When we get Anna changed and ready for bed, she always comments that it's time to put on her "night-night" diaper as opposed to her daytime diapers.
That's all I have to say. All other coherent thoughts are somewhere trapped in my head.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Verb conjugation
Tonight at dinner we somehow started discussing verb conjugations. Rachel asked what a "verb combination" was and that started this discussion:
Me: "I eat, you eat, he eats."
Then I decided to try something a little different.
Me: "We are..."
Anna: "HAPPY!!!"
Me: "I eat, you eat, he eats."
Then I decided to try something a little different.
Me: "We are..."
Anna: "HAPPY!!!"
Saturday, June 12, 2010
I managed to keep a straight face...
...when the very young groom-to-be who came to my house recently asked me if I'd played at very many weddings. I suspect that he and his fiancée were barely out of university if that. Very nice people, but I sure wasn't expecting that question from him!!
I kindly explained that my group had been playing together for 15 years and had played at hundreds of events during that time. I usually get that kind of question from parents, not the bride and groom! And I haven't gotten asked that in awhile so either I look really young again (ha!) or he was just nervous and making random conversation. Either way, I was amused.
I kindly explained that my group had been playing together for 15 years and had played at hundreds of events during that time. I usually get that kind of question from parents, not the bride and groom! And I haven't gotten asked that in awhile so either I look really young again (ha!) or he was just nervous and making random conversation. Either way, I was amused.
And now for something completely different
Ben and I have been trying to define exactly what irritates us about the so-called egalitarian movement in both reform and conservative synagogues. Neither of us is a fan of females adopting the practices of wearing a kippah, tallit or tefillin. While arguments can be made that the daughters of the great rabbi known as Rashi put on tefillin, it has certainly not been looked on as something common for women to take on until the past couple of decades.
We've talked a lot about this recently as it starts to become more immediately applicable to our family. In religious school this past year, our daughter was the only girl in the Kindergarten class who did not wear a kippah. The rabbi at Beth Shalom basically tried to mandate that every student was obligated to wear one during school hours. We spoke to the school director and both she and the Kindergarten teachers were helpful in ensuring that Rachel was not forced to do something that neither she nor we wanted her to take on. I will admit that we ignored the issue with Anna in preschool although it also made us both uncomfortable knowing that everyone put on a kippah for "Shabbat" on Thursday mornings.
Why is it a big deal to us? Partly because it doesn't sit right with us. I was browsing on chabad.org the other day and an article about this very issue jumped out at me and articulated our thoughts on the matter more succinctly than I think either one of us could have done. Basically, if a woman (or girl) wants to take on these traditionally male customs, let her do it AFTER she has done everything she can as an observant female. Let her do it in her own home so that it is between her and G-d, not to show other people that she can. It's that last part that I think is most relevant.
How often do we do something hoping that someone else will see what we have done as opposed to doing it privately in a pay-it-forward kind of way? When we attend services and hear how women can do everything men can do, I want to jump up and scream that no, that's not true or necessary.
In Judaism, women are exempt from time-bound commandments. I may have posted about this before, but I think it bears repeating. This morning Anna needed an early nap, so I stayed home with her. Am I exempt from being required to pray? No, but I am not bound by time the way a Jewish man is. I think that makes perfect sense.
I also don't think that men and women need to be "equal". That doesn't mean that I think men are superior to women, but it does mean that I actually acknowledge that there are differences.
Ben and I have had many a conversation about where we'd like to end up, Jewishly speaking. Most of these conversations follow the same sequence of statements/questions:
1. We'd like to be more Torah-observant than we currently are.
2. It's sad that mundane things like career and what our friends and family would think can hold us back from this goal. (I thought about putting quotation marks around mundane, but since it refers to things pertaining to the world/earth I think it's best left as is.)
3. At the same time, the truth is that becoming orthodox would entail us needing to make drastic changes to our careers. It wouldn't really be acceptable to play at the weddings we play at, nor to play many of the concerts we play whether because of time, content, or both. It would also affect our ability to teach since our private teaching is obviously one-on-one and in orthodox Judaism that can be an issue one children are past bar/bat mitzvah age.
4. If Ben could get a full time university position, we would be able to make these changes. Otherwise, we're back to the same old discussions and debates regarding what's halachically desirable and what's practical for our current life.
5. If we were to switch, we'd ideally like to attend a Modern Orthodox shul. From what we've studied, the MO shuls seem to adhere to a traditional liturgy while making some concessions to "modern" life.
6. If the conservative shuls weren't so insistent on pushing gender-neutral terms in prayer books and egalitarian *no matter what*, we probably would be quite content there.
7. Or would we?
8. Probably not. We left reform Judaism for a number of reasons. Conservative Judaism holds many of the same problems although it has retained more of the traditional liturgy that we prefer.
9. I still maintain that putting a doily on your head in shul is not a head covering. I will concede that it is a sign of respect for the tradition of married women covering their hair, but I doubt that I'll ever be comfortable with it.
10. Dressing one way to attend services and another way for the rest of life occasionally seems just fine and sometimes seems like a double standard since clearly G-d is everywhere and the obligation to pray is not just on Shabbat and Yom Tov.
11. So we're back to fitting in with the world or doing what we think G-d is telling us to do. Apparently there's no doing both 100% of the time, or at least not in a way that we're ready to take on.
12. And now back to reality... here in London there are precisely 3.5 options. There is the Reform synagogue we left and wouldn't feel comfortable returning to. There is the Conservative synagogue that we will renew our membership at - Ben and Rachel went this morning and Ben seems optimistic that the "new" rabbi (it's his 3rd year there now) has been able to implement some much-needed changes. There is the orthodox synagogue that is very "black hat" - this comes as no real surprise since the rabbi and his wife are really Chabad and therefore it's got its own flavour. Ben has been to functions at the orthodox shul and he is just not comfortable there. There is also Chabad at Western but since that's for university students, I'll call that the "half option".
So here we are at the beginning of a new month and week, Jewishly speaking. Shavua tov!
We've talked a lot about this recently as it starts to become more immediately applicable to our family. In religious school this past year, our daughter was the only girl in the Kindergarten class who did not wear a kippah. The rabbi at Beth Shalom basically tried to mandate that every student was obligated to wear one during school hours. We spoke to the school director and both she and the Kindergarten teachers were helpful in ensuring that Rachel was not forced to do something that neither she nor we wanted her to take on. I will admit that we ignored the issue with Anna in preschool although it also made us both uncomfortable knowing that everyone put on a kippah for "Shabbat" on Thursday mornings.
Why is it a big deal to us? Partly because it doesn't sit right with us. I was browsing on chabad.org the other day and an article about this very issue jumped out at me and articulated our thoughts on the matter more succinctly than I think either one of us could have done. Basically, if a woman (or girl) wants to take on these traditionally male customs, let her do it AFTER she has done everything she can as an observant female. Let her do it in her own home so that it is between her and G-d, not to show other people that she can. It's that last part that I think is most relevant.
How often do we do something hoping that someone else will see what we have done as opposed to doing it privately in a pay-it-forward kind of way? When we attend services and hear how women can do everything men can do, I want to jump up and scream that no, that's not true or necessary.
In Judaism, women are exempt from time-bound commandments. I may have posted about this before, but I think it bears repeating. This morning Anna needed an early nap, so I stayed home with her. Am I exempt from being required to pray? No, but I am not bound by time the way a Jewish man is. I think that makes perfect sense.
I also don't think that men and women need to be "equal". That doesn't mean that I think men are superior to women, but it does mean that I actually acknowledge that there are differences.
Ben and I have had many a conversation about where we'd like to end up, Jewishly speaking. Most of these conversations follow the same sequence of statements/questions:
1. We'd like to be more Torah-observant than we currently are.
2. It's sad that mundane things like career and what our friends and family would think can hold us back from this goal. (I thought about putting quotation marks around mundane, but since it refers to things pertaining to the world/earth I think it's best left as is.)
3. At the same time, the truth is that becoming orthodox would entail us needing to make drastic changes to our careers. It wouldn't really be acceptable to play at the weddings we play at, nor to play many of the concerts we play whether because of time, content, or both. It would also affect our ability to teach since our private teaching is obviously one-on-one and in orthodox Judaism that can be an issue one children are past bar/bat mitzvah age.
4. If Ben could get a full time university position, we would be able to make these changes. Otherwise, we're back to the same old discussions and debates regarding what's halachically desirable and what's practical for our current life.
5. If we were to switch, we'd ideally like to attend a Modern Orthodox shul. From what we've studied, the MO shuls seem to adhere to a traditional liturgy while making some concessions to "modern" life.
6. If the conservative shuls weren't so insistent on pushing gender-neutral terms in prayer books and egalitarian *no matter what*, we probably would be quite content there.
7. Or would we?
8. Probably not. We left reform Judaism for a number of reasons. Conservative Judaism holds many of the same problems although it has retained more of the traditional liturgy that we prefer.
9. I still maintain that putting a doily on your head in shul is not a head covering. I will concede that it is a sign of respect for the tradition of married women covering their hair, but I doubt that I'll ever be comfortable with it.
10. Dressing one way to attend services and another way for the rest of life occasionally seems just fine and sometimes seems like a double standard since clearly G-d is everywhere and the obligation to pray is not just on Shabbat and Yom Tov.
11. So we're back to fitting in with the world or doing what we think G-d is telling us to do. Apparently there's no doing both 100% of the time, or at least not in a way that we're ready to take on.
12. And now back to reality... here in London there are precisely 3.5 options. There is the Reform synagogue we left and wouldn't feel comfortable returning to. There is the Conservative synagogue that we will renew our membership at - Ben and Rachel went this morning and Ben seems optimistic that the "new" rabbi (it's his 3rd year there now) has been able to implement some much-needed changes. There is the orthodox synagogue that is very "black hat" - this comes as no real surprise since the rabbi and his wife are really Chabad and therefore it's got its own flavour. Ben has been to functions at the orthodox shul and he is just not comfortable there. There is also Chabad at Western but since that's for university students, I'll call that the "half option".
So here we are at the beginning of a new month and week, Jewishly speaking. Shavua tov!
How to move
1. Buy a house sight unseen
2. Trust wonderful friend's judgment after she saw said house briefly
3. Hire moving company based on firm estimate
4. Husband accepts job 2 hours away from said house less than 2 weeks before closing
5. Pack all things and label anally so as not to have any issues with customs
6. Get unreasonably excited about Mayflower providing a Canadian truck driver who clearly understands the ins and outs of international moves
7. Follow all protocol at both US and Canadian borders - turn in I-94 cards, have passports stamped, get inventory list stamped, etc.
8. Find out that truck driver got stopped at customs in Windsor
9. Remind self that there is a reason to cross at Port Huron/Sarnia instead of Detroit/Windsor
10. Find out that poor truck driver was made to sit in a chair at the customs office for 16+ hours while a customs crew unloaded every single item from all 3 shipments off of his truck
11. Find out that the shipment bound for Mississauga was going to a storage warehouse, belonged to a family named Mohammed AND contained a bucket of white powder laundry detergent
12. Don't even bother to feign surprise at the customs search upon discovering this (seriously, who is stupid enough to pack white powder to cross the border?!!? Laura, this is why you have all of my white substances!!!)
13. Point out to blog readers that while you clearly harbour no ill will toward the Mohammed family, unfortunately racial profiling is alive and well since no-one really believes that this was a random check
14. Movers arrive on schedule on Tuesday to unload our things. Too bad for them that customs did a crappy job reloading and things got mixed up between shipments. It's interesting to note that our boxes were less messed with than the Mohammeds'.
15. Sign off on forms acknowledging that one box seems to be missing. Discover later that you are also missing 2 shelves from your armoire.
16. Receive call from truck driver 3 days later saying that he has your missing shelves. No mention of the potentially missing box.
17. Explain to blog readers that no-one is 100% sure that there is a missing box. Its inventory tag number was not found on anything else that came in to the house, but until everything is unpacked it won't be known for sure whether it was one of the untagged cartons or not.
18. Sit down to blog about moving adventures, because that's obviously more fun than unpacking all of the remaining boxes in the house!
2. Trust wonderful friend's judgment after she saw said house briefly
3. Hire moving company based on firm estimate
4. Husband accepts job 2 hours away from said house less than 2 weeks before closing
5. Pack all things and label anally so as not to have any issues with customs
6. Get unreasonably excited about Mayflower providing a Canadian truck driver who clearly understands the ins and outs of international moves
7. Follow all protocol at both US and Canadian borders - turn in I-94 cards, have passports stamped, get inventory list stamped, etc.
8. Find out that truck driver got stopped at customs in Windsor
9. Remind self that there is a reason to cross at Port Huron/Sarnia instead of Detroit/Windsor
10. Find out that poor truck driver was made to sit in a chair at the customs office for 16+ hours while a customs crew unloaded every single item from all 3 shipments off of his truck
11. Find out that the shipment bound for Mississauga was going to a storage warehouse, belonged to a family named Mohammed AND contained a bucket of white powder laundry detergent
12. Don't even bother to feign surprise at the customs search upon discovering this (seriously, who is stupid enough to pack white powder to cross the border?!!? Laura, this is why you have all of my white substances!!!)
13. Point out to blog readers that while you clearly harbour no ill will toward the Mohammed family, unfortunately racial profiling is alive and well since no-one really believes that this was a random check
14. Movers arrive on schedule on Tuesday to unload our things. Too bad for them that customs did a crappy job reloading and things got mixed up between shipments. It's interesting to note that our boxes were less messed with than the Mohammeds'.
15. Sign off on forms acknowledging that one box seems to be missing. Discover later that you are also missing 2 shelves from your armoire.
16. Receive call from truck driver 3 days later saying that he has your missing shelves. No mention of the potentially missing box.
17. Explain to blog readers that no-one is 100% sure that there is a missing box. Its inventory tag number was not found on anything else that came in to the house, but until everything is unpacked it won't be known for sure whether it was one of the untagged cartons or not.
18. Sit down to blog about moving adventures, because that's obviously more fun than unpacking all of the remaining boxes in the house!
In the house
Not only are we in our new house, but the majority of our things are here and we've got phone, cable & internet hooked up. Our cell phone number was ported easily to become our home phone number, and we just got new cell phones from Telus yesterday. (You didn't seriously think we'd give any more money than necessary to Rogers, did you?!?!?!) We're clearly bonafide Londoners once again since we have also already received our property tax notice from the city. Those suckers certainly don't waste any time.
The people who moved out clearly have quite the disposable income since they left us their daughter's playhouse and sandbox in addition to the swingset in the backyard. Inside the house we were gifted with a ping pong table and a giant work desk in the basement, both of which we can thankfully use. The wall sconce with candles in the living room has been removed and we're looking to re-gift a bottle of wine. Clearly we have no class. ;)
Rachel's room is extremely pink. We were going to hire someone to paint, but someone dropped the ball on calling painters and decided to do it himself even though he had never painted before. After taking my advice about extra primer and brushing techniques, the room turned out pretty well. You can still see hints of previous wall colours in a few spots but overall it is very pink and Rachel is deliriously happy about this.
Anna is in love with her blue room. "Thank you thank you thank you for my blue room!!" she yelled happily upon finding out that it was hers. The previous owners did some shoddy touch-ups in there but perhaps we can just hang pictures over those spots.
The house is in very good shape for a 9-year-old building. While there are some spots on the carpets, the magical Spot Shot from Wal-Mart seems to be adept at removing them. I had to scrub the cabinets quite a bit more than I expected to given that the previous owners apparently had a cleaner come in just before we moved in but I likely would have done it anyway so I'm not complaining.
There seems to be exactly enough kitchen cupboard space for our gazillion sets of dishes. No more questionable separation in this quasi-kosher kitchen! I'd say it would be pretty difficult to mix things up now that there is a home for everything.
Our new fridge and stove arrived on Tuesday but the stove only had 3 feet and so it sat in the middle of my kitchen on a piece of cardboard until yesterday morning when a lovely gentleman from Kiwi Appliances (dispatched by Future Shop) came to fix it and shove it into place. We had to move one of the kitchen cabinets up a few inches to make room for the fridge so now there is an unsightly area of white cabinet side showing above the (not-my-style) oak panel. Neither one of us really cares enough to do anything about it since it's clearly not a big deal!
We opted for a bottom freezer model with French doors on the fridge part. Great plan, except that because our fridge is between a panel and a wall, the door on the wall side doesn't fully open. Oops. I figure it just makes me work harder to get food out of it! I quite like the set-up since the fruit & vegetable drawers are now at a convenient height instead of being at the very bottom.
Way earlier in this post I alluded to some difficulty with the move since only the majority of our things are here. That's another post in itself. And if you're reading in order of last published, you already know the story!
The people who moved out clearly have quite the disposable income since they left us their daughter's playhouse and sandbox in addition to the swingset in the backyard. Inside the house we were gifted with a ping pong table and a giant work desk in the basement, both of which we can thankfully use. The wall sconce with candles in the living room has been removed and we're looking to re-gift a bottle of wine. Clearly we have no class. ;)
Rachel's room is extremely pink. We were going to hire someone to paint, but someone dropped the ball on calling painters and decided to do it himself even though he had never painted before. After taking my advice about extra primer and brushing techniques, the room turned out pretty well. You can still see hints of previous wall colours in a few spots but overall it is very pink and Rachel is deliriously happy about this.
Anna is in love with her blue room. "Thank you thank you thank you for my blue room!!" she yelled happily upon finding out that it was hers. The previous owners did some shoddy touch-ups in there but perhaps we can just hang pictures over those spots.
The house is in very good shape for a 9-year-old building. While there are some spots on the carpets, the magical Spot Shot from Wal-Mart seems to be adept at removing them. I had to scrub the cabinets quite a bit more than I expected to given that the previous owners apparently had a cleaner come in just before we moved in but I likely would have done it anyway so I'm not complaining.
There seems to be exactly enough kitchen cupboard space for our gazillion sets of dishes. No more questionable separation in this quasi-kosher kitchen! I'd say it would be pretty difficult to mix things up now that there is a home for everything.
Our new fridge and stove arrived on Tuesday but the stove only had 3 feet and so it sat in the middle of my kitchen on a piece of cardboard until yesterday morning when a lovely gentleman from Kiwi Appliances (dispatched by Future Shop) came to fix it and shove it into place. We had to move one of the kitchen cabinets up a few inches to make room for the fridge so now there is an unsightly area of white cabinet side showing above the (not-my-style) oak panel. Neither one of us really cares enough to do anything about it since it's clearly not a big deal!
We opted for a bottom freezer model with French doors on the fridge part. Great plan, except that because our fridge is between a panel and a wall, the door on the wall side doesn't fully open. Oops. I figure it just makes me work harder to get food out of it! I quite like the set-up since the fruit & vegetable drawers are now at a convenient height instead of being at the very bottom.
Way earlier in this post I alluded to some difficulty with the move since only the majority of our things are here. That's another post in itself. And if you're reading in order of last published, you already know the story!
No title
Anna habitually pronounces the word sunscreen as "sunscream" and it never fails to crack us up.
Wednesday, June 09, 2010
Voyeuristic?
Sometimes Ben and I chuckle over how voyeuristic the concept of a blog really is. Let's face it - it allows people to have a window into our lives without actually needing to pick up the phone or email us. Good deal, eh?
Well, yes and no. I enjoy blogging. I get a kick out of writing down funny things the kids do, and I have to assume that our friends and family enjoy it as well. (Otherwise I suppose that my audience is fairly limited!)
The thing with blogging is that it's not a daily diary of events. We get to pick and choose which events to write about and which ones don't really need a mention. I highly doubt that anyone needs to hear about how we almost said Shehecheyanu upon spotting our first groundhog in a neighbouring backyard yesterday, or about how the truck driver's truck had a broken wheel that caused him to have to delay delivery of his Mississauga load.
I don't always take the time to blog. That's life. Just like we don't talk to every person we know on the phone every day or send an email to everyone in our address books on a regular basis, I don't always document every happening here.
I know people who are on Twitter and I will readily admit that I don't (yet?) see the attraction of that site. I enjoy Facebook, but primarily as a means of keeping up with my friends. Instant messaging? Bring it on! Texting? Not likely, especially after I once texted a friend of mine with the one-liner "canyouhelpme" because I couldn't figure out the spaces or the punctuation on our archaic non-QWERTY cell phone!
Anyway, don't be surprised if sometimes I blog a lot and sometimes I don't. I might be elsewhere on the internet or *gasp* reading a book or playing with the kids. I might even be cleaning the house although I wouldn't hold your breath on that one!
Well, yes and no. I enjoy blogging. I get a kick out of writing down funny things the kids do, and I have to assume that our friends and family enjoy it as well. (Otherwise I suppose that my audience is fairly limited!)
The thing with blogging is that it's not a daily diary of events. We get to pick and choose which events to write about and which ones don't really need a mention. I highly doubt that anyone needs to hear about how we almost said Shehecheyanu upon spotting our first groundhog in a neighbouring backyard yesterday, or about how the truck driver's truck had a broken wheel that caused him to have to delay delivery of his Mississauga load.
I don't always take the time to blog. That's life. Just like we don't talk to every person we know on the phone every day or send an email to everyone in our address books on a regular basis, I don't always document every happening here.
I know people who are on Twitter and I will readily admit that I don't (yet?) see the attraction of that site. I enjoy Facebook, but primarily as a means of keeping up with my friends. Instant messaging? Bring it on! Texting? Not likely, especially after I once texted a friend of mine with the one-liner "canyouhelpme" because I couldn't figure out the spaces or the punctuation on our archaic non-QWERTY cell phone!
Anyway, don't be surprised if sometimes I blog a lot and sometimes I don't. I might be elsewhere on the internet or *gasp* reading a book or playing with the kids. I might even be cleaning the house although I wouldn't hold your breath on that one!
Sunday, June 06, 2010
Bossy but clever
"Mom, you'd better eat all of your fries before I eat them!" Anna told me at a restaurant last week.
She had a point.
She had a point.
Slightly confused Anna
We're staying at my mother's house until tomorrow when we close on our house in London. The problem? My mother and John aren't there because they're in England right now! Anna isn't quite sure what to make of this. She knows that we're at Grandma's house, but keeps expecting them to show up.
Then again, Anna also asked Ben if Kansas was outside. He explained to her that no, we were not in Kansas anymore.
Then again, Anna also asked Ben if Kansas was outside. He explained to her that no, we were not in Kansas anymore.
Life. It's cyclical.
Rogers is scheduled to port our cell phone number to be our home phone number in addition to hooking up cable and internet on June 8th. So? June 8th, 2007 just happens to be the date that we finally got our service from Rogers after 33 days of waiting for it. We're already off to a rocky start since the first Rogers guy I talked to in the mall a few weeks ago never got back to me.
Ben and I went in again last Thursday and theoretically have it all set up for Tuesday evening. I look forward to seeing how they can bungle it up this time.
Ben and I went in again last Thursday and theoretically have it all set up for Tuesday evening. I look forward to seeing how they can bungle it up this time.
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