In the past few weeks I have been to the shiva house for two different people who both passed away way too young. I try not to talk about these things because I generally try to be upbeat and optimistic, but truthfully I've been thinking about it a lot.
And then there was the horrific terror attack with a truck just driving over a group of soldiers. Just awful.
People have asked me if I'm scared. I'm not scared. I'm angry and sad when I think about that. Just a senseless loss of life, and for what? Listen. Us Jews have been through a lot. You aren't going to get rid of us.
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And now Happy Things!!!
I must begin with my coffee. I generally make my own coffee at home because you might recall, we received a "free" fancy coffee maker for spending zillions of shekels on appliances. But some of my ulpan friends and I met for coffee to "study" and once again I'm obsessed with Israelis and their coffee obsession. Plus, one guy in my group bought us coffee, so really it's even better!
Okay. Back to my regular strange life. Chanukah has been over for a while, which means my kids packages from grandparents finally arrived. Because the word snail mail doesn't even begin to describe the Israeli postal system. It's more like amoeba mail.
Then we bought some new fancy furniture made of plastic. A closet for our outdoor laundry room. If you need to know the weather, just go outside and do some laundry. For reals. Today one kid did their laundry before school and then reported to the other which jacket they should wear to school today. And then we got the smallest kid to help carry it because he was the only one home.
In exchange for this, he moved into the box for three days. That's right. He put a blanket in it and spent every afternoon reading books inside of the box. I couldn't find him after school one day and I called out, where are you? And I hear, "I'm in my box." You might find this odd but this is perfectly normal in this house.
On January 1st, Israel passed a law that all large chain grocery stores no longer provide free bags. You need to either bring your own or pay. So we received a few from the store with a cute little Hebrew rhyme on it. I'm a sucker for a rhyme so of course I snapped a photo.
Then, I had my ulpan oral exam. I think I mentioned that I'm sitting for the exam that is a level above the class I am in. Don't even ask it's a long story. But anyway, lucky me went first for the exam. And good news. I passed the oral exam. Now we wait for the written exam. Eek!
Did our usual Friday breakfast out but took a different kid this time. I think he was mainly in it for the hot chocolate because he wouldn't tell us much info. Then we took him to visit a possible new school (his ulpan finishes shortly). We liked the new school and signed him up. Hopefully that will all go well.
Fast forward to one child attending yet another bat mitzvah, kids cooking for some scout event, and me obsessing over Israeli vegetables (they are kind of amazing!)
And finally, attended parent teacher conferences for three of my kids. That's seriously a lot of Hebrew. Every teacher starts slowly and then just speeds up their Hebrew. But I think I got the main points. I hope so. Amazing how much ulpan helps.
In conclusion :
#1 Still trying to be optimistic
#2 Boxes are still good toys and homes
#3 Thank goodness my kids can cook so I'm not stuck making cookies for their events at the last minute
#4 They can cook because I taught them Home Ec fairly intensively for the past two years
#5 Parent teacher conferences are basically the same everywhere
#6 Except I couldn't get Google docs to work in Hebrew so I had to sign up for conferences in English. Hello new olim, way to stand out
#7 Israeli food is the best, planning to write a blog on that
#8 Sometimes after dealing with your day and a house full of teenagers you need a little snack
#9 I call this snack "OMG thank goodness I can easily buy kosher liquor here because I just finished this bottle.
#10 L'Chaim לחיים
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