyanu for returning to the slopes at the beginning of the season. I have no idea why I chose skiing as my example, since I don't!)

Can I do it? Can I find 36 different, legitimate reasons to say shehecheyanu over the next 36 days?

I'm going to try. I started making a list of "firsts" - some are easy, like trying new recipes. Some are harder, like trying new experiences, or teaching or learning something new.

Since I don't blog on Shabbat, I'm going to set up something different for those days. I'm going to write about personal memories for the Saturday posts (they will go up after Shabbat is over!), so as not to have to look for something new to do on Shabbat!

It starts Thursday....so please join me on my 36 day journey. Leave me your suggestions (totally clean and appropriate, of course) of experiences and "new" things that I can do in the next 36 days! I'd love to hear your ideas.

(P.S. I thought of doing a tzedakah push for my birthday. I have decided not to this year. There have been so many gifts made in honor of Sam and our family over the last six months...I am sure that I will come to you all with a big, beautiful project in the future. I am so blessed in so many ways, and there are so many opportunities that I will be blessed to share with you in the future.)

A Place of Her Own

I've mentioned before how wonderfully unique my daughter is.

She is incredibly busy. There's always a story running in her mind, in her world. She's always pretending, she's always doing something. Recently, she has started spending time in the closet in her room. Yep, the closet. She refers to it as her "office."

The other day, I needed to find something in the closet, and I realized that it was a bit of a mess. Since it wasn't actually intended as an office (obviously), she was squished in amongst bags of old clothes and a few other unused things. I realized that she was in need of a Room Makeover!

Since I didn't see any cameramen from TLC around anywhere, I knew I had to do it myself.

I deliberately didn't take a "before" picture. I couldn't bring myself to do it - it was too embarrassing to show how messy the closet was! But here's the "after" shots....

All the wall hangings were already hiding in the closet, but on a shelf. How perfect?!

With four kids in shared bedrooms in a small house, I know how important it is for each of my children to have their own place. Now that I've set up hers, I'm on the lookout for a few other nooks and crannies for the rest of them...

How do you make special spaces for each of your children?

Backwards Birthday

Last week, when we were eating breakfast donuts for Sam's birthday, I asked David what we were going to have for breakfast on his birthday, one week later.

He grinned at me with an impish glint in his eye and said, "I think we should have backwards day - pizza for breakfast!"

Challenge accepted.

Breakfast, er, Dinner was pizza, made fresh from our friend Adam's City Pizza that he delivered to our house on Wednesday. (You can't exactly order pizza at 7am and the thought of making crust and all that in time for school...oy.) The kids even got to drink soda! It was a special birthday day, after all. And then we had dessert, one Oreo each.

And then for dinner breakfast, we went to our favorite pancake house. I brought along the morning paper so that David could, as is his daily custom, read the comics. Over breakfast, of course.

Why yes, he is eating french toast AND hashbrowns. He ate it all, plus one of Solly's pancakes. Oy.

How do you make birthdays special in your house? This one was pretty simple but everyone will remember it!

My Son, the Tween

I am realizing that the dramatic changes that took place in my children from age 1 to age 2...age 4 to age 5...are growing less...definable.

I re-read my post about David's birthday from last year.
It pretty much all holds true still today.

Things are a little different. Each day, he has new questions, new ideas, new stories to tell. He's definitely gaining his own sense of self, of what kind of person he wants to be. There is a little bit lot more attitude than before. But that's to be expected, right?

I look at this tall, gangly creature...it's so hard to believe that 11 years ago, he made me a mom.

 Happy birthday, David!

Lucky Number Seven

Once upon a time he looked like this...

...but he's grown up so much.

Of course, this year's birthday is especially poignant.
Every birthday matters. Every year is worth celebrating.

But after the last five months, we are especially filled with gratitude on Sam's birthday this year.
We've already started discussing how we can honor his birthday in some incredible way in the future.
And I love planning ahead with him.

Birthdays matter.
Each and every day is a precious one.
Happy birthday, Sam!

 

What's in Your Bag?

The other day, Yael asked me to find something.

She has always been something of a magpie.
There are a number of small handbags, some sparkly and pink, others hand-me-down grown-up purses, that are strewn around the house, filled to the brim with Yael's stuff.

When Yael decides that she wants to find something specific, however, she usually can't remember where it is. What I have learned recently, though, is that she has a clear idea of what she has and what she wishes she could find. She just doesn't remember where she stashed it. I'm sure a full house cleanup is in order, not only to help her find things but to help me get rid of things! That is, however, another blog post.

I digress.

Yael asked me to help her find a pair of sunglasses. So I suggested that we look in her purse(s).

She brought me her current favorite.

I was so giggly at what was in the bag that I had to photograph her, a la US Weekly.

Note the other purse over her shoulder.

My favorite item is the single blue Duplo Lego. And then there's the stack of haphazardly folded papers with scribbling all over them. "My notes," she called them. If you, ahem, seek out the bottom of her mother's purse, you might very well find the same stack of folded papers... (Also note that she has not one but two pretend Blackberry phones and that we did not find the desired sunglasses.)

I am so often struck by this girl-child. She is so uniquely herself, creating a rich and full fantasy world in which she is the star, and in which she embroiders stories where she plays all the characters. I love to watch her at play, and I always wonder if her differences from her older brothers is purely a product of her gender. All of my children differ from each other, but as the only girl in the bunch, I will never know how much is nature and how much nurture. She is different, no question. Is it a combination of her genetic material that has created her personality or is there an actual difference between boys and girls?

I don't know. I will never know, certainly.

For now, though, I will continue to relish her imagination, her storytelling, her quirks and her creativity.

And I will keep looking for the sunglasses.