Day 260 (busybusybusy)

Remember when I got the best parking spot at Rami Levy and was the first customer in the store at 7:45 am? That's because technically, Rami Levy only opens at 7:30 on Erev Shabbos/Erev Yontiff. Otherwise, it opens at 8. Whoops. So today I arrived at 7:58, and I got the second-best parking spot in the lot. Not quite as awesome as showing up before they open, but following rules is something I occasionally endorse.

One of the funnier side effects of living in a reasonably Charedi neighborhood is that about 90% of my Hebrew is spoken with women. That means that when I have an unexpected conversation with a man, (as when I passed the man whose family we invited for this Friday night and I stopped to ask him if they were coming), I won't necessarily address him using the masculine conjugations. Whoops. Guess I need to talk to more guys :P

I did a good job cooking today (apple pie, stuffed zucchini, noodle fish salad, soup), even with BSM's not napping. I do not like this pattern!!!

What I do like is that for the second time in a row, BSM was happy in the bath. I have no idea what changed between last week and this week, but tonight, rather than saying "all done" before he even hit the water, BSM didn't want to leave the tub. This is an improvement! I'd much rather fight about BSM getting out of the tub than him getting (and staying) in it.

Day 259 (sunlight and olives)

I came downstairs this morning, and sunlight was streaming into the living room! I'm so glad we no longer have the high-riser mattresses blocking one of the sliding doors.

Our dryer was delivered today, which is cool, but it didn't come with a duct, so we'll have to get one before we can use it. Sooooo muuuuuch waaaaiiiitiiiiing.

Around the dryer getting delivered, we built the high-riser. We are now significantly closer to being prepared to have four sleepover guests this Shabbos. Good, good.

Not having mentioned the clocks changing, yet, I'll bring it up now. With the sun setting an hour earlier, it feels like forever from when BSM wakes up from his nap until his bedtime. Just sayin'.

Tonight, I finally pickled the olives that I've had soaking for a little over a week. I followed the directions for about 85% of the olives, but then it struck me that I don't generally like pickled stuff that's vinegar-y. So I did about 5 minutes of internet research, and realized that I'd better start over now. So I dumped out the brine from my zillions of jars and containers, and replaced it with plain saltwater and some olive oil on top. Now over half of the top shelf of my fridge is housing olives. They'll be ready to eat within 4 days to 2 months, depending on which internet source is to be believed. Huh boy. Though the humans I spoke with said a week to cure and week to pickle, so maybe I'll just believe them.

Day 258 (that sort of a day)

I saw the ice cream lady again today, but she said we only get ice cream if we see each other three times in one day. "Eating ice cream in the morning?" she exclaimed, "That would be crazy talk!" Too bad.

We cleared out a chunk of Husbinator's office today. That's really the last room that's still an absolute wreck, so this is good progress.

BSM did nap, but when he woke up, he needed all sorts of attention. Rather than hang out with him at home, hoping to get more stuff done, I threw in the towel and took him to the park. He had a nice enough time, but after about half an hour, he was done. I wasn't: this boy was no more capable of independent play than he had been when he started, and I generally dislike being inside with him when he's like that.

So we went for a walk. I enjoyed the view, and BSM enjoyed the various dogs, cats, electricity meters, and people he saw on the way. He also enjoyed shoving me away when I tried to hold his hand on the railing-less steps. I can no longer deny that toddlerhood is fast supplanting babyhood. After all, BSM is nearly 16 months, and that's closer to a year-and-a-half than a year...

Right before I put BSM to bed, I hung up the laundry that I threw in the washer this morning. It was that sort of a day. After I put him to bed, I did about a zillion dishes and made challah dough.

At that point, I felt no guilt about taking two solid hours to read The Slow Regard of Silent Things, Patrick Rothfuss's latest published work. I loved it. It doesn't follow the typical arc of a book, but I'm certain I've read more than one short story in that style. And at 170 pages and a very fresh point of view, it worked. Oh, wow, does it work. The Slow Regard of Silent Things has the added benefit of making me a better person: getting caught up in the Auri's worldview makes helping out the natural thing to do: even at the expense of reading the book.

(Husbinator asked me to help him move the high-riser pieces into his office, and the cabinet pieces behind the couch. I didn't think twice, but Auri-like, floated up to do what ought to be done. Weird.)

Day 257 (of this and that)

Stupid changing clock business. I woke up at 6am. BSM, bless his little soul, didn't make noise till 6:10. When will this end? I know, it's only been 2 days, but lo, I despair.

On the bright side, since we were both awake so early, I dropped him off at daycare at 7:30 and was shopping at Rami Levy by 7:45. That's the way to do it, yo. Show up 15 minutes after opening, get a great parking spot, be the first customer in the store, don't  have to push other people's carts out of your way (or have your cart shoved along), no-wait checkout... Ahhhhh. The one tricky part was since I parked in the best row, I had to actually think about the traffic pattern for getting to the exit: I've never parked so close to the store before.

Remember my obsession with chocolate leben? The kibbutz would have it every so often, and I would exult. I still haven't found it in the store, yet, but I found vanilla leben this morning. I was pretty excited, but it just tastes like vanilla yogurt that's been frozen and defrosted once. Nothing like the thick, rich, sour goodness of the kibbutz's chocolate leben.

To make up for the disappointment, I made pancakes, which I've been craving for a few months, now. However, those, too, failed to be as wondrous as I had hoped. I used the wrong sort of pan, the wrong level of heat, the wrong spatula, not enough oil... The last 4 pancakes came out great, but the first dozen were bummer-ish.

I did fill out the insurance claim for our lift, though! Any claim must be filed within 30 days, and today's only #29. We haven't opened everything yet, but the time has come. (The things that broke aren't a big deal, but as long as we paid to insure them, we might as well collect.)

This afternoon, BSM did grace us with a nap. Thank you, sweetie. While that happened, I made a sixtupled batch of Yerushalmi kugel. That's not something I plan to do again: it takes two colanders and two or three extra bowls, so it doesn't save on dishes. And a bunch of kugel flaked away while I was cutting it, so instead of two batches of kugel for kiddush, I have one big batch of kiddish kugel, a box of shredded bits that will be lovely in soup, and a container of tiny pieces of kugel for our next Yerushalmi Kugel Cocktail Party.

Day 256 (the clocks have changed)

Wonderful, so the clocks changed. Did BSM's sleep schedule magically shift by an hour? No, of course not. Why would we change the clocks? What mother voted for that one? Whatever.

Walking to drop BSM off at daycare, I passed many people, and wished them all a good morning. On my way back home, after dropping BSM off at daycare, I passed one of the women again. I gave her a big smile (she had been exceptionally friendly the first time I saw her today), and as I was about to wish her a good morning again, she said, "The third time, we get ice cream. Get ready!" I think that's great. Is it an Israeli idiom? That woman's original ad lib? I don't know.

Husbinator (with a tiny bit of help from me) took apart the huge cabinet that the Landpeople left in our saferoom/home office. The cabinet is your standard Israeli cabinet: impressive looking, but super-junky particle board. With that disassembled, we'll be able to take the pieces of the high-riser (a.k.a. daybed) from  behind the couch in the living room, and assemble it in Husbinator's office, giving ourselves a secondary guest room.

BSM refused to nap again today, which is very not cool. What is cool is that he danced in circles and laughed and laughed. That was before he got helplessly exhausted and his cruel mother wouldn't let him go to bed until 6:30, which felt like 7:30 to the poor kid. Durned clocks changing.

Day 255 (Shabbos)

We had another Israeli family over for Friday night dinner this week: Aharon and Adi came with their children, Esther and Avishai. Esther is about three months older than BSM and gets into the same hijinks as he does. She goes straight for the regular books (rather than the board books), she insists that all animals bark (except for the dog, of course, which said meow), she kept insisting she wanted water from a lidless cup, etc. etc. It was a real pleasure seeing that we're not alone.

I also like the parents, so it's a real shame that they have one foot out the door. We talked about the Yishuv, and the fact that so many people from the community have left, and that  more are leaving (including them: boo), and that with neither rabbi nor school the outlook for the community isn't good. Aharon pointed out what we all know: the community desperately needs someone to step up and take charge. He added, however, that the community members with the most "get up and go" have already gotten up and gone, leaving behind those who are content to sit back and see where things take them. Uh-oh.

We ate lunch at the Gordons' house, and it was moste enjoyablee. I think this is the first time since we've made aliyah that we've been guests of people our own age. It's nice. We brought dessert, and due to reading too many status updates on Facebook, I brought a Ma(r)ble cake. With blue icing and rainbow sprinkles. Ha ha, right? The best part is that Nechama Gordon made some cookies, herself--and she used the same rainbow sprinkles I did, also due to over-reading of Facebook. Good times.

Darn it, this community better not fall apart. I like it here!

Day 254 (clean at last!)

No, we're not done unpacking. But we've gotten enough stuff put away that I finally managed to properly sweep downstairs--and wash the floors. Clean at last, clean at last. Thank G-d Almighty, they're clean at last. Just thinking about it makes my breath come deep and slow.

And because it's Erev Shabbos, I also undertook a necessary but non-urgent project. In this case, I used steel wool to remove the rust from our cast iron dutch oven (which rusted between packing and unpacking) and reseasoned it and our cast iron wok, which was also looking dangerously grayish.) Now they are both beautifully shiny and black. Good times!

Also due to it being Erev Shabbos, I forced BSM to break his napless streak. He cried and cried and rather than waiting it out until it was too late, I went up and held him until he fell asleep. Ha! I win!

Day 253 (Erev Erev Shabbos)

Well, today I learned that when making Yerushalmi kugel it is  crucial to stir the caramel very quickly as soon as it hits the noodles. Otherwise it clumps. And then the kugel is not yummy. Clearly I learned this the hard way. So I picked out the hardened sugar clumps, and turned the noodles into a salt and pepper kugel. It was a bit sweeter than I'd like, but it came out just fine.

I walked to the makolet while that kugel was cooking (Husbinator was in Romema, getting super-kosher meat from a grocery store called Sha'are Revachim) and bought more kugel noodles. My friends, the makolet is soooo much more expensive than Rami Levy. But yeah, I was willing to shell out the extra money in order to be able to restart the kugel immediately, so there it is.

While playing with the No-Nap Wonder in the front yard this afternoon, I noticed that we have grass poking up from under the straw! (Like very many [most?] Israeli yards, ours does not have cultivated grass, which requires tons of water. Rather than laying down astro-turf, our landpeople have straw on top of the dirt. When we buy a house one day, I'd like to look into moss. I've read about using moss as a water-saving alternative to grass somewhere...)

I'd forgotten that aspect of living in Midbar Yehuda. That's often translated as the Judean Desert, but the Judean Wilderness would be more accurate. I know that the stony hills turn green after the rain, but I never quite expected to see that happen in my own yard. So cool!

I finally started a jar of vanilla extract: the imitation stuff here is pathetic. I also cleared two box towers, did lots of dishes, and some laundry. That and the cooking made today quite the successful Erev Erev Shabbos.

It's really convenient that BSM can talk a little: he woke up crying, and when I went in, he said, "Mayim-mayim-mayim-mayim-mayim," so I gave him his sippy cup and he drank for a full minute and went peacefully back into his crib. Problem solved. (Without his usefully telling me what he wanted, it would have taken me quite some time to deduce that since he ate something called salt and pepper kugel for dinner, he was probably thirstier than usual.)

Day 252 (excursions)

Husbinator and I went to Mea Shearim today. Husbinator, G-d bless him, has put his foot down and declared we need a dryer. Now. No more scratchy, board-like towels. No more T-shirts with internal good posture. No more having fully- or nearly-dry laundry get wet in the rain. (Rain!) So we went and we saw and we bought. The guy who sold us the dryer looked pretty familiar: turns out he's the guy who sold us our beds, and we saw him two days ago when he brought over the correct-sized frame.

So we chatted a bit (but not much, because we had to dash to pick up the BabeO), and he said if we owned our house, we should do something about the attic entrance. Tell me about it! It was very heartening, though: his next sentence was, "You know, in the States, they have folding steps that you can pull down..." Yes! That's what I want if we end up buying a house with an attic entrance like this one, but I didn't know if they had them in Israel! I asked the guy about that, and he said, "Eh, you can get anything made."

This Shabbos, we are having guests who only eat meat with one of four hechsherim, so I went to Rami Levy tonight and looked at Every Single Package of Meat or Chicken. Every One. (Yes, we had just been in Mea Shearim/Geulah, but we ran out of time and didn't have time to double back and buy meat/chicken.) It's a good thing I went tonight, because Rami Levy does not have a single one of those hechsherim. (For the record, they are Eida Charedis, Rubin, Landau, and Hacker. That last, according to the woman whom I took to Rami Levy with me, is not actually a hechsher, but a butcher.)

In the terrible news department, I heard about the baby girl tonight. As much as I like to keep things upbeat, this is... I don't know what it is. But it is very upsetting, and I feel that to make no mention of it would be wrong. I have nothing to say about it really, other than I can't ignore it.

Day 251 (olives!)

The olive drama continues. I sorted through the olives, and put up a gallon of black olives in brine, a larger amount of purpling green olives in water (had to smash each olive first, so that's a patchke), and attempted to make olive oil (also lots of smashing of olives, and depitting to boot. This is getting ridiculous.)

Between the oliving, I picked up and swept the baby's room for the first time in who-knows-how-long. This is a huge advantage to having moved the boxes out of his room and into the attic yesterday. I also almost managed to catch up on laundry from Yontiff, but not quite.

When BSM woke up from his nap, I took him over to the doctor's office to get a polio vaccine that seems to have slipped through the cracks when we moved (this is an advantage of having a fluent English-speaker read over his American vaccination record). The nurse also offered a flu shot for BSM, which is great, because I saw the sign for flu shots a month ago and forgot about it since then. She also offered me a flu shot. Right! Good call!

Day 250 (attic)

Yesterday, I climbed pretty high on our ladder to pick the olives at the top of our oldest tree. "Well," thought I, "So I can climb this ladder when it's propped against a wall, after all. Perhaps I can climb to the attic if I just visualize being surrounded by an olive tree." I've got news for ya, peeps: my imagination cannot turn the landing at near the top of the steps into an olive tree.

I considered asking Husbinator to hold the ladder for me (even though I know rationally that's it's fully stable just propped against the step and the wall), but as I was about to open my mouth, he asked if I would hold the ladder while he climbed up. Now there's an offer that I won't refuse! So he tied the carabiner to the ceiling beam, and we hauled up the Pesach stuff and the vast majority of the infant stuff.

While we were in the middle of our attic adventure, the guy from the bed store finally came (he called first) to bring us the correct size bed frame for the second bed we bought from him almost two months ago. That's one less thing I have to worry about dealing with, so that's great. While the guy was here, he asked if we needed help getting stuff to the attic! (By the by, this guy is the owner of the bed store, not a professional schlepper per se.) How nice is that? We declined, but it warmed the cockles of my little heart.

We were hoping to get the rest of the infant stuff and miscellany up to the attic in the afternoon, but BSM actually napped at daycare this morning, so no nap in the afternoon. Thus, instead of hauling more stuff up to the attic, I took BSM on a walk and gave some olives to Mrs. Barzilai, whom we met on the way. I still have waaaaaaaaay too many olives....

The rest of my day consisted almost entirely of washing dishes, in the vain hope that I'd manage to clear the space I need to wash the huge pot I cooked last week's Yerushalmi kugel in. Well, I cleared the space, but the pot will be washed tomorrow.

I did manage to make another (small) Yerushalmi kugel, though. I'll freeze it and we'll eat it this Shabbos, thus determining if this is a kugel that freezes well. If so, I'll be able to get a jump on the weekly kugel for shul. Cause, yeah, I'm the kugel lady, now. Makes me happy. But being able to freeze the 4-lb kugel in advance will make this new role more flexible.

Day 249 (rain!!!)

This morning, I finally finished picking all of the olives. The grand total is 20kg. That is a loooot of olives. Next step: finding people to take olives.

Husbinator and I went to Pisgat Ze'ev today to buy a pulley so we can start hauling things up to the attic. Unfortunately, most hardware stores only carry laundry-line pulleys, and those are attached to a bolt and can't bear a whole lot of weight. I found one heavy-duty pulley, but it cost 60 NIS and it had a hook rather than a ring at the top. Since we planned on throwing a rope over a ceiling beam to hold the pulley, a hook ain't gonna cut it, and I wasn't about to pay 60 ILS for something that wasn't perfect.

Husbinatoar and I discussed our options (buy a heavy-duty wheel and carve out a line in the middle? see if we can find a pulley meant for shutters? use a laundry pulley? use the pulley with the hook?) and Husbinator had the brilliant idea to forget about the wheel of the pulley and just buy a heavy-duty carabiner. Those things are cheap and easy to find. Yeah, it'll be a little harder to haul stuff up, but it will work without a hitch. (Haha! Hitch!)

While we were walking up and down the main row of stores, it started to rain a glorious, steady rain. The first good rain of the season. I was soooo happy, and what was great was that all of the Israelis shared my joy. Well, most of the Israelis. The ones who were taking public transit and didn't have any rain gear had trouble mustering the appropriate level of celebratory gratitude.

Also, I heard this evening that the mail strike is over. I knew there was a mail strike: that's why I don't entirely understand why I've been getting mail for the past who-knows-how-long. Whatever. Glad it's over, whatever it was.

Day 248 (Shabbos)

The Gordon's, who moved to the Yishuv a few weeks after we did, invited us to play games with them after Shabbos dinner! We were into the friendliness, but less into waking up BSM, so they very sweetly came to our house to play games. It's nice to hang out with new friends.

We had the Golds over for lunch, and we all enjoyed that, too. Yay, social circles!

Also in the yay category was BSM listening to me read from Bereishis (because he wanted me to read him a book and I wanted to read the parsha, so that was the obvious solution). When I read the pasuk about Hashem creating the sky to divide between the waters, BSM picked out the word "mayim" [water], and started saying, "Mayim? Mayim?" So we took a break to get him his sippy cup. I love that my baby understands chumash! Or bits of it, anyway, but how cool?

After Shabbos, I continued with the olive picking, figuring since it's so tactile, the neighbors' floodlights should be sufficient. I got a bunch of olives, but the next day I saw how many I missed. Still, it was definitely a good use of time. Also while olive-picking, I answered a question I had on the parsha. Why does it say that Adam and Chava hid "in the tree of the garden" rather than "among the trees of the garden"? Well, while I was tangled up in the olive tree branches, Husbinator came to look for me. He knew I had went to pick olives, but he didn't see me, so he asked where I was. Without pausing to think, I answered with my precise location: "In the tree." Oh.

Day 247 (Erev Shabbos, again)

I brought BSM back to daycare this morning, as the vacation schedule that Dikla gave out does not mention today as a day off (surprising as I find that). We got to her house and BSM--after well over a week away--blew me a kiss goodbye before I even took him out of his stroller. Unfortunately, there was no answer when I knocked at the door, so I called Dikla, and she said that there is no daycare today. Sigh. I was not about to argue with someone whom I just woke up, especially when I need that someone to love my son.

As I was leaving, another mother pulled up, and my news did not make her happy. I kind of hoped she'd call Dikla and get this straightened out (the other mother had work today), but she didn't get much further than I did. To her credit, the other mother did tell Dikla that the schedule says there is daycare today, but she didn't put up much of a fight when Dikla said, "No, it doesn't." That's when I processed the fact that even though this other mother's Hebrew is better than mine, she still has a French accent. I can't exactly expect a Frenchwoman to get Israeli-style aggressive, after all.

So we went home, and I picked olives even though BSM was home. BSM also picked an olive, but he wasn't really interested. I, however, was fascinated. Picking olives is a surprisingly tactile experience. Sure, it's the eyes that initially locate the olives and send in the hands, but it's all in the fingers from there. Are the olives ripe? Are there more? Have they been detached from their branch? The fingers walk down the branch, combing through the leaves, rolling the olives and working almost of their own accord.

Also, since the two trees I was working on are so young, I could harvest fruit from the entire tree without a ladder. The branches are supple enough that my arms just reached up and up, and my back arched back and back, and the whole tree bent to me. I like dancing with olive trees. Though when I grabbed my Erev Shabbos shower (yes, picking olives on Erev Shabbos does lead to Erev Shabbos insanity), I discovered that I had gotten horrifyingly dirty. Good times.

Day 246 (Simchas Torah/Shmini Atzeres)

Unlike in America, where some eat in the Sukkah on Shmini Atzeres, and some don't, we do not eat in the sukkah on Shmini Atzeres/Simchas Torah (one day, all combined) in Israel. It's because there's no doubt that maybe it's still Sukkos, so to eat in the Sukkah would violate בל תוסיף (no numerical adding to Torah-commandments).

Since we didn't know what the shul schedule would be like, we didn't invite anyone for meals. Good thing, too: there were a few handwritten schedules floating around the shul on Simchas Torah (including one written on a napkin), but it was clearly because someone heard that the schedule was due, so they just scribbled something down and handed it in so they'd at least get partial credit. We did do everything on the schedule, but none of the times were remotely correct.

Hakafos at night went until 1am, but they took a (theoretically hour-long) break at 8pm for dinner. We ate, and relaxed, and I went outside at 10pm and didn't hear anything from the shul, and Husbinator went back at 10:30. Hakafos had restarted 15 minutes before. I would be so frustrated if we didn't live next door, but we do, so it's totally fine.

I stayed home with BSM while he slept, but Husbinator tells me that post-dinner hakafos were very silly. There were ad-libbed songs, and silent dancing, and animal noises, among other silliness. He had a great time.

On Simchas Torah day, I took BSM to shul, but he did not want to dance with the men. So I danced with him on the ladies' side, and he had a really great time. Again, hakafos went for a very long time (as in, until around 5pm long time), so there was a break for lunch at some point. However, since we hadn't davened mussaf, Husbinator couldn't eat even a k'baitza of bread (so less than a nice, thick slice). The rabbi said there was no need to wash at all, we were essentially having kiddush with substantial food, but our Yontiff meal would be the one after mussaf. It was kind of weird, but that's the halacha!

I stayed home with BSM while he napped, and then I took him to the playground when he woke up. At some point, I wandered back to shul to see what they were up to, and I see all the kids heading up to the bima, and Mrs. Gold said Husbinator was looking for us so BSM could get his aliyah with all of the other kids. I had totally forgotten about kol ne'arim! We had gotten back just in time though, and I gave BSM to Husbinator, who took him to the bima where the other kids had already all assembled. And BSM started to scream and cry. So he missed kol ne'arim after all :-(

Oh, well, next year. It was definitely a different sort of a Simchas Torah, but very interesting! (We ran home for "lunch" about 10 minutes before sunset.)

Day 245 (Erev Chag)

I had no choice but to go to Rami Levy this morning, Erev Chag or not. I was reeling for a while afterwards: not only did I get a parking spot and a shopping cart, there was no wait to check out. Literally no wait: I found a checkout lane with no other customers. I was kind of freaked out until Husbinator pointed out that today is Hoshana Raba, so davening is really long, so most people have to start their day much later than usual. Ah.

Today, I made Yerushalmi kugel again. Since this was my second time, I allowed myself to play with the ratios, and it came out perfectly!!! Tastes exactly like real Yerushalmi kugel. I am so happy and grateful and a little surprised. Yay!!!!!! Recipe is below.

***

Yerushalmi Kugel (adapted from Moshe Atlo's YouTube video)

400 grams thin egg noodles
1/2 c vegetable oil
1 c sugar, divided
1 1/4 tsp salt
1 Tbsp ground pepper
3 eggs

• Boil the noodles in 2L water for five minutes. Drain, but do not rinse.
• While the noodles are cooking, heat the oil and 1/2 cup sugar in a small pot on a medium flame. Stir occasionally. (You can use the same spoon you're using to mix the noodles.) Let the caramel cook until it is a deep, dark brown. It will bubble. Do not be afraid of burning the sugar.
• Between poking at the noodles and the caramel, measure out the dry ingredients and check the eggs.
• Stand back and CAREFULLY pour the caramel into the noodles (which you have cleverly transferred out of the strainer and back into the pot you cooked them in). Stir vigorously, quickly, and thoroughly.
• Add the other 1/2 cup sugar, salt, and pepper to the noodle/caramel mixture. Stir,
• Add the eggs and mix thoroughly. Don't worry that the eggs will scramble in the hot noodles, just be ready to pour everything into the cooking pan as soon as you're done adding the eggs.
• Pour the kugel into a pot. In the future, I plan on lining said pot with parchment paper rather than greasing it well. 
• Poke at the kugel to remove any air bubbles, and cover the pot, but leave a small gap for steam to escape.
• Cook on the stovetop for an hour-and-a-half. I put my wonder-pot flame-spreader under the pot for ease of mind.
• Allow kugel to cool before cutting. 
• Serve warm, with pickles, and celebrate the goodness of your very own authentic Yerushalmi Kugel.

Day 244 (meh)

This morning was a succession of stuff not being as effective as I wanted. The doctor's diagnosis for BSM's two-week diarrhea saga is "teething" (seriously???), I couldn't find a pulley I liked to get stuff into the attic, and the grocery store didn't have the two items I went there to buy. Urg.

I figured I'd try again for waking up on the right side of the bed, so I took a nap, which really did help.

I used the built-in bathroom heater for the first time since we moved in, and unlike my previous conclusion, it does work. However, unlike other bathroom heaters I've used, the heat is not fan-forced, so next time I'll turn on the heater before I start filling the tub.

After I put BSM to bed, I (along with everyone else on the Yishuv) stopped by the Yishuv's mail room to pick up a package. The line moved much faster than I thought it would, but I still like the assessment made by the guy behind me: "What is this? Rami Levy?"

Day 243 (more Chol HaMoed)

I am getting tired of washing BSM's sheet every morning. I called the health clinic today, and the woman who answered the phone said that all of the tests came back negative, but I can come in and talk to the pediatrician tomorrow. This is not quite the Chol HaMoed baby-outing I was hoping for (there's no daycare during Sukkot), but after changing not only his sheet, but four of his onesies today, I'm game. And BSM picked out his first onesie today, and had such a good time poking at the monkeys on it! Y'know, for the entire hour that he wore it before pooping through his diaper, poor kid.

Because his stomach has been bothering him for so long, we've abandoned the BRAT diet in favor of giving BSM more than just four types of foods. He ate three whole hot dogs and a small mountain range of ketchup for lunch. When Husbinator tried to teach BSM the word "hot dog," BSM responded, "hav hav," which is what Israeli dogs say. That's my boy! ...As long as he doesn't think hot dogs were ever actual dogs, that is.

I put away a bunch of toiletries, and the rest of the blankets and bathtowels, and I even unpacked and re-packed all of the Pesach stuff. We now have some under-the-bed boxes freed up for better use, but I have yet to find my kitcfhen scale, rolling pin, and shul cookbooks. This is not good, people...

You know what is good? BSM gave me a kiss on the cheek before bed! A real kissy!

Day 242 (Sunday-Chol HaMoed)

Remember the the Kornbluths' intimidating niceness? I popped by this afternoon to return a pair of sunglasses I found in our sukkah, and I left with half of a sandwich and a glass of chocolate milk (both inside BSM), the end of a bottle of pomegranate wine, a new board book, the loan of a juicer, and an invitation to borrow their grill. Oh, man. Oh, my my. Wow.

Speaking of the juicer, I have finally been chided by the neighbors enough that I picked even the bad pomegranates from our trees, cut off the bad bits, and juiced them (along with the good pomegranates that I picked right before Rosh HaShana).

Luckily, Aunty Em and clan came for a barbeque today, or else I would have been left with spoiling pomegranate juice in place of the rotting pomegranates. It's nice, this hosting of family events. It's also pretty glorious having a sukkah that can fit 15 people without squishing, especially when putting up that sukkah took such minimal work. Thank you, Landpeople!

I also finished putting together BSM's growth charts today. I doubt that his pediatrician's office really wants them (if they did, they would have asked me for his growth data), but I like to have everything neatly stitched together in one record. So there. Also, I miss drawing graphs and trendlines.

Day 241 (Shabbos)

We had guests for both meals. I had met our Friday night guests, the Chasdot, once before. But that was at a picnic for all the Anglos in the Yishuv, which really isn't the greatest place to actually meet meet someone. A meal is better for that, and it turns out I really like the Chasdot. So that's cool.

We had the Kornbluths over for lunch, and they really are incredibly nice. They're not at all irritating in their niceness, but it honestly is a little intimidating. I will never be that nice. I will never even make it into the same league as their niceness. Hopefully my immigrant-charm will be an acceptable stand-in, because that's all the reciprocation I can offer.

In other news, BSM did his usual stalling at the landing tonight, poking the wall and babbling. Unlike the past few nights, though, I finally got what he was doing. This wasn't any old "I'm not ready to go to bed stall," this was BSM playing with his shadow. So I showed him how to wave at his shadow, and he laughed and laughed at my shadow-animals, and then he told his shadow, "Bye," and went to bed. So cute!

Day 240 (Erev Shabbos)

A bit ago, Aunt L80 emailed me that my cousin and his new wife would be in Israel over Sukkot, and that she'd given them my contact info. I thought that was nice, but I doubted they'd actually be in touch. But they were, and today I got to see them!

I took BSM and our tiny, light Combi umbrella stroller, and bussed it. Since the cousins were staying in central Jerusalem, I finally made it to the shuk before seeing them, and finally filled out our spices collection. For the record, spices are expensive. I guess I bought about 5 pounds of assorted spices (none of which were onion/garlic/herbs), and spent almost $60. I'm still reeling.

I had lunch with said cousins in their sukkah, and got to chat with them. It was really nice: I think we met once when we were about 10 years old, but he doesn't remember it, so now I'm not sure. Anyway, we got to meet for realsies now, and that was cool.

On the way home, instead of walking over a mile back to the bus stop, I caught the train from the shuk, which took me to the bus stop in Pisgat Zeev. Oh, my, Gosh. The light rail is soooo convenient.

Sure, when I got back, Shabbos prep was C-R-A-Z-Y, but I knew it would be. I'm still glad I got to see the cousins :)

And when I got back, I made real Yerushalmi kugel for the first time, caramelized sugar and all. I owe a huge thank-you to this guy and his video: I followed his instructions exactly (down to mixing the noodles and sugar with the same spoon), and the kugel came out perfectly. Next time, I'll cut down on the sugar and add more pepper, but I am very, very pleased with how it came out.

Day 239 (Sukkos 1)

We had a local couple for dinner Thursday night. They each brought a sister, and also one other friend. Between the three girls, one knows Piano Toes (not personally, just because they're the same age and from the same neighborhood) and one went to high school with R2. And it was a good thing we dug out our dining room table: we got kiddush, motzi, and bentching in the sukkah, but rain took everything else was inside.

On a more disappointing front, BSM was not excited at all by his plush lulav/esrog set that I bought almost two months ago. I thought he'd have so much fun: Abba with his lulav, BSM with his own lulav... sigh. It was not to be :(

Day 238 (Erev Sukkos)

I caught BSM multitasking today, though it may be called "over-consuming media." He was playing with his electronic play table, and while it was singing its little ditty, he also slapped some buttons on his electronic alphabet apple toy, then vice versa.

Today was a frenzy of sukkah decorating and house cleaning. I had figured it was OK that our living room (a.k.a. "salon," i.e., living room/dining room combo) still had multiple stacks of boxes in it: after all, we'd be eating in the sukkah! But Husbinator pointed out that there was rain in the forecast, and we should probably be prepared to move inside. Fair point, Husbinator, fair point.

While we were sukkah-decorating, Rabbi Barzilai called over the fence and asked if we were going to cut the lulavim from our lulav tree. I told him I doubted we'd have time, but if he'd do us the favor... He did! I'm really glad he cut them instead of us: he knew that in order to harvest lulavim, you really have to cut off the outer branches, first. There is no other way to avoid impaling yourself. Good to know.

While he was here, Rabbi Barzilai also taught us how to tie palm rings to hold the lulav tight. This is excellent, since we haven't been able to find any lulav rings for sale. After he taught us how to tie them, I see why they aren't for sale: if you have a lulav and two minutes, you can make your own with minimal trouble. I feel very cool, having made our own lulav rings.

In between sukkah decorating and house cleaning and lulav cutting, I found the time to look up the weight for size 4 Target diapers. (Husbinator finally found the case of diapers I kept insisting I had packed in our lift, and a good thing, too: BSM is between diaper sizes in his Israeli brand.) Turns out that the weight range is exactly what I need for BSM right now. Of course, when I saw the Target weight in pounds. I had to convert to kilograms to figure that out...

Day 237 (essentially Erev Chag)

Today I baked the cookies whose dough I made yesterday, an apple pie, and carrot kugel. Today I learned that in this lactarded household, it makes much more sense to have the second sink be pareve rather than dairy. I feel that my life has just become much more convenient.

This is good, because here's a picture of the checkout line I waited in when I went back to Rami Levy today. (This morning we hammered out a menu, so I knew what I actually needed to buy this time)

And in the interest of clearing up some more of the house, I took a bubby-cart full of stuff to be toyvelled. Getting that stuff off of the dining room table and into kitchen cabinets definitely helped The Effort.

Day 236 (Erev Erev Erev Chag)

Because BSM's stomach has been bothering him so frequently, I took him to the doctor. Unlike the doctor for grown-ups, the pediatrician is great. He listened to what I had to say and asked relevant questions, then told me not to worry about dehydration (which I hadn't told him specifically I was worrying about, but, yes, that was my main concern), ordered some tests in the meanwhile, and gave me some good advice for stomach bugs. He also explained a little about how the clinic works (without yelling at me for not knowing) and wished BSM a refuah shelaima. Like I said, a good doctor.

After the doctor visit, I went grocery shopping. I got a kick out of the fact that as I passed the shopping center guards, I saw them inspecting an esrog. On the grocery-store front, I didn't know what I wanted to make, so I didn't know what I wanted to buy, so I took the safe course and just bought everything.

I had a busy baking day: challah, pie crust, and coconut-chocolate-chip cookies. Luckily, one of the things I had bought at Rami Levy was good chocolate chips. I am officially sick and tired of "chocolate-flavored chips," so I shelled out the extra 60 cents for the real deal. My Gosh. I feel much more the wastrel when the prices are in shekel. I can pay 60 cents more for something that tastes like chocolate instead of margarine!

In the less cool news, sure enough, my cookie sheets do not fit in in our oven. (And no, two 9x13's do not fit on one shelf.) Still, I think we'll try to figure out a dishwasher before we try to figure out a bigger oven. Anyway, I can fit a 9x13 and a loaf pan per shelf, and since I rarely get more than two challot on a cookie sheet, it hardly matters in terms of challah baking. Still, not being able to use my beautiful cookie sheets is disappointing.

We also finally invited Sukkos (and Shabbos) guests. I gave my little "I know it's late, but" introduction to everyone except the Kornbluths. On the first night of Rosh HaShana, they invited us to come for lunch the next day, with our guests. They are our kind of people.

Speaking of leaving things for the last minute, Rabbi Gold came over today and looked at our "sukkah-site" and told us that we only have to put up one board in order to have a kosher sukkah. Heck yeah, baby.

On the unpacking front, I have yet to find some kitchen stuff (notably my pareve rolling pin and electronic scale). Husbinator made the terrifying observation that the movers may have thrown them in with our Pesach stuff. Oh, dear L-rd, help us all.

Day 235 (silliness and fun)

I am that silly, but hopefully endearing, immigrant who acts things out. You see, I'm fairly certain that I just said the right words to express what I want to communicate, but I'm not 100% sure. However, with the addition of one silly sound effect and a broad gesture, I am completely sure that my message gets across. (The problem is that now you're all curious about the context, and the context involves a little too much information. Well, I shall assumed you asked! BSM's daycare provider was reminiscing about how scary his stomach bug was, and I agreed that his diapers were pretty explosive.)

Also, if you want to steal my ID, just mumble something about calling from somewhere and say, "Are you still looking for work?" I will sing like a bird. In this case, it was a lady from some government office. Or so she claimed.

Today, we got so much closer to being unpacked! I found and put away every single sheet (and did a lot of other unpacking in the process). Husbinator's been saying for a while that the boxes of framed pictures take up a lot of room, so we hung some of the pictures today, and it really does make a huge difference.

I've found most of what I've been looking for at this point in the unpacking process, which is pretty awesome. Among the things we found was one of those electronic play tables for young people. You know, they're short enough for a baby to reach the top, and they're covered in fun buttons and toys that make music or say things when you play with them. BSM loves it (and it's not nearly as irritating as I always insist "noisy toys" are).

The only issue with this play table is that it has a fake book in the middle, complete with a page that you can flip back and forth. BSM kept turning the page, then trying to turn the "other pages." These "other pages" are molded into the table, but don't actually turn, so BSM was getting quite frustrated. This is a shame, because he really does love the play table, so I worked with him, saying "All done," every time he turned the one real page and tried to turn the fake pages, and pretty soon he understood that there was one and only one page that would turn. Really cute.

Day 234 (Yom Kippur)

For starters, I actually got to go to shul for Kol Nidrei! This was an absolutely unexpected gift: BSM was exhausted all afternoon, and Kol Nidrei is right around bedtime. But a few minutes after Husbinaor left, BSM walked to the front door and said, "Bye." I wasn't going to turn down that invitation, so we went. I am so grateful.

Unfortunately, poor BSM was sick again on Yom Kippur day, and my pre-Erev-Yom-Kippur stomach bug didn't help my hydration preparation. So the only shul I got during the day was the tail end of neila, but I did get to daven all of the amidot at home.

Day 233 (Erev Yom Kippur)

Continued unpacking, getting all but a handful of boxes inside. I also managed to dig out the beds in the guest room, which makes me feel more in control of the unpacking situation. Now it's just the living room that's totally full of boxes.

I also ran out to Rami Levy today, because I wanted sweet potatoes with our pre-Yom Kippur meal. As I had hoped, Rami Levy was nowhere near as insane as it usually is on an Erev Shabbos/Erev Yom Tov, and I did not have to thread my way through the aisles or wait half an hour on line to check out. I even took BSM with me, and since it was nowhere near his naptime, he was totally fine.

Naturally, I bought a good deal more than just the sweet potatoes that I ran out for. Among other things, I bought some gummy candy. My friends, I did not know that stuff could be so fresh. I have never had such soft gummy candy in my life. Yum.

Day 232 (less unpacking)

I managed to dig out the kitchen! Not that all kitchen items are unpacked, but there are no longer any boxes in the kitchen, and that's huge.

Today's post is titled "less unpacking" because BSM had a really bad stomach bug yesterday, so I kept him home from daycare today. Thank G-d, he was totally fine, but I didn't know that would be the case when he woke up, and he was so, so sick yesterday.

Luckily, the rain that some website said might show up today didn't, so it's OK that we still have some boxes outside.

Day 231 (unpacking)

Whew, it's a good thing I've been making bullet points! Catching up on some overdue blog posts.

Last night, I slept in my very own bed. Not the thin kibbutz mattress whose every spring was clearly felt, not air mattresses that deflate in the middle of the night, and not even your basic good-quality Israeli-made mattress on a wooden frame. No, my friends, I slept on my Simmons pocketed-coil system bed. On a box spring. Oh. My. Gosh. The sheer luxury of it! I'd forgotten beds could be so decadently comfortable.

Today, I started by getting books out of their boxes (which were on the front patio) and onto bookshelves. My goal was to get all of the Jewish books and most of the secular books inside and on bookshelves. To that end, I did my level best not to sort, and I just put the books on whichever shelf was closest at hand. It wasn't easy, this conscious lack of order, but I did it. Moreover, I got all of our sforim on shelves, and all of our secular books inside. (We ran out of shelf space after secular book box #10, so we have a box and a half left on the living room floor.)

It is glorious to have our sforim again, and our secular books, and other board books to read to BSM. I figured since his favorite part of Goodnight Moon (among the books of which I am sick nearly unto death) is pointing at the cats, and since BSM also likes dogs and loves barking, the first "new" book I'd read him is Doggies: A Barking and Counting Book by Sandra Boynton. Oy, was that a mistake. Now I'm almost right back where I started. However, I have laid down the law: I will not read that book more than once in a row or more than three times in one day. I have spoken.

I also had a nice long talk with Ema today, which was absolutely lovely.

And speaking of speaking with people, my across-the-street neighbor, Shira, called me this evening. She was sitting on the bus, and the woman next to her works in a lab near the Yishuv. So Shira put me on with her bus-friend, who is in charge of finding a replacement for one of their employees who is going on maternity leave. How cool is that? Unfortunately, it's an analytical chemistry lab, and due to the short term of employment, they really need someone who can hit the ground running. Since I've never even heard of the processes that they run, I'm out, but seriously, how cool? This is the kind of Israeli networking that I think might actually lead to a job, G-d willing.