potty training

(posting for Dikla -- they seem to have lost their account somehow, but good news should be told!!)



We had poop in the pot today, however, I didn't take apicture of the poop.
I did do a paparazzi of the process (as dori said: IMA, AL TAFRI'I LI !).

keren, this is a majoer event, feel free to share on blog (...)

I hope that we are on the right track, although yesterday I read that in average it takes several months on average to completely potty train a child.



Potty Training - Click here for the funniest movie of the week


kisses - dix

Shavuot dinner pictures

...waiting to get the pictures cd from Daffi.

Happy birthday Dori!

Dori's 3rd birthday. Time sure flies fast!! it seems like his 2nd birthday was only a few weeks ago...
Due to technical issues, i couldn't upload the pictures we took with the Sharonim's camera. here are a few that Dikla sent around. All important the elements were there: a train cake, blowing the candle, flying up in the air on your birthday chair, and of course - some culture, in the form of a hand-made card board theater.
One of my favorite books as a child was "habayit shel yael" - yael's home. Safta Shoshi made a full set of cardboard figures, to be acted with the story, with Dori as a guest of honor in the audience. it took Dori 5 seconds to make it clear to everybody that his right place is BEHIND the scenes, sat on Shoshi's lap and moved the figurines with her :D that was a lot of fun for us -- and probably most fun for Dori!!! what a show.






There are lots more pictures, which i will post sometime...
(Ron, do you think you could put them on ftp? they should be on the parents' desktop.)

Poyke night

It all started a few weeks ago, on Lag Ba'omer, when Ron and his friends cooked their famous poyke on the fire in the back yard.
Dalia immediately had an idea -- invite all their friends to a "parents- children" Poyke night. It so happens, that there's a ~90% overlap between the two following groups: people who are in the Sharon's local group of friends, and people who are parents of Ron's local friends.
So 40-something people were invited over, all of Ron's friends, their parents, and the Weismanim, whos kids happen to fall in the wrong age-group, but that's no reason to leave them out :)
everybody brought something, and the younger generation was in charge of the Poyke.

And there were three pots of poyke: special chili (with a secret ingredient), chicken with dried fruits, and a vegeterian pot. everything but the kitchen sink went in there.

I put online all the pictures from that night. since i'm really behind on my blogging, having to fly back and forth and all, i didn't put any coments there -- although as you will be able to see clearly, there are some pictures that REALLY ask for it. so go ahead and send me your comments, and i'll put them in (if you want to add a comment to a specific image, please write the picture number too)

bath

דורי מי זה פה בתמונה?
זה דורי מה קרה לו? הוא באמבטיה
מה אתה עושה באמבטיה?
אני משחק
במה אתה משחק?
בצעצועים שלי

Friday dinner with Mr. Weber

Mr. Weber. He's black, chubby, and makes great steaks. What a wonderful addition to the family! (Oddi gives the scientific explanation: it's ability to control airflow allows for precision grilling, accurate timing, and perfect results)

Enjoying the good food (left to right):
Dikla, Ben acher, Martha, Keren, Dalia, Oddi, Ron, Omer, Safta Sara, Shoshi.

Dori is too busy to attend the group picture:


On the menu:
Appetizer: Chicken Livers on crispy base with pear slices.
Main course: Steaks, chicken shishlik (see picture) and kababs; Potato and yams duet, green salad, cherry tomatoes with pine nuts and olive oil, cauliflower salad with cranberry raisins
On the side: Hummus, tehina, vine leaves.
Dessert: Parfait halva and nutella, topped with caramelized almonds.

DON'T WASH YOUR CAR

Except for the stork coming, there is another phenomena in Israel. Mud rain.
Every time someone washes his car, sand and dust rise to the air, looking and searching for he who dared to wash his car. then, the punishment is collective - everyone gets a shot of dust. After the rain, our cars look almost like your cars in the winter time (only our "snow" is not so white, and it does not melt down). I know of people (Keren) which the sand and dust are so terrible where they are (probably because they walked next to the car that was washed), and the dust got in there eyes (and contact lenses).

So this week, I admit, it was me.
It's the middle of May, and usually we don't have rain this time of year. but the world follows it's laws, and the muddy rain came.
....The car is not red anymore....... :-(

Babies

Everybody seems to be pregnant right now. I can count at least 8 couples, including some of my best friends and family, who are expecting. The first stork arrived last week, with Sharon Weissman's new baby. Mazal tov!!
(I still can't understand how someone this big can live inside another person, not to speak of the fact that they needs to come out of a rather small opening. It seems to work for most people, evidently there are plenty of people in the world ;) )

As you all know, Pass-over is over.

Like you have in the US the preparation for X-Mass and new years eve, in Israel many kids (and adults) preper for months to Lag Ba'omer. The main concept of this holiday is that we make fires, eat Marshmallow and baked potatoes in the fire. All over Israel you may find kids with "borrowed" shopping carts, walking along the sidewalks, with wood, doors, plates. everything that will burn. Some building contractors are making outside the location they work on piles and piles of wood, so kids will not dissemble their work in order to get more wood. Of course drinking beer, wine, and everything else.We used this Lag Ba'omer to make a final use of many many pieces of wood we had lying around the house, and burnt them. Don't worry, we have plenty more for next time.
On the fire we placed a big Potjie pot . this amazing pot, weights about 10 KG, is made of solid iron, and makes good food. you can see in the link above the potjie pot in action. they all look the same in action, and they taste quite the same.


Me and my friends decided on making this meal/campfire in our garden.


I have made a few years ago a hole in the ground, just for these capfires.




From right to left: Rel, Uri, Beer, Shani, Iddo, A friend of Shahaf, Hagay, Shahaf (which I don't really know), Beer, Ron

Calling one another (after cutting all the gevees and meat) we figured out that we might be 2 guys eating this 8 littre pot of food. but the rescue came. one friend brought another (it is a free meal, after all), and than ima, aba & safta came also to eat. From a candle light dinner (with food to last forever), we were eventually 11 people, and the pot was over.

About the meaning of the name: "The Omer Count" is the period between Pass-Over and Shavuot (free translation: weeks). Shavuot is on the 49th day from passover - 7 weeks. During that period the religion says that you are not allowed to "party" (weddings), shave, or even go the the sea for a swim. There are some more restrictions, I think....
Lag Ba'omer is the 33rd day from passover, where the Hebrew letter for L is counted as 30, and for G is 3 (we do not have voule letters). In Lag Ba'omer day and the day after there are no restrictions, so that means that in that particular day there are many many weddings.

bonfire holiday

Ron, this is your story to tell. go ahead!

phones, doors and toilets

In thermodynamics, entropy is a measure of order: the more disordered something is, the more entropy it has. (For example, a cup of water with ice has less entropy than after the ice has melted). According to the laws of thermodynamics, entropy must grow at all times (unless you invest energy and organize stuff).
As any household, the Sharon mansion follows the rules of Physics. It's a natural behaviour. Things just tend follow the rules and fall apart ;)
In order to lower entropy, someone needs to do something (i.e, put energy in the system). And that someone follows a list.
The list of things-to-do-around-the-house includes many things, from trivial to complicated, from extremely urgent (like fixing leaks in toilets) to not urgent (like organizing closets). Frankly - it includes many things that most people would hire a professional to do. But the "balabayit" in the Sharon mansion would hear of no such thing. You probably remember Ron's post from a couple of weeks ago. If there's a professional out there that can fix it, aba can probably do it better.
That's one of the reasons we spent our saturday doing creative stuff around the house.

1. very urgent: fix the leaky toilets.
buy: 2 toilet mechanisms (go to Ace, get 2 boxes, check that all the parts exist, drive home, realize that one main part is missing, go back to the store)
manpower: Oddi.
method: hug the toilet until it's fixed.
result: flush!!



2. very urgent: fix the phone lines.
buy: nothing. everyone has a bunch of communication wires and a welder lying around just in case, no?
manpower: Oddi.
method: improvise something, weld some wires together, it should be working now.
results: all the phones are alive!! hurray!

3. not so urgent, but as long as we work on the phone/electricity cupboard, we might as well do it: close the gap above the cupboard, and repaint the doors.
buy: yacht varnish. find anything else you need in the tool shed and storage spaces - some wood, white paint, brushes, saw, sander, sand paper...
method: take measures, cut the wood, refine the size, refine the size again, and again, paint 2 layers. sand the cupboard doors and repaint them with yacht varnish.
results: the doors face direct sunlight most of the day, resulting in some areas that are very faded and destroyed. sanding did a lot of good. the cover part is finished, but needs to be installed. we will paint the doors some other time.


4. not urgent... but long over due:
remember we "got" Oddi and Dalia a new grill for xmas? it finally arrived (well, someone actually finally went over and bought one). it needed some assembly, we will report on how good the BBQ is after we test it.


Maybe we managed to decrease entropy slightly. but every little bit helps!

grass update

Ron and I spent most of Friday around the house, doing stuff in the back yard.
here are some pictures:

this is the SMALLEST pile of leaves. We used a leaf blower and a rake. Ron put all the leaves in those giant sacs (that used to contain 5 tons of sugar at some previous life)

Ron takes a break to step back and get a better perspective of his work.

me, the lawn mower, the grass.

our dedicated water-girl :) ima came with a cold glass of water every once in a while, to make sure we stay hydrated. thanks ima!

The grass isn't as full as i expected it to be - i guess it knew that the wedding was postponed (it was supposed to be TODAY, by the way!!), so it didn't bother to grow sideways and fill the gaps.
I also mowed the rest of the lawn around the house (until i ran out of gas, so there's a triangle in the middle of the front lawn that's taller than the rest...), and tried to sand the stairs that Ron built a few months ago (until the sand paper broke off the sander, and i had to stop doing that too).

Tomorrow we plan some more household works. It feels good doing such tasks -- you don't really need to think (except for figuring out the best rout around the yard with the mower), and you know that if you keep doing the same thing the project will be successful (except if your tools gang up on you).
Very much unlike my day job. In my line of work need to think a lot until i have smoke coming out of my ears, and the satisfaction is not guaranteed, and is definitely not immediate...

Things that I deal with when Keren is here

1. Use more lotion around my mouth to avoid getting more wrinkles from smiling (- thanks Keren for getting me that creme at Meijer!)
2. Debating whether to keep talking to Ron when he wakes up in the morning or keeping silence because Keren likes a quiet surrounding when she wakes up
3. See the red car and say to myself-it is Keren coming
4. Realize again how tiered I am or how deaf I am being able to sleep next to Oddi when he snores (-thank you keren for taping and providing me with evidence!)
5. Realize the improvement that Keren has achieved tiding up everything (are genes passing between sisters in law - thank you Erin!)
6. To see Keren with Dori ....
7. To see malakas being brushed-and the white hair is not on me
8. To hear how the rest of the family solve maths and physics problems during dinner and to understand that this is the time for me to clear the table because I understand nothing from what they are saying.
9. more will probably come, it's only her 4th day here...

Things i forgot about living with the parents

1. quiet(1). it's 2AM. sheket, kulam yeshenim...
well, not that quiet, actually (need sound):


2. quiet(2). it's oh so quiet. i close my eyes at night, and i can hear the blood streaming in my ears. the road is too far away, and there's no "dingdong, doors closing". ever.

3. traffic. i almost forgot how bad traffic is in TA. it's terrible. the average driver is inconsiderate, pushy, and doesn't acknowledge your existence or right to be on the same road as him/her. they don't indicate their intention, and they keep changing lanes without notice. mostly it's just a gradual "drifting" into your lane, forcing you to move to another lane. i can write a lot more about this... maybe the few months of minimal driving got to me.

4. kuku baken (i will take a picture and put it here. although i think it should also be on the recipe book!!)

5. surprises. in the refrigerator, the kitchen cupboards... some of them are at least 5 months old.

6. groceries appearing magically in the refrigerator :)

7. the phone rings, and it's not for me.

8. "aba, can i take your car?"

9. TV. there's one, at the parents' bedroom. way after midnight, they sleep, the TV is on.
ron: the TV is on.
me: i know.
ron: should i turn it off?
me: yea, turn it off.
ron: but it will wake them up, no?
me: a truck wouldn't wake them up :)

10. tea. dad making tea for me. dad not remembering that i drink my tea without sugar or milk. it's not because i haven't been here in a long time, it was always like that :)

11. mmmmmmmmmm smells of cake baking :D. ima's great cooking.

Beaufort (2007)

Last night, 9:30 PM, ima&aba Sharon already in bed. Dalia's foot already bandaged for the night, Odi is about to take the TV changer in his left hand (and we all know what that means), malakas is taking a nap somewhere, all is calm.
I am still not sure how it happened, but at 9:55 we were at the movies. I think Dalia didn't believe she would encounter such an eager response when she quietly suggested to go and see the movie Beaufort, that was recommended by both Omer and Dikla.
The theater was almost empty.
The movie was very good, although so sad... it told the story of the last group of soldiers stationed at an outpost in Lebanon just before the eventual withdrawal in 2000. I am looking forward to read the book that the movie is based on. It was filmed in Nimrod fort, and cost a lot of money... mainly because they had to make this touristic site look like a military outpost.
anyway, i recommend!