No-Sew Mask Credit: Adventures in Mama-Land

I'm so glad to have discovered Tzivia's  Literally TWO MINUTE no-sew easy coronavirus mask from an old hankie (video + step-by-step guide).

I followed directions best I could. The only differences were that since my husband's hankies are a bit smaller, I had to fold a bit larger than by thirds, and it felt better to tie slightly differently around my head, probably because my scarf is different. But I'm very happy with the results. I'll probably cut some 100% cotton fabric the right size to have more.

Thanks, Tzivia. I really appreciate the idea and your hard work perfecting this no-sew mask.

PS I used about a meter of jersey yarn I've been crocheting with for potholders and rugs.

Hiking Shoes? Only in Israel

One of those very "Only in Israel" things is the Israeli understanding of Hiking Shoes, especially for people my age and older. When I was at last week's Kenes Shiloh, I took one of the offered walking tours.

Before all the lectures start, one can register in advance for one of two tours. One is for "first-time" visitors, or those who hadn't been to Shiloh Hakeduma in the past few years. It gives a general background of Tel Shiloh and takes the participants to the movie, among other sites. And I go on the tour for recent visitors which tries to give us the latest discoveries and the newest high tech sites.

Even though these tours are walking tours, more like hikes, many participants are older than me and need the aid of walking sticks etc. Besides that, look at their "hiking shoes."  Yes, Israelis wear sandals for hiking.

I wore comfortable sneakers, which are my summer hiking shoes.

My guess is that most older Israelis don't find anything strange or unusual in hiking in sandals. That's how they had been raised. Even in the 1970s when my older children were young, your typical Israeli only had one pair of shoes at a time. They had heavy 100% leather shoes in the winter and sandals, also of leather, in the summer. These shoes and sandals were also produced here in Israel.

One summer in the late 1970s the girls and I spent the summer in New York with the family. (My husband joined us for August, since he needed to work.) My mother registered my older daughters in a free local day camp. We sent them with their lunch, so kashrut wasn't a problem. One of the first days of camp they came back reporting that they had been forbidden to play sports.

"Why?"
"Only children wearing sports shoes were allowed. Sandals aren't considered safe here."

So we quickly went off to buy them sneakers.

In Israel kids played soccer in sandals. They kicked balls and hiked in their summer sandals. There were no such rules about shoes being required at that time. A few years later, when we were already living in Shiloh, I became the girls gym teacher. The girls were required to wear suitable shoes for sports classes. I also made them wear pants under their skirts for modesty. I even calculated their grades according to their cooperation with the dress cold. My rationale was that sports talents were gifts from Gd, while they were responsible for dressing themselves. I didn't like the idea of giving a girl a low grade, because she hadn't been blessed with athletic ability.

What do you think?

Most Useful and Safest Cleaning Tool

I don't use sprays. I don't like the idea of breathing in dangerous cleaning chemicals or having them damage my eyes. That's why I use an old-fashioned long-handled cleaning brush.

Just put the cleansers, bleach etc. in a bucket with water and scrub away.

The big problem is that they are difficult to find nowadays.

Safety Glove and Vegetable Soup

I'm sure that I'm not the only person who has all sorts of scars on my fingers from "cutting accidents." Somehow the knife slices fingers more easily than a tomato. That's what happened to me other other night, and not for the first time.

A few years ago, I bought my kids and myself safety gloves that we're supposed to wear on the non-cutting hand to prevent these annoying, unintentional and sometimes long-healing slices. They were definitely not the most enthusiastically and graciously received gifts. Only one of my kids even admitted that it's needed. The rest made it clear that I had wasted my money. I kept one for myself and must admit that it has been sitting a the drawer with lots of kitchen gadgets I'd been given by my husband never to be used. But that last cut really bothered me, more as a reminder than anything else. I didn't need professional first aid.

I wore the glove on my left hand when cutting up vegetables yesterday for the post-fast, Ta'anit Ester-Fast of Ester, and Mishloach Manot (Purim food gift) Vegetable Soup.

Here's an illustrated Vegetable Soup Recipe:

For this vegetable soup, you need two pots, cutting implements and boiling water.

1- take a cup of dried peas, put them in a pot, add boiling water, cover for an hour or more so they will be at least partially cooked before you add them to the vegetables.

Here are all of the vegetables I used, 3 carrots, 2 squash, 2 onions, 1 sweet potato and some fresh garlic. 

As you can see, my left had is protected by the glove, even though I did very little actual cutting. That's because I "cheated" and used the food-processor for the actual slicing.

As you may notice from the magimix 2000 written here, my food processor is old and small. I work in batches and keep emptying it when full. There are two major advantages to using one especially for larger soups.
1- quicker and safer preparation since I don't have to do so much cutting.
2- it slices the vegetables thin, so cooking takes much less time. 

1- I put all the sliced vegetables in a large covered pot with oil and let it begin the cooking process.
2- I also boiled water, and when it was boiling...
3- I added the parboiled (partially cooked) peas to the vegetable pot and used the boiling water to rinse out the pea pot and added all the liquid to the cooking vegetables.
4- Lower to simmer after it all reaches a boil, and then have it cook for 40-60 minutes.
5- Just before you turn off the flame/heat, add salt and pepper. You can add parsley or whatever other seasonings you want at the same time.

Wait at least 15 minutes after turning off the stove before you serve the soup.

This is a "never fail," "TNT-tried and true" Vegetable Soup.

How Can I Report This?

The other day when I was walking from the bus stop at the First Station, the old Jerusalem Train Station which has become a lovely activity, leisure place with restaurants and more, on my way to my husband's office in the Menachem Begin Heritage Center, I found myself being forced to walk on the busy road because of a truck parked on the sidewalk.

I really felt in danger, since it's a very busy road with buses, cars, trucks etc. so I took those photos. I figured that if Gd forbid something happened to me in my attempt to walk down the street, the camera's memory card would survive. I needed to be on that side of the street, and I was in a rush, so walking back and looking for a place to cross the street and then crossing back just didn't seem very practical. Thank Gd, as I walked, cars stopped for me to pass the truck and get back on the sidewalk.

My greatest danger ended up being the driver who returned to the truck just as I took these pictures. He wasn't a happy camper and kept yelling at me. That really frightened me. So I got to the Begin Center as quickly as I could and hoped and prayed that he was far away when I exited and waited for my next bus.

Safe Walking, Finally a Sidewalk!

One of the worst things about my job in Sha'ar Binyamin was that there was a section between commercial buildings that forced pedestrians to walk with the cars.

It was hard enough for a very careful and lucky adult alone, but I can't imagine how anyone could take young children safely to or from the bus stop, or from Rami Levy or Yafiz or the bakery etc. to the clinic, pharmacy or bus stop.

So, I was overjoyed the other day to see that a sidewalk/ramp was being made there.

All I want to know is:

Why did it take so long?

Ready for the Holidays and Safety First

I was going to post this a few weeks ago. 

One of the signs that Rami Levy was getting read for the hectic Jewish Holiday season, which in terms of shopping lasts a month, was to stock up on new shopping carts.

Here's proof that they do start with brand new ones, but being a very successful discount supermarket, the carts age.  But these were lined up near the store a few weeks before Rosh Hashannah and are already in use.  They wheel easily, too.

I noticed something that most people ignore:

Besides rescuing the kid who could have suffocated, because her head was in the plastic bag, I've told parents to mind their kids instead of leaving them playing together in a shopping cart.  Too many parents think of the shopping cart as some safety enclosure where they can just let the kids play, stand, jump etc.   Or they drag the cart behind them, full of enough supplies for a brigade, oblivious as it bangs into displays and people.

The exit of Rami Levy is a decline, and I've seen lots of miracles, when people have let go and the cart would roll, picking up speed almost running down children (even their own) or into the shoe store's glass window.

Too bad you don't need a drivers license for those carts...

Happy and safe shopping!

Terrifying

I thought I had seen everything. 

I've been among a crying crowd at a funeral for a baby who died when her totally over-tired sick father forget her in a car.  The sight of the chevra kaddisha (Jewish burial staff) emerging from the ambulance (we don't use hearses in Shiloh) carrying the dead baby in his arms elicited such a collective cry of grief... unforgettable.

I'm a survivor of a terror attack which left a couple dozen wounded, including myself, and one dead.

I once found myself waiting with neighbors, some dead and some alive, who had been in a horrific, tragic car accident.

I've spent time in the hospital praying for my sons, one after an accident and one who was deathly ill as a tiny infant.

I successfully, thank G-d, did Heimlich on my young son choking on an ice cube.

I could go on unfortunately...

But when I saw the toddler with her head fully enclosed in a plastic bag, while her parents happily shopped I could not be quiet.  I just had to speak to the parents.

"Excuse me, but it's very dangerous to pull plastic bags over a head like that."
"It's fine" insisted the young father.
"It can be fatal" I continued.  The father glared at me as the mother took the bag off of the child's head.  "There are countries that have Keep Away From Children on plastic bags."

picture credit

 

Then I continued on my way to use the amazingly well-kept WC's at Rami Levy Discount Supermarket.

Don't Spray! Cleaning Alert

In the Jewish World this is a very dangerous season.  The desperate, dedicated fanatic Passover "spring" cleaning unfortunately fills the hospital emergency rooms with many preventable injuries.

One of Rabbanit Yemima Mizrachi's warnings was about dangerous cleaning supplies, because a friend's child spent months hooked up to all sorts of unpleasant feeding tubes after drinking a strong cleanser which had been in a cup on the table.  If the dirt needs a substance so strong and powerful, then it's not the forbidden chametz anymore.  Anything that doesn't come off with ordinary cleansers and elbow grease can stay forever including on Passover.

My own personal pet peeve is the marketing and use of spray bottles for cleansers.  If you spray, you're endangering your eyes, skin and lungs.  I don't spray.  I work with rubber gloves, rags, commercial "sponges" and for the hard to reach spots, brushes, the longer the handles the better, though beware of dripping poisons into your eyes and on your skin.

Also, keep the windows open, so you won't breathe in dangerous fumes.

You don't want to exchange a "chametzdik" (full of chametz) house for a hospital room.