Pics from summer vacation

Hi - please read the last three posts in the order they were posted so will understand all these pics!
sorry for all the pictures of monkeys. shaya took a lot of them.
To start the slideshow click on the bottom left hand corner.
yes, i have a lot of other things to be doing now, but hey, its a coffee break! enjoy

summer vacation

What did we do on our summer vacation? you may be wondering...



Here's a recap:


Thankfully, the boys "summer vacation" is quite limited. It begins after tisha b'av and it ends on Rosh Chodesh Elul, for a grand total of three weeks. (there are some perks that come with the boys cheder system.) So for the first two weeks we sent them to "camp"-



YB: his gannenet made a camp, which meant gan was extended with a few added kids and extra projects. this was great. no transitions or crying fits necessary.



MM: in the building right next door to YB, a mother of a friend from school had a 15 y/o sister coming to visit for 2 months who made a 2 week camp in their house. 5 mischevious amost 4-year olds giggling together all day. they enjoyed a lot of projects, baking, water balloons and kiddie pools with the summer ending in a "field trip" to the new ice cream store down the block! he was thrilled and so was I with the $50 price tag for the whole two weeks!



Shaya: All money saved was blown on shaya's fancy day camp. Shaya stayed in camp until 3:30. this cost a lot and was worth it. the reason i sent him to this camp was because they had swimming in a decent sized above ground swimming pool (shallow, don't worry) for the boys twice a day - once in the morning and then again in the afternoon. i thought he would love this. he said he only wants a camp with swimming. after the first day he came home thrilled and said "Mommy, you chose the right camp". I was quite pleased. The next day he said, "mommy, i need a tube for the pool". no problem, bought a tube. next day, used the tube, and came home happy again.


Then the trouble started: mommy, i only want to go swimming one time. next day - Mommy, i don't need my bathing suit because i'm not going swimming. why not? apparently the water is too cold. apparently the tube was to avoid getting to close to the cold water. apparently that was not good enough and thereafter shaya spent 2 hours a day, for 1 1/2 weeks of camp running around the grass around the swimming pool with the other 3 boys who refused to go in. So much for that one.

Camp ended the day Ben returned from his quick trip into America, so we had a few days for family outings. Unfortunately, YB was quite sick with Strep throat which did not respond initially to antibiotics, which limited the amount of family available for the family outings.

So the first day of family trips, Ben took the two big boys to a great place called "The Monkey Park" - where there were lots of different types of monkeys to look at and some birds and at some point they could go in the cages with the monkeys (they fit right in:) They had a great time. Me and Yanks had less of a good time as he was a super kvetchy monster and I got to watch him, but at least the boys enjoyed the monkey park (they also had climbing things and ball-pits as does just about every excursion in Israel for some reason.

On the second day we shlepped yanks along with us to this family fun-center type place about 30 minutes away. highlights included - bumper boats, bumper cars (just shaya did those), train rides, moonbounce, go carts, climbing area, rides, indoor play area with little tikes cars and gymboree. it was really perfect for the kids. unfortunately Mommy forgot the food bag at home (oops) but luckily there were kosher snacks and ices available.

The on Friday we took Yaakov B back to the doctor because he was still sick after 5 days of antibiotics. They gave us a stronger antibiotic (those clever doctors). by Sunday he seemed much better - hooray for Augmentin!

So on Sunday we had a family picnic and BBQ at Gan Sacher - a really nice big park only about 15 minutes away. We brought the boys bikes and they rode around on the bike trails there. Theres also a really big fancy playground area and then we BBQ'd hotdogs on a disposable grill - i think this was the highlight as the boys love fire and smoke! We also played some catch, blew bubbles and ate ices. The boys also enjoyed watching all the other families making BBQs (more fire!). Came home for dinner, baths and bed.

Monday was our last outing. The boys had cheder the next day so we wanted just a half a day tiyul so we decided to take the boys to the Old City and the Kosel. They've barely ever been there and they were SO excited to go. We left Bassi at the babysitter for this one and then took the three boys in a taxi to the Old City (they were so excited to go in a taxi). We then showed them around the Rova - the old walls, the Cardo, the new Ramban shul that they. rebuilt, the Menorah replica. Then we walked down with them to the Kosel where we stayed for a little while but not too long, as it was really really hot. It was a very nice ending to the summer and a nice way to get the boys excited for their new school year in cheder.

Please see our next post for pictures

SOOO - the boys have begun school!

Shaya - is in "kitah mechina" which is the equivalent of Pre-1-A I think. he loves his rebbe who is a more toned-down type than last year's Rebbe which is good for Shaya. He is in a classroom up some stairs and will not allow ben to even go up the stairs with him much less to his classroom as he is very into doing it himself, and finds the existence of parents extremely embarassing!

Moshe Meir - is in "kitah gan" - this is the youngest year in the Cheder - and has a new Rebbe who is actually american and speaks english, which is nice for us. His class had so many kids that they split it into two classes and now he only has 24 kids in his class- hooray! normalcy! (shaya has 34). He seems happy but doesn't talk much about what goes on in school. He is still timid and wants ben to walk him into his classroom (at the end of last year he was just dropping them off at the entrance to the building), but he seems to be adjusting well.

Yaakov Baruch - is going to a private American gan in the neighborhood - I think there are supposed to be 7 kids so he should get lots of personal attention! He will be of the youngest which is good for him, and there is supposed to be a lot of information and curriculum that she teaches them which is also good for him, as he is pretty advanced and loves circle time and learning new things and his last morah says to keep him as busy with this as possible so that he doesn't have time to beat up the other children! We'll see how it goes. It starts in two days (had to stick him in a daycamp for 1 1/2 weeks but there was just no way he was staying home!)

We are planning to move in two weeks from today I think (sept 5). we may be able to go the thursday before (sept 2) but not clear yet. have lots of little details to work out before then that are keeping me plenty busy. not happy that we had to move, but if we're moving, we are happy with the apartment and with the neighborhood (Sanhedria Murchevet, 2 minutes from where we are now which is just Sanhedria). its very close to the boys cheder, and they have friends there.

We'll keep you posted!!

Cute lines:

YB: started saying "um" before answering any questions.
eg. Q: "Yaakov baruch, do you want some juice? A: "Uhhhm, Yah".
Q: Yaakov Baruch are you ready for your bath? A: Uhhhhm, No". Its very cute.

- (as Bin was going to shul): "bye bye Abba! Have fun Abba!"


- Me: Ready to go to sleep? YB: "yah...maybe...no"

MM: - (climbed up to the top of the stepladder) "Look Mommy, I almost growed up!"

Shaya: -upon arrival of the cleaning lady : "mommy, why are you giving her money? then later you are going to want money and you won't have any". pauses. "We should just clean up so that you dont' have to give her money". Brilliant.

We're Back!

What can I get done with a kvetchy baby and a sick 2 year old? update my blog!

wow, its been a while since we last left off with Bassi's birth, as she is now almost 6 months old (we won't mention how old Mommy is now almost!) You know she is getting big as the boys have stopped referring to her as "the girl baby" and actually call her by her name (although MM still refers to her as "he" as in "he's crying" and "YB is hitting him".)

Will not try to fill in details as its too much, but highlights included:

- in the middle of our visit with the Sharon Beisers, came the unexpected early arrival of Bassi Beiser! Good thing Uncle josh and Aunt Sue were around to babysit! And just 8 days later we managed to decide on her name - hey the boys all got 8 days!
- Purim 1 1/2 weeks later - the boys were policemen, yup, all three. hats, whistles, guns and all! (we dressed up bassi as a baby boy, as I managed to scrounge up a blue stretchy) a good time was had by all at our quiet just the family seudah. next year: soldiers
- Tante Breindy and Shmully are here for Pesach - well, shmully didn't sleep here, but we saw a lot of him. Bin enjoyed a 2nd seder where he could actually speak divrei torah (our 1st night kid-friendly seder did not allow for much). The kids enjoyed their tante so much that our 3rd bedroom is still being referred to as "tante breindy's room"!
- Tante Raizy and Uncle Heshy and the girls were here for Pesach too! Wow, cousins everywhere! We had a great Shabbos with all the tantes and cousins and even mangaged to get a good color-coordinated picture of everyone. Also got to spend time chol hamoed and we were so glad to spend time together. Thanks for shlepping so much stuff for us!
- Post-Pesach visit from Bubby - toys and books abound as Bubby is a lifesaver watching the kids, despite terrible allergies, so Mommy can work on her paper!
- Yaakov Baruch turns 2 -happy birthday Yanks! He's so cute.
- Visit from Grandma and Papa Arnie - we were so glad you could come visit us! Striking resemblance has been noted between Bassi and Grandma!
- Kiddush for Bassi B. - our first kiddush, wow that was fun but so much more work than a bris! (although cheaper)
- Abba has taken his last 3 bechinas and passed 2 so far...waiting to hear back about the third so we can officially call him "Rabbi Abba"

then we hit a bit of a dry spell with nothing that stands out in my mind although i'm sure there were interesting things that happened, or at least several occurances of strep throat (YB is currently in recovery)

-Now we are nearing the close of summer vacation. Will have to make a seperate post about that, as this one is getting to that length where people stop reading! highlights will include: summer camp, moving plans, and removal of training wheels and family trips, so stay tuned:)

Hope everyone is having a great summer....