Building a Sukkah, Part I

Josh has, for a long time, been talking about building a sukkah to cover the whole deck. Well, finally he's done it (part I)! Here is the sukkah, of his own design:

Step 1: Buy a bunch of wood. (8 [2x4], 20 [1x2], 1 [1x6], 1/4" dowels)



Notch 2 of the [2x4]s to fit the [1x6] 4 inches deep. Drill and add 2 dowels to the top of all 8 [2x4]s.

Slide the 1x6 into the notches, and the [1x2]s (on the taller axis) onto the dowels (having first cut them to size and having drilled holes into them, obviously).

By adding a few dowels along the short side of the sukkah, the extra 12 [1x2]s can be stood up to be a foundation for the schach.
Tada--(the structure of) a sukkah the size of the deck!
Next up: walls (tarps?) and schach (4 [4x8] bamboo mats).

Making Round Challot for 5770!

Shana Tova everyone! We undertook our yearly creation of round challot. Sara mixed the ingredients. Josh rolled out the dough and started braiding:



Start with a weaved pound sign, as above. Then swap the location of each pair of braids that makes a 90 degree angle. Do that again, but crossing in the opposite direction. Do it one last time, and you end with the picture below:

Pinch all 8 ends together in the middle and flip the thing over:

Rise, egg wash, and bake!

Yum! (And cranberries go awesomely with honey)

Vacation in Northern California

What a busy week!

First we went to San Francisco--we wandered around Fisherman's Wharf, Ghiradelli Square, and all the way to the Golden Gate bridge. Click here for some highlights. Or just enjoy resting your feet and seeing the Golden Gate in the background. (Sara must be staring off at a distant Alcatraz.)

Then we went hiking in Oakland, at a now-collapsed volcano and in some redwood forest. Click here for highlights. Or just appreciate this photo here--Sara at the top of a quarry in the volcanic preserve:




On day 3, Friday, it was time to head down to Sunnyvale for wedding weekend. (The purpose of our trip--to celebrate Beth and Evan's wedding!) We stopped at Quarry Lakes along the way. It was a gorgeous, if hot, day. We both came back with a bit of a tan. Highlights here, or just enjoy this one lake photo:

On Sunday, Beth married Evan! It was a beautiful day, and a beautiful wedding, all in Beth's grandparent's backyard! Click here for some highlights, or just enjoy her happy, loving gaze:

Finally, we drove up north to see wine country. And the Jelly Belly factory. Click here for some highlights. Or just enjoy Sara inspecting the grapes for firmness.


Finally...a HUGE thank you to Garrett and Elke Barter for being such amazing and giving hosts to us this weekend, allowing us to use their guest room, their car, Penny (their GPS), their guidebooks, and their food. You guys rock!

Ultrasound @ 20 weeks

Dlet shows off swimming ability!



And here we see a nice footplant (5 toes?), a prominent nose, and both a left and right brain hemisphere!

In a few more months, we hope to be able to share color pictures :)

Auntie's 60th!

We went to W. Hartford this past weekend to celebrate Aunt Helen's 60th birthday.
In addition to Mom, Jason, Naomi, Lauren, Jerald, Jono, Seth, Becca, and Justin, we spent the whole weekend with:


Shalom, Aviva, Rena, Elliot, Avi, Yitzi, Uncle Les, Ella, Nachi, Aunt Helen, Tzipora, Gram, Elan, Mo, Daniel, Meira, and Chani! It was good to gather the clan from Boston to Baltimore and hang out all 28 of us. It doesn't happen often enough. Thanks for being born, Auntie!

Of course, with that many kids (and adults), the party wasn't the orderly, calm type as you might think from the above picture. Most of the time things were moving so fast the pictures came out blurry! Here's a more representative shot:



For more pictures, see here