Ending work on one piece and starting another

When I put this tallit up on my dressmakers form to take photos for you today

I recalled our trip home to Quincy from my grandfather's Shiva. I sat next to my grandmother in the back seat of our Studebaker.

I took my grandmother's hand

I smoothed and resmoothed the wrinkles on my grieving grandmother's hand.

Each worn spot on this tallit is a mark of either Hilary or her long dead great grandfather using this tallit.

I find every mend, each and every wear spot to be deeply moving.

Below are some of the materials for a new tallit that I will be starting after Shabbat.

I purchased these supplies in the garment district.

I selected the Petersham that I purchased from among ALL of these rolls of ribbon.

I also noticed to new to me architectural details in the garment district.

The first is from 38th Street.

I wish I knew which business was represented by the N and the apples.

This doorway is on Seventh Avenue.

Today is Friday and I made chicken.

The chicken is being made with a variety of red spices, smoked paprika, sumac cayenne pepper and a bit of black pepper. Below is the chicken after it's spice massage.

I like my chicken well cooked. In our household language, we call this "cooked dead".

I still have to make and herb rich and grain shy tabouleh. the mint and parsley are currently soaking in water to free them from dirt.

I have been living in my building since 1986. Even so, I still notice new things about my building.

The third floor of my building has little Juliet balconies. This was the first time that I noticed the ironwork.

The first floor windows have a fancy bit of stonework embellishment above them.

Today was the first time that I actually stopped to take a good look at the foliage used in this pretty cartouche. The center medallion is filled with birchbark. The foliage surrounding the medallion is oak leaves and acorns.

After I got home I looked up the iconography of the two species of trees. Birch is a symbol of new life oaks are a symbol of old age. I was so touched that the architects of my building, George and Edward Blum, gave a visual benediction to the residents of our building. My building was completed in 1911. I still hear their blessing today in 2024.

A lovely secular prayer of thanks.

A secular prayer for peace..

Shabbat Shalom!

Comments

Connecting with the past

A few months ago I had a craving for my father’s chicken fricassee. If my father were still alive I would have called him up and he would have talked me through the process of making it. My father is no longer alive so I turned to my cookbooks and the recipes I found for chicken fricassee were nothing at all like the stew of chicken necks, gizzards and wings in a watery sweet and sour tomato sauce that I enjoyed as a kid. I assumed that the dish was an invention of my father’s. I then attempted to replicate the dish from my memory of it and failed. A couple of weeks ago I saw an article on the internet, and I can’t remember where, that talked about Jewish fricassee and it sounded an awful lot like the dish I was hankering after. This afternoon I went to the butcher and picked up all of the chicken elements of the dish, a couple of packages each of wings, necks and gizzards. My father never cooked directly from a cook book. He used to re...

The light themed tallit has been shipped!!!

I had begun speaking to Sarah about making her a tallit in the middle of August. It took a few weeks to nail down the design. For Sarah it would have been ideal if the tallit were completed in time for her to wear it on Rosh HaShanah., the beginning of her year as senior rabbi of her congregation. For me, in an ideal world, given the realities of preparing for the High Holidays I would have finished this tallit in the weeks after Sukkot. So we compromised and I shipped off the tallit last night. I would have prefered to have more time but I got the job done in time. This tallit was made to mark Sarah's rise to the position of senior rabbi but it was also a reaction to this year of darkness. She chose a selection of verses about light to be part of her tallit. 1) אֵל נוֹרָא עֲלִילָה God of awesome deeds ( from a yom kippur Liturgical poem) 2) אוֹר חָדָשׁ עַל־צִיּוֹן תָּאִיר May You shine a new light on Zion ( from the liturgy) 3) יָאֵר יְהֹ...

A Passover loss

My parents bought this tablecloth during their 1955 visit to Israel. It is made out of linen from the first post 1948 flax harvest. The linen is heavy and almost crude. The embroidery is very fine. We used this cloth every Passover until the center wore thin. You can see the cloth on the table in the background of this photo of my parents and nephew My Aunt Sheva bought my mother a replacement cloth. The replacement cloth is made out of a cotton poly blend. The embroidery is crude and the colors not nearly as nice. The old cloth hung in our basement. We used the new cloth and remembered the much nicer original cloth. I loved that my aunt wanted to replace the cloth, I just hated the replacement because it was so much less than while evoking the beauty of the original. After my father died my mother sat me down and with great ceremony gave me all of her best tablecloths. She also gave me the worn Passover cloth and suggested that I could mend it. I did. Year after year ...

sarah in nyc

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