The Winning Ticket
December 2012
In the hours leading up to last week’s mind-blowing Powerball drawing, my boys were busy spending their winnings. Each devised his own specific game plan, but the essentials were more or less the same. (Read More)
Keeping an Eye on the Storm
November 2012
It was the eve of Hurricane Sandy and I was on line at Walmart. My cart was full of bottled water, but I’d also picked up camping-strength rain ponchos, thermal underwear, and a package of little candles for my son’s birthday, which we would mark in the aftermath of the storm. (Read More)
Everything Is Shrinking
October 2012
This year, I swore things would be different.
The week before Rosh Hashana, I made my way to the kosher butcher and stocked up. Though I feared the sticker shock, what I really dreaded was having to wait on those crazy long lines while making idle chit chat. How wonderful it would be, I imagined, to simply shop in my garage freezer when it came time to cook over the course of this festival-filled month. (Read More)
Rounding Up
September 2012
We are on the threshold of Tishrei, the beginning of a beautiful month of Jewish holidays. It is the New Year, a time for self-reflection and thoughtful resolutions, as well as my seasonal penchant for list-making. (Read More)
A Driving Lesson
September 2012
In accordance with our family’s summer tradition, we took the boys on a meticulously orchestrated two-week road trip this past August. Because the experience is by design less about our destination and more about the adventures along the way, we are always thrilled to integrate pleasant but unexpected detours into the plan as we go. (Read More)
Clearing House and Mind
August 2012
With the August sun bearing down upon me, I spent this past week cleaning. I don’t mean your average sweeping and dusting kind of cleaning or your mother-in-law is coming cleaning or even find every crumb pre-Pesach cleaning. I mean scorched earth, take no prisoners, it’s like we’re moving cleaning. (Read More)
If You Give a Girl a Checklist
July 2012
In the early weeks of summer, I found myself fantasizing about all the things I would accomplish in the extra hours these longer days have to offer. (Read More)
Ice Cream for Dinner
June 2012
The calendar passed into June when I wasn’t looking, so now I’m busy wrapping teachers’ gifts and ironing labels onto the waistbands of camp shorts at warp speed. Though there are still finals to take and essays to write, summer is about to be crowned king. You can practically wrap your hands around the excitement pulsing through the house. (Read More)
A Band of Brothers
June 2012
Now that the cheesecake and blintzes are behind us, I started thinking about a few non-dairy matters that came to mind over Shavuot. (Read More)
The End of a Ritual
May 2012
When our boys were little, bedtime rituals were a sweet treat I savored at the end of each day. They involved all of the usual – the reading of stories, the singing of lullabies, some snuggling, and plenty of kisses to noses and foreheads and puffy little cheeks. (Read More)
Our Garden
April 2012
Spring has delivered another batch of color and sound to our little corner of New Jersey. I awake to the whip of the sprinkler, which silently waters the garden but pings its way loudly across the shingles of the house. Bird songs provide the sound track for my morning coffee as I stare out the window to spot what has blossomed overnight. (Read More)
The Nutcracker
March 2012
One of my earliest – and fondest – memories of Pesach is this:
My grandmother, my mother, my sister, and I are sitting around my mother’s kitchen table. There are bags of whole walnuts in a pile at the center, and the broken shells are slowly filling up a large Pyrex bowl. Three of us grip our metal nutcrackers, and one lucky soul – the one whose turn it is to give her knuckles a rest – is cranking the clumsily shelled nut pieces in a hand-turned nut grinder. (Read More)
Let the Games Begin
March 2012
Like wearing white before Memorial Day, thinking about Pesach before Purim is a faux pas best kept under wraps. Any mention of the “P” word while everyone else is packing mishloach manot raises eyebrows at best, and it can set others entirely on edge. But Pesach is where my mind was, even as I was baking hamantaschen. (Read More)
Do I Want It or Do I Need It?
February 2012
It’s time for true confessions, so I beseech you not to judge me harshly. I have sink envy. There. I’ve said it. (Read More)
Please, May I Have a Do-Over?
February 2012
Decoupage is Queen of the Crafting World and I am her loyal subject.
It is a happy obsession, one that enables me to rescue the old, the garbage-bound, and the utilitarian and transform them into something colorful that makes me smile. My family knows this is no trifling matter. The long–running joke here cautions you not to sit for too long, lest you find yourself covered in giant paper tea roses. (Read More)
Make Way For Ducklings
January 2012
The Art of Idling
January 2012
It is a truth universally acknowledged that on the day I have a long-ago scheduled doctor’s appointment or an important meeting or even once-in-a-blue-moon plans for a social activity that one of my boys will awake with an unpleasant, uncomfortable – though, thank G-d, in no way life-threatening – ailment that will require him to stay home from school. (Read More)
Merri Ukraincik 