Today we celebrated Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. Some of the other Jewish holidays have a dark undertone which I don’t find very festive, but the new year is just full of good wishes for the upcoming year. Jeremy is half Jewish through his father’s side, so that makes him a non-Jew because one’s Jewishness is claimed through the maternal line. But I take what I can get, I count the kids as 1/4 Jew, so we celebrated in our own way.
This kids had no school today because of Rosh Hashanah. There is a large Jewish population here – I grew up attending a number of bar mitzvahs. I wonder why we don’t get Chinese New Year off – certainly there are the same number of Chinese as Jews here. Oh well, what do I know?
Started the day with pancakes. (Not a Jewish tradition, just a Kappa tradition.)
Then we went to the river for a morning hike. Apparently throwing pebbles into running water symbolizes casting away ones sins. Jeremy, Vince and I threw many stones trying to skip them across the surface of the water. Edda threw one tiny stone.
Then you are suppose to eat apples dipped in honey – this symbolizes a sweet new year. Vince wanted to change it to apples dipped in peanut butter. I wonder if this mean we are in for a nutty new year?
We feel much better today. I walked a little bit outside in the beautiful weather. Jeremy spent all afternoon chopping, dicing, mixing, boiling and spicing making the most fabulous Indian dinner – all vegetarian to boot! The dishes included aloo gobi, a cauliflower dish much mentioned in the highly entertaining movie Bend it Like Beckham. In the film, the mom wants her daughter to give up playing soccer and learn to make aloo gobi like a proper Indian woman.
I am wrapping up my duties as a stay-at-home mom because as of Monday I join the masses in the morning commute. I just have a few more of Edda’s therapy sessions that I can personally attend. I really enjoy watching Edda’s relationship with her therapists grow as well as my own fondness for people who are dedicated (and patient) in finding the best in Edda and nurturing her skills and talents.
Yes, she’s not thrilled about the tape on her hands, but she can push it, especially on the linoleum.
We’ve got the grumps. Bah humbug! Come back tomorrow.
While I as in California a few weeks ago, Edda managed to get a huge bruise on her left temple that had all her therapists and teachers inquiring after her well being. From the evidence, we think that Edda tried to climb the bottom step of the stairs and missed and then fell backwards onto the brick fireplace. Poor thing, it’s just about faded now, three weeks afterwards.
I don’t know if becuase of that bruise or of general nervousness, the folks at Edda’s school want her to wear a helmet during gym. I did look at a number of special needs helmets, but we are settling with Vince’s old bike helmet. It’s free and it fits.
So we ride the short bus and wear a helmet. It’s quite a combination!
We are also making the house even more attractive and worthy of Architectural Digest. Duct tape, the new rage in interior design.
When I moved back to DC, I had no idea that the city had acquired a new baseball team, nor did I know that a brand new annex to the Air and Space Museum was built next to Dulles Airport. I have no intention of ever going to see a Nats (gnats) games, but today we did go to see the Air and Space museum which is named after the major donor. Also, the Annex has fabulous parking, much like the parking lot at Target, so the distance from our car to the air conditioned hanger was about 100 steps.
The trip went really well until I proposed a trip to the gift shop where Vince insisted on buying the most complex and piece intensive box of plastic crap when I was really only willing to buy him a small tiny plastic replica of the space shuttle for 4 dollars. This resulted in a 45 minute drive full of tears and unhappiness.
Well did we drive straight home? No, of course not. We headed into that special torture for half-Chinese kids everywhere. The dreaded Sunday afternoon Chinese school. We showed up at Wootton “just to inquire”, but it turned out that classes started in 20 minutes and, what the heck, we’ll just pile on a completely unexpected Chinese immersion after a 45 minute teary eyed meltdown.
He didn’t like it much. I think he could hang on by his fingernails if he is in a good mood. God, I barely could hang on to the parent instruction part of the class today and all the homework is in Chinese, I’m going to have to fax it to someone who actually reads Chinese to help out.
This was followed by the weekly sunday night Martin dinner.
I cleaned, Jeremy connected the ethernet in the house, Vince went over to the next door neighbors, Edda watched her videos.
We did manage to go to the park this morning. Vince is trying to shove a third “person” onto the swing.
A lovely tweed jacket and tie from his parents.
I contributed to the celebration with balloons and a pie.
Somehow the balloons ended up out of reach. Hmmm, I wonder who was responsible for that?
Earlier in the day, I stopped by Edda’s school to meet her teacher and her classmates. I was impressed and happy. Here’s Edda trying to make a choice. They want her to wear a helmet for gym class so they can feel a little more secure and let her explore a little more freely. What do you think? Pretty ugly, huh? I want to find something cute.
I went to the Quince Orchard/Wootton season opener tonight just in time to see some poor mother’s child being wheeled off the field into a waiting ambulance. Yikes!
White hairs are starting to emerge.
I have nothing to say about Edda except for the fact that she is a super cutie.
I don’t know what happened, but Jeremy and I are both tired and hoping to be in bed by 9 pm tonight.
I finally got to meet Vincent’s kindergarten teacher tonight. I like her a lot and I think it’ll be a great year. I wish I was back in kindergarten where the rules are clear, the rewards are stickers or a sweet, you see your friends everyday and lunch comes on a little compartmentalized tray.
Coat hook.
Classroom (Vince’s teacher is facing away from the camera behind the wicker basket):
I snuck a peek inside his pencil box. A lot of the markers were uncapped. Oh well.
