sarah in nyc

 Tonight is a special night. Tonight all five of us will be sitting at our Shabbat table. Our older son is home from Amarillo for the weekend. It feels really wonderful to have all of us together. Our younger son asked me if i could make him a cross body bag to hold his phone, epi-pen and wallet. I had tried last week but the physics of construction completely overwhelmed me and I just couldn't figure it out. Yesterday I sat down to try again and this time I was able to come up with what I described to my son as a first draft for the bag to hold his essentials as he goes out and about. The bag is made out of denim and is topstitched with orange thread that showed up in stash from a friend's dead mother or grandmother. The front pocket has room to hold a standard men's well stuffed  bifold wallet.  There is ample room for both a large phone and an Epi-pen in the main pocket.. The next iteration of the bag will be made in fabric that my son chooses and may be lined or made ...

  This weekend our summer came to an end and we now turn towards the New Year. I have been practicing shofar. You can hear me on the second day of the holiday if you come to my synagogue. (I will be doing the big shofar blowing before Musaph.) Thursday I walked into my local pharmacy to ask if I could get the new COVID vaccine. I didn't need an appointment and the pharmacist suggested that I also take the second half of  the shingles vaccine and my flu shot at the same time.  I think we were both worried about the future availability of vaccines in this country. Three vaccines at one time is a whole lot for one body to absorb. Luckily I didn't have all that much to do, so I could spend my weekend doing very little except feeling crummy. So yesterday, after several days off line, so to speak, I was ready to start the rest of getting ready for the High Holidays. My husband and I did another pre-holiday adventure to Bingo, the kosher version of Costco. As soon as we parked t...

 The mended tallit was worn this past Shabbat by the mother of the spectacular Bat mitzvah girl. The bat mitzvah girl actually spoke about the mitzvah of wearing a tallit during her d'rash.  Hannah's d'rash sent me on a deep dive into  Fashion in ancient Mesopotamia . You can read more  here . Clearly fringes were a big deal in that particular universe of fashion. This kippah was shipped out and  delivered. David was just incredibly pleased. He wears the kippot I have made him every day. David is one of those guys who tries to do good wherever he goes and the kippah will be on his head during each one of those adventures. Tuesday, Nini arrived to see her tallit in person for the first time and to tie her tzizit. Nini loved how comfortable her tallit was. She also shared more photos from her recent trip to Nova Scotia. She was so happy that I was able to evoke her beloved landscape. I love the peek of the underside of the tallit. I also love how great the tallit...

  Starting off this Friday post with this lush rendition of the beginning of kiddush. Earlier this week I got a surprise in the mail. My friend esther sent me two of the pretty blue dotted napkins pictured below. She has chosen the fabric from one of my favorite home dec fabric suppliers,  Fabric Guru .  I talked Esther through how to pattern match across curtain panels.  The napkins were her thank you. I love using these napkins. It makes me feel like I am hanging out with Esther. A friend gave me four plastic bins filled with fabric. The fabrics are an interesting mix. There are off cuts of delicious soft suiting wools. Some people might be receiving some luscious scarves in subtle colors. There are a couple of small pieces of wool coating in charcoal grey. There are several off cuts from drapery projects in satin. I am now the owner of several cuts of denim in a few different weights. One of the fabrics felt like a blast from the past. it was a champagne colored ...

Our friends invited us to join them last night for  this book talk  at Temple Emanuel. The talk was between Yaakov Katz  former editor in chief of The Jerusalem Post and Bret Stephens. The book is about Israel's failures to anticipate the awful events of October 7. When we got to the synagogue, the entire block was cordoned off with not only police barriers but also with large granite blocks around the synagogue . Police were stationed at each corner asking people to show their tickets to the lecture. After getting through the police barriers we had to go through a security checkpoint to get in. There were a fair number of New York City police inside. The audience as most free lectures in New York tended to be older. The lecture hall was ringed by synagoge security officers and New York City police.  At first I thought this was overkill. Soon after the conversation between the two journalists began, a masked audience member began shouting. he wasn't trying to engage...