We got together at Mom and Dad’s for brunch to celebrate Matt’s 39th birthday (Ed. Note: How is it possible that my baby brother is almost 40 years old? I’m not old enough for that). The kids had a great time playing together. And Jonathan remains completely enamored of his cousin “Fuzzball” (a/k/a Ella).

With Bubbie’s unveiling scheduled for Sunday, June 13, Martie and Bob Kramer and their granddaughter Rylei were in town for a few days. Mikaela, Samantha, Jonathan (and even Ella) enjoyed the chance to catch up with their cousin. The fun came first – dinner out together at Martie & Bob’s old favorite, Waid’s.

Then, on Saturday, playing at Monkey Bizness (the rain interfered with plans for the Zoo). Saturday evening Rylei came over and the kids made and decorated cookies.

With Rabbi Levin unavailable due to his back injury and Rabbi Harris also unavailable, I conducted the unveiling ceremony at Bubbie’s graveside on Sunday morning. I edited the ceremony on the fly, as I watched the storm clouds approaching. The raindrops started falling just as we said they last Amen, and by the time we were pulling onto the highway the rain was falling in sheets. After the ceremony, we all (plus many more extended family members) gathered back and Marcia and Larry’s for brunch. The kids got more time to play together, the adults got to catch up, and we all ate waaayyyy too much.

Our Passover season started with Jonathan’s CDC model seder. We enjoyed the usual mix of cute Passover songs about working for Pharaoh and a plague of frogs and opportunities for the kids to sample seder plate foods (Jon liked the hard-boiled egg, the matzah, and the celery dipped in salt water. The horseradish? Not so much). First Seder was our usual Seder at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s house, made notable by Mikaela leading the Four Questions (in English) for the first time.

We hosted our usual small second Seder here at our house – just us, Grandma Marcia and Zaydie Larry (Grandma Sali helped us prepare while she was in town, but had to head back to be with Paca Steve for Passover), Uncle Matt, Aunt Sarah and cousins Ella and Samantha. The kids were great, considering they were being asked to sit through a much longer than usual dinner for the second night in a row. Mikaela took a regular turn reading parts of the Seder and led the younger kids to open the door for Elijah.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. We had the largest Thanksgiving Feast yet at Grandma Marcia and Zaydie Larry’s house – I believe the final count was 28. We were served by the biggest turkey yet too – a full 30 pounds of Thanksgiving bird. It was great that so many out-of-town-based relatives were able to join us – Grandma Sali and Grandpa Steve from Montana, Corey, Monique and Annie from Chicago, Steph from Springfield, and Jeff and Brandi from Houston. Both the food and the company were great!

Now, if the Jayhawks can just pull off a victory over the Tiggers this afternoon . . .

We buried Bubbie today. It’s been an incredibly emotional few days. The words and notes of support from family and friends have been wonderful. Jonathan doesn’t really understand what’s going on – just lots of people around and disruptions in his schedule (though getting to spend some fun time with Aunt Mo this afternoon was a treat). But Mikaela is struggling with all of this. At first, she just tried to ignore that Bubbie had died. She wanted to pretend that nothing different had happened, she even wanted to go to Sunday School on Sunday. But she left Sunday school about 15 minutes early, as the reality of it all hit her, at which point she also decided that she wanted to come to the funeral. After the funeral, Mikaela turned to Miriam and said, “I just want to go home and go over to Cannon’s house to play and forget all of this.”

All of the grandkids spoke at the funeral. Corey and Matt and Greg all spoke beautifully. I had an unusually difficult time figuring out what to say. You can read the full text of what I wrote after the jump.

continue reading "RIP Jean Rittmaster May 10, 1918 – November 14, 2009"

I have a new niece! Ella Dayne Rittmaster was born yesterday morning, October 4, 2009. She weighed 7.5 pounds and was 20 inches long. Mom and baby are doing great – Matt says that Sarah and Ella might even be able to come home from the hospital today. Mikaela and Jonathan are excited to meet their new cousin (even if Mikaela was a little miffed when she found out that Ella would be a girl, because she was “the only one who had to have a brother.”).

Ella shares her birthday with United States President Rutherford B. Hayes (1822); comedian Buster Keaton (1895); and actress Alicia Silverstone (1976).

On Ella’s birthday in 1648, Peter Stuyvesant established the first volunteer fire department in America; in 1824 Mexico became a Republic; and in 1957 “Leave it to Beaver” premiered on CBS.

The end of September was remarkably quiet, all things considered. Mikaela is settling into her first grade routine. Jonathan continues to explore his music (especially classical music) obsession. Even the high holidays were relatively stress free. Of course, this is really the calm before the storm – Fall craziness is just around the corner.

Next week, Mikaela turns seven years old. Just about any day now, we’ll be welcoming a new niece into the world. Halloween will be upon us before we know it (Mikaela is all set to go as Harry Potter. Jonathan wants to be a dinosaur again). Grandma Sali and Paca Steve are coming for a visit. Then comes Thanksgiving, followed closely by Jonathan’s birthday and Chanukah is early this year (first night is December 11) and Miriam’s birthday will be during Chanukah. Deep breath. It should be a fun ride.

One random Jonathan note. We’ve been getting books through the PJ Library program. By far, Jonathan’s favorite is “Bagels from Benny”. It’s essentially a riff on the classic story of leaving bread for God in the Ark, the bread being taken from the Ark by a poor person, and the person leaving the bread learning the lesson that giving to the poor is doing God’s work in the world. The story ends with Grandpa telling Benny that feeding a hungry man has made the world a better place and saying, “and what better thanks could God have?” Jonathan thought for a moment and said, “Hmmmmmmmm. I don’t know. Maybe cake?”

Oh, and a couple of links, because people have been asking.
Mikaela’s Amazon Wishlist: http://amzn.com/w/3H9DXQM787VGX
Jonathan’s Amazon Wishlist: http://amzn.com/w/ZHKS0FLCFHN

We had a fun Labor Day brunch at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s house. The weather was beautiful, and it was wonderful that Bubbie was feeling better and was able to be there with us. The kids had a great time – Uncle Lloyd showed Jonathan how to use a telescope (well, he tried – Jonathan couldn’t quite manage closing one eye and keeping the other one open). Mikaela, Margo and Teresa harvested apples from the apple tree out back. It was a perfect holiday celebration – good weather, food, family, and fun

We got a nice treat when Annie came to town for her high school reunion. We had a fun, casual dinner at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s. Matt and Uncle Lloyd talked car repair. Mikaela gave Annie a refresher course in slapjack. And Mikaela and Jonathan provided some extra entertainment when they found Annie’s old twelve-string guitar. They’re pictured here leading us in a rousing (if slightly off-key) rendition of “Not By Might.”

Fourth of July weekend celebrations started early, with the Kramers getting in town from Dallas the week before the Fourth. It was great to see them – we got to eat a few meals together and the kids got to enjoy time together – like in this picture from our outing to Deanna Rose Farmstead. It was good to see Martie and Bob and Rylei again, and I’m really glad that my leg didn’t keep me from dinner at Jack Stack while Greg was in town too. (I managed to get a pretty nasty scrape on my leg when I fell – twice – in the garage, courtesy of a big oil slick next to my car. Thankfully, the oil was from a couple of bottles of oil I’d managed to run over, and not from the car itself).

The 4th of July itself meant pool party at the Rooks’. As usual, the kids had a blast in the pool and playing in the basement with friends that they don’t get to see all that often. And the adults even got to have some normal adult conversation. The food and drink was also excellent, as usual. Though next time Miriam makes a Pina Colada, I suspect she’ll do a more thorough job of checking the provenance of the maraschino cherries.

We closed out the holiday weekend by taking advantage of Sunday’s beautiful weather and gathering the cousins together in the park for a little photo shoot. I think we got some nice shots of Rylei, Mikaela, Samantha and Jonathan together, as well as a few of just the girls, and even some of Samantha solo. After we finished taking pictures, the kids took a little walk in the park with Miriam, Grandma Marcia and Aunt Martie – and found a treasure trove of seashells on the ground. They had a ball collecting, and then later sorting and cleaning their new “collections”