It’s harvest time
October 11th, 2006 by amylherzog
We’re smack dab in the middle of the Jewish harvest festival of Sukkot. Formal practice of this 8 day holiday includes building a “fragile hut” in one’s yard and “dwelling” in it, and waving around a collection of greenery called a lulav and smelling the citrusy scent of an etrog. (Informally, one simply spends 8 days celebrating the fullness of the season by eating well and spending time with family. It’s my favorite holiday.)
This year, our sukkah wound up being a slightly cheesy PVC-and-vinyl affair, but the decorations are nice and we’ve still enjoyed it. Jacob is having a lot of fun playing around with the lulav and etrog.
Today’s game was “toss the etrog”, and is played thusly: First, take the etrog and hold it high in the air above your head.
Then, throw the etrog on the ground. Lean down close and wave bye-bye at it a few times (“buh buh!”). Pick up the etrog. Repeat. It’s quite a large leap from one year ago, during his first Sukkot:
I haven’t written in a few days because there’s been no time in the evenings. We had a wonderful visit with friends this weekend, but for the past few days Jacob has started refusing bedtime again. We had associated this problem with our recent night-weaning (ahhhh blissful sleep), but reading through the archives here I see that perhaps it is associated with teething, instead? I have no idea. Anyway, tonight we’re trying something different so we’ll see.
We went to the pediatrician yesterday for our 12-month wellness visit, and Jacob got a clean bill of health. I was obsessed with his height and weight for the longest time, to make sure he was growing, but this time I actually forgot until Jon asked. (For the record, 31.5 inches tall and 23 pounds.) Generally, I’m a lot more relaxed these days about Jacob and his health. It’s nice. It lets me spend more time simply enjoying our days together.