The Forest Trail

A Happy and Blessed Easter to all of our Christian friends!

This may look a little bit like a winter greeting, but note the green buds amidst the snow. It is spring. Sort of.

N. has been working on Kemana--his wilderness studies--even amid the chaos that overtakes me during the myriad preparations for Pesach.

This weekend, finally, despite looming tests, papers and projects, I have taken some time off to walk the forest trail with N. Bruce has come along, too!

Our house is in a development inside the Cibola National Forest, Sandia District. Certain sections have been sold to developers with very strict guidelines about the type of development--residential rural--in order to provide roads and access at the edge of forest lands. So we are fortunate to have the National Forest a few hundred feet from our door.

This is where N. has been doing the Wilderness Trail part of his Kamana-Nature Awareness work. He goes out almost every day and practices various aspects of nature awareness that are assigned in the course and then he comes home and uses books, the internet, journaling and mapping to research and describe the ecology of the place we live.

To get to his secret spot and to practice his awareness skills, N. uses the "forest trail," an unmapped trail that heads across a mountain meadow south of our house and then into the forest and up the ridge.

Entering the forest trail, is an experience in contrasts. One moment, you are in the meadow and it is light and open. The wind blows strongly down the meadow and across the trail. With a few steps, past an outlying juniper surrounded by grass--which is now really, really green!--you enter the forest, where the trail is bounded by the dense growth of the pinon-juniper woodland ecosystem. It is cooler, darker and more protected from the wind. Here you can hear the alarm calls of western jays--the self-appointed alarm system of the Cibola N.F.--as you move through the woods.

The trail takes you across the southern exposure of the ridge, and into the small canyon made by Sedillo Creek (it is really a wash since it does not have year-round water above ground). As you climb, you enter the ecotone between the pinyon-juniper woodland the Ponderosa Pine forest. The ridge between Sedillo and Juan Tomas is not quite high enough to become full Ponderosa Pine forest, but from the top, you can look across to higher mountain tops that do.

As we walked quietly on the forest trail, we saw trees that had fallen under the weight of winter snow, providing cover for coyote and rabbits. We saw quite a lot of coyote scat and some scat that may have belonged to a bear.

I could feel my hearbeat slow to a steady beat and my body relax. There is something that feels existentially right about walking with the soft earth beneath my feet and the sky above; with the wind blowing softly across my face, bringing the rich scents of the forest and the soft feel of humidity to my skin.

This spring, the forest is so green, and the ground is damp with recent snows and rains, making the smells richer and the air softer.

N. showed us the tracks of a bobcat that had used the trail briefly, before returning to the dense growth of the forest. They are very shy here, where there are so many people so close. It is very rare to actually see the cat.

We circled around a stand of Ponderosa and started back. As we crossed the mountain meadow, we saw a golden eagle take flight from the top of a juniper stand below. He has been hunting the meadow behind our house as well, but I have not had a camera available when he has been close enough to get a picture. I did not get this one either, but now that I know where he hangs out sometimes, I plan to come back, settle down in the shade and get the picture. This picture is from of the New Mexico Department of Tourism.

Now that the snows are off, I can walk the forest trail easily. Oh, I envy N. with his Kamana curriculum. What I am studying right now keeps me indoors--reading, memorizing and writing papers. It is very interesting and I like it, but I have to really work in the time to get outside. N. is outside in the forest almost every day!

John Stossel, Kids with AS, Middle School and the "S" Word

I am sure that I have mentioned that N. has AS, which is Aspergers Syndrome.

AS is an Autism Spectrum Disorder that involves difficulties with social interaction, non-verbal and verbal communication, and stereotyped obsessive behaviors. This sounds formidable, and it can be, but "Aspies" often look "normal" to others, although they seem to act just a little bit "different."

ABC Nightline and ABC News has been doing a series called Echoes of Autism about AS. Last night, Nightline ran a ten minute segment about the difficulties that students with AS have when they reach adolescence and middle school.

Middle school. John Stossel called middle school "the scorched earth zone of American childhood." A psychologist interviews on the Nightline program said several studies show that up to 90% of middle school students with AS are bullied every day. Every day!

I knew this statistic. And we had already had problems with bullying in N.'s elementary school experience. There were times of intense bullying interspersed with relatively calm times throughout for him. Sometimes it seemed to us as though all of our energy was going to keeping N. functioning in school and that there was none left over for actual learning. In the beginning of 4th grade, for example, N. spent most of his day under the table.

The statistics. Warnings from other parents that you cannot work and have a child with disabilities in middle school. Our previous school experiences. All of this, as well as academic concerns, and concerns about too much testing, factored into our decision to take N. out of school and begin homeschooling. N. has made great progress and never looked back.

When I watched the Nightline segment, I was mentally congratulating myself on the wise decision we had made not to send N. to middle school.

And then John Stossel said that sentence. The one I wrote above. The one I will repeat again, in case you missed it. It is easy to miss, I think, because it fits the picture of reality most Americans have. He said:

Middle school is the "scorched earth zone of American childhood."

Think about that statement. It was said very matter-of-factly. And yet it is both profoundly sad and full of despair. John Stossel was saying that American middle schools are terribly unfriendly, stressful places and that this is "normal." It is what we can expect of our children at a certain age. Adolescents are naturally cruel to each other and nothing can be done about that.The only problem is how to help children who are different, children who have disabilities adjust to it.

Since we have taken N. out of school, I have had the opportunity to watch homeschooled kids interact in a variety of settings. At the grocery store. At the library. At "park day." At museum science classes. In all of these settings, the kids are interacting in multi-age groups with minimal adult supervision. And they are not cruel to each other. They gently tease sometimes, but they explain the jokes to those who don't get it right away. They seem to think independently and do not have that group "herding instinct" that teachers so often laugh about when discussing adolescents.

And it is not only homeschooled kids who are this way. We have been going to the skateboard park, N's newest "special interest," lately. (Very good to large motor coordination and proprioreception). There, kids from about mid-elementary age to high-school come to practice their 'boarding." They teach each other new "moves," discuss the fine points of velocity and balance, organize themselves so that there are no collisions--and there really are no collisions--and help each other out. There are no adults in the Skatepark. N-O-N-E. Adults are elsewhere in the park, or gossiping happily on the picnic benches, but no adults are supervising the skaters. And the kids are civil with each other, and more, they are friendly and engaged in something of interest to all of them. They want it to work out so they can become better 'boarders.

From all of these observations, I have concluded that they way kids treat each other in middle school is not "normal" for them. It is abnormal. They are as nervous and jumpy as lab rats raised in an impoverished environment. It is not "normal" for social mammals to be isolated from their community and raised in an age-segregated environment. Animal behaviorists know that this is a recipe for making an animal "mean to the bone," as the little guy with AS said when he described his bully to John Stossel.

So why do we accept the antisocial behavior of middle school students as "normal?" Why are older people often afraid of adolescent energy?

My hypothesis is that the problem lies not with the kids, but with the environment in which we force them to live and grow and learn. The environment is age-segregated,intellectually unstimulating, encourages competition for teacher time and attention, crowded, noisy, and has only poor nutrition available. It is definitely not the optimal environment for young mammals out to learn how to be social in their culture.

It is so interesting that the first objection I am met with when I tell someone that I am homeschooling is the "S" question. "What about Socialization."

N. has so much more energy to put into learning social skills now that he is not in an environment that stresses him so much that he can barely function.

He skateboards, he plays chess, he studies electricity and magnetism, he goes to astronomy club meetings. In all of these places, he interacts with people of a variety of ages, all of whom want to share a particular interest. He is allowed to talk to people naturally, thus he learns social communication skills in the environment where they are to be used. What a concept!

Now I want to be clear that I do not think that school caused N.'s AS or that it is cured now that he is not in that environment. Rather, I believe that when people interact in real social situations where they are together in the pursuit of a common interest or goal, they are happy to accomodate differences among themselves. It is natural for people to want to share what they love with others. AS kids are no different--they want that, too. All of those good things that contribute to "flow" in human social situations are present when people get together voluntarily to learn together: affinity, intellectual stimulation, joy. I have very rarely seen them in my years teaching secondary education. And yet it is these things that de-stress a difficult learning for kids with AS. Affinity, intellectual stimulation, joy. These are the components need for developing social skills in any human being.

My answer to people who bring up the "S" word is that school is the least likely place for optimal social interactions to take place. It is up to the schools to make changes that will provide our children with socialization appropriate to human children. If and when they do so, I will consider the school option. Until then, to use another "S" word" Sayonara.

Europe is lost: Revisionist History in the UK

Sunday evening April 15 is

Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Memorial Day). Place a yellow candle in

your window at sunset that evening to show that you have

the courage to speak the truth of what happened.

Today as I was driving home from class, I came in on the middle of radio program about revisionist history being taught in the UK. Specifically, they are not teaching the Holocaust or the Crusades in history classes because it might offend Muslim students in the classes. I was going to blog extensively about it when I got home, but Judy Aron over at Consent of the Governed has already done that.

I do have some commentary on this issue, though. It has to do with fear.

Notice that the schools in the UK are worried about offending Muslims. They are not worried about offending Jews, who might have family members murdered in the Holocaust. They are not worried about offending their own elders, some of whom served in Europe during WWII and many of whom suffered terribly in the London blitz. They are not worried about offending gypsies, pacifists, trade-unionists, and gays, many of whom have predecessors who were killed in the death camps. So why are they worried about offending Muslims?



Could it have something to do with the fact that it was Muslim extremists that perpetrated the London bombings several years ago? Could have something to do with the fact that it has been Muslim extremism that has perpetrated almost all of the terrorist acts in this new century? I suspect this is the case.



I think we should be very worried when people silence themselves and refuse to speak the truth as they know it because of the threat of violence. It should be even more worrisome when government institutions do the same. Silence in Europe! Where have we seen that before?



Good night, England.

Why is this Night Different? Seder 5767

Our Seder at Sunset 14-15 Nisan 5767

April 2, 2007

Some of our guests socialize in the living room before the Seder

Once all the preparations are done, the fun part of Pesach begins. Bruce and I have had a Seder every year of our married life. Preparing Seder is important, but it is the guests that make the Seder work. Every year, I say that I am going to keep the number down to a managable 12 - 14 people, but that never happens. Someone always asks to bring guests of their own. And it always works out wonderfully when they do!


Of course, while some of the guests socialize, others wander into the kitchen to help me finish setting up. On Seder night, I am always up to my elbows in last minute tasks, but somehow, it all gets done.

Here is our Seder plate on the table. It has all of the usual symbols plus an orange. Later when we tell the meaning of the shankbone (it symbolizes the lamb sacrificed of old so our ancestors could mark the doorposts of their dwellings so that the angel of death could pass over them), and the matzah (the bread baked in haste when they fled Egypt), and the maror (bitter herbs--to symbolize the bitterness of slavery), we also tell the modern midrash of the orange on the Seder plate.

The Orange on the Seder Plate: A Modern Midrash

by N.

Sometime after the war, a famous rabbi was asked if women would ever read Torah. He said: "A woman belongs on the Bimah (raised platform where Torah is read) as much as an orange belongs on the Seder plate." The rabbi's wife heard him, but she didn't say anything. Months went by. When Pesach came, the rabbi's wife worked as hard as Jewish mothers do, removing chametz and preparing for the Seder. The rabbi cleaned his study. When he came out to take his place at the Seder table, there was an orange on the Seder plate! We are not free until all are treated equally as complete human beings, regardless of gender.

Elisheva's commentary on the midrash: A midrash is a story that amplifies the meaning of some aspect of Torah, or of Jewish law. This midrash is in the grand tradition. There have been many times where our rabbis have made pronouncements or tried to stop folk customs, but have been unsuccessful. They did not approve of some of the customs that developed around Purim, for example, and also Hannukah. But the people Israel maintained the customs and elaborated on them, and the rabbis had to accept that. The same was true in the middle ages, when Maimonides tried to impose a creed--Adon Olam. But many Jews, including the famous Nachmanides, rejected having a creed. So we sing Adon Olam, but it is not a creed that we all agree upon. In Judaism there is no higher authority that stands between a Jew and G-d. There is no orthodoxy in the stict sense of "right dictum" but rather an orthopraxy, that is "right practice." And there are differences of opinion about what is indeed "right practice." Remember--two Jews, three opinions! So we place an orange on our Seder plate to demonstrate that women do belong on the Bimah, and are on the Bimah in the majority of Jewish congregations throughout the world.

The purpose of the Seder meal is discussed in Torah. We are commanded: "You shall tell your child on that day..." So our rabbis set up a feast modeled on a Greek feast, but with many important differences. The purpose of all of the symbols and actions of the feast is to pique the curiousity of the children so that we can tell the story. Hence the "Four Questions" asked by a child or children begins the mighty Maggid, the Telling.

"How different is this night from all other nights! On all other nights, we eat leavened bread or matzah, why on this night, only matzah? On all other nights, we eat all kinds of vegetables, why on this night, only maror (bitter herbs)? On all other nights, we do not even dip once, why on this night do we dip twice? On all other nights, we eat sitting upright or reclining, why on this night, only reclining?" These questions call attention to the symbols and actions of the Seder and we answer by telling the story:

"We were slaves to pharoah in Mitzrayim (the narrow places--Egypt), but Adonai our G-d brought us forth with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. And if the Holy One, praised be G-d, had not taken our ancestors out of Mitzrayim, then we, and our children, and our children's children, would still be slaves to Pharoah in Mitzrayim. Now, even if all of us were sages, even if all of us were elders, even if all of us were learned in Torah, it would still be our duty to tell the story of the Exodus from Mitzrayim. Moreover, whoever elaborates upon the story of our Exodus is worthy of praise."

Because everyone who elaborates on the story merits praise, at our Seder, during the Telling (Maggid), everyone who wants to read gets a turn reading some of the story. The story is told in four different ways in order that everyone will learn something new from it.






Since the Maggid is so long, some people think that the four questions are: "When do we eat? When do we eat? When do we eat? When do we eat?"


We eventually do come to the time for eating. But first--as N. says, there's always a 'but first!--there is the ritual of the washing of hands. This is not a matter of cleanliness--it is assumed that one comes to the table with clean hands--it is a matter of raising our hands to a higher level because Judaism is a religion of the home, and in our homes, the dining table is called a mikdash katan, a little altar. Our service to G-d takes place at the table, starting with the ritual eating of bread, so we do a ritual handwashing before eating bread, or in this case, matzah. The custom is that one does not speak between washing and eating as they are one act, so when there is a large crowd, the first person to wash must be quiet the longest! This is hard on Jews--so there is always a mad rush to be last! However, we always manage to find someone to go first--and I am always last, since I help with the blessing.

At last! Food. Food is very important in every Jewish holiday, but at Pesach, it takes on greater meaning. The dinner is usually elaborate and served in courses and must be prepared according to the strict kashrut standards of Passover.

I am always the last to sit down--which means sometimes my most special dishes are already gone. I have learned to set back a little of my favorite kugels and such so that I do get a "bissele." My husband watches this in amazement (I guess men don't plan like this) and usually says, "My dear wife has a Yiddishe kop." (Translation: I married a really smart woman). Personally, I think my midwestern upbringing has something to do with it. Midwestern women are very practical.

But, wait, the mean is NOT the end! After the meal come some of my favorite parts of the Seder. During the Maggid, the children steal the afikomen, the broken middle matzah that symbolizes the passover lamb that was once sacrified in the temple. We cannot finish the meal until we can share the afikomen, so, in the interest of preserving what's left of our waistlines (Passover cooking is not on the FDA's food pyramid), we pay a prize to get the hidden afikomen back.

Then we say the blessing after meals, and then, we open the door for Eliyahu (Elijah), herald of "the great and awesome day of Adonai, when the hearts of the parents will be turned toward the children, and the hearts of the children toward the parents." The children are sent to open the door, and someone usually makes sure the amount of wine in Elijah's cup is lessened when they return. This year MLC had the honor, but she did not hear the word "lessen," so she chugged the whole cup! It was Manischewitz syrup...er, wine. Poor thing missed her Quantitative Analysis lecture yesterday.
It is our custom to sing Elijah's song while holding hands--and after three cups of wine, we all sway a little. It is a Jewish 'Kum ba-ya" moment.

But my favorite part of the Seder is the singing of Chad Gadya (Only One Kid).
The commentary on the song in our Haggadah is beautifully written, and it is always MLC that reads it. Part of it says: "To find in the Haggadah--so full already of miracles and marvels-- a peaceful place on the last page...And this very Haggadah whispers, 'Join us, you're welcome here...you belong among my pages full of smoke and blood, among the great and ancient tales I tell.' So I know that the sea was not split in vain, deserts not crossed in vain--If at the end of the story stand Daddy and the kid, knowing their turn will come." (By Robert Alteman).

And then we sing the song, each verse longer than the last, so that it is hard to sing the last verse all in one breath! (It is like the English "House that Jack Built).

We end the Seder saying: Next Year in "Jerusalem!"
And we sing Adir Hu (G-d of Might).

The guests depart with kisses and lots of food. The extra chairs are folded away.

Then there are the dishes...

An Adventure in the Rituals of Making a Seder

Yesterday, we had an unusual adventure while we were preparing for the first Passover Seder, which was observed last night.

One of the rituals for preparing for the Seder is Biur Chametz--the ritual of total destruction of the levening that was found in the Bedikat Chametz ritual that happened on Sunday evening.

The ritual involves burning the Chametz (levening) while reciting a legal formula that goes as follows:

"All chametz in my possession, whether I have seen it or not, whether I have removed it or not, is hereby nullified and ownerless as the dust of the wind."

The formula is recited in Aramaic and in the language of the place--here English. I am reciting the formula as I sit next to the firepit N. dug. I need the book to remember the Aramaic!





N. has become my right-hand man for conducting this ritual of Pesach preparation. He has learned how to lay a small fire and get it started and keep it going in Boy Scouts. We do not need lighter fluid anymore!
N. is also very conscientious about putting a fire completely out safely. More on this later--it is part of the unusual thing that happened yesterday.

Here is N., getting ready to put the first of the ten pieces of chametz to the fire. This year we had crackers left--we had eaten all the bread alreay. I wrapped each cracker into a small sandwich bag in order to minimize crumbs when I hide the chametz for the search.
You can see the fire in a small hole--to keep it below the wind--and ringed with stones, on cleared ground near the asphalt driveway--which was downwind from the fire yesterday.




So, I recited the legal formula declaring that we were at the end of the process of removing chametz from our lives for the next eight days.

N. placed the chametz on the wooden spoon we had used to collect it during the search.
In the process of burning the chametz, the spoon is also burned, as is the feather used to sweep it onto the spoon, and anything else that came in contact with it.

I interpreted this liberally yesterday. There was a small wind, and I did not want to burn the paper bag, which risked blowing sparks across the driveway. I never burn the plastic, either, as it produces potentially toxic fumes. The Torah says "you shall live by them (the laws)," which the Rabbis of the Talmud interpreted to mean "you shall live by them, not die by them." I did not want to begin Pesach by burning down the entire forest--only the Chametz. I did not want to annoy the neighbors with toxic fumes, either. So we completed the ritual of Biur Chametz safely and without incident.

N. smothered the fire with dirt, buried it completely, making sure that no smoldering sticks remained even partially unburied, and covered the area with stones.




I went back into the house, got the matzah ball dough out of the refrigerator, and commenced making matzah balls.

The ritual of making kneidlach, as matzah balls are called in Yiddish, is not commanded anywhere, but it is an important ritual in the Ashkenazi (Yiddish-speaking) Jewish kitchen. My recipe includes only well-beaten eggs, matzah meal and salt. I do not use chicken fat or any modern substitute. This makes them very light, if the eggs are well whipped, and they rise up in the soup quickly and expand readily in the boiling liquid. Here they are boiling and steaming the kitchen with a delicious smell.

As I was forming the matzah balls, the dogs began barking and I thought I heard a vehicle on our street. Since the dogs stopped readily, I continued with what I was doing. It is hard to be interrupted when shaping matzah balls, because the dough is very sticky on the hands. I coat my hands with a little olive oil (kosher for Pesach, of course), so cleaning them would be a pain. But then the dogs started barking again. This time it was their urgent, "somebody is in our yard" bark. So I reluctantly washed my hands, and carrying the towel as I dried them, went to the front of the house to determine what the ruckus was about.

A Bernalillo County fire department truck was parked on the road above our driveway, and two firemen were walking along the edge of the driveway!
After stilling my rapidly beating heart, I went out to see what was going on. As I opened the door, I heard one fireman say to the other: "Are you sure this is the right address? I don't see anything at all!"

Naturally, I greeted them and asked them what was up. It turns out that a neighbor had seen the smoke from the burning chametz--a little fire burning bread makes a lot of white smoke--and had called the fire department, thinking our house was burning down. I explained that it was the beginning of Passover and that we had burned ten crackers near the driveway. I then asked if there were fire-restrictions that I had not heard about.
The fireman said, no restrictions, but they had gotten a call and came to check it out.
I explained that the fire was small, placed in a protective area and below wind level.
The fireman said it was alright--certainly religious rituals are allowed in Bernalillo County as long as safe practices are observed. Then he said: "We weren't even sure we had come to the right place, there is no evidence that you burned anything at all."
I explained that my 13-year old son is a Boy Scout and has all the fire safety training down and that he is always extremely careful.
They said they could see that he is skilled, since there was absolutely no evidence of any fire, not even a charred stick. One of them then said: "Have a good holiday," and they said good-bye and left.

I went back to my kneidlach, contemplating the incident. Maybe we should have used the grill? But that is well above wind-level. It appears we have some nervous neighbors. Understandable, and probably a good thing, overall.

What is funny, though, it that we burned our chametz every year in the city. No one every expressed any concern at all. Only out here, where the houses are further away, and much more private, have we ever had a problem with it.

I suppose I could put out a general e-mail to the HOA list, explaining the ritual.
Or maybe just let it go until next year.

Hmmm.

Carnival of Homeschooling Spring Fever

The Carnival of Homeschooling is up for this week. Kris has made the theme "Spring" and there are many good reads there!

Head on over to Kris's Eclectic Homeschool and catch Spring Fever.

Making Pesach and the Search for Levening

Today we turned the kitchen over for Pesach. This means removing all the dishes that will not or cannot be make kosher for Passover, kashering those that will be used during the holiday and then bringing in the Pesadikh dishes and the food.

In the process, there is much cleaning. The cabinets have to be cleaned out, the counters cleaned and covered, and there is a massive moving of dishes.

Everybody helps!
This is MLC, my 21 year old daughter, showing off her muscles as she removes a stoneware salad bowl. Stoneware takes on the substance of the food placed in it, being porous and cannot be made kosher for Passover.

MLC is a runner and is training for "Run for the Zoo!" She has been getting very good times and is proud of her progress.



Another thing that has to be done is the kashering of pots, pans and utensils for use during Pesach. Different items have different rules. May utensils are immersed in boiling water. First, you boil a full pot of water. Then you immerse a stone to make the water overflow and kasher the outsie of the pot. Making Pesach involves a lot of towels! Once the pot is kosher, you can immerse your utensils. (I keep a set of Pesadikh tongs which I use to fish them out again).

Here I am kashering some of the items I will need for Pesach.

I also kasher my pots and pans. That involves scrubbing off accumulated carbon and then using the heat of the pan or pot to make it kosher for Passover. I have a dream that someday I will have a separate 'Pesadikh' set of cookware. But I really like my cookware and to have another set would be very expensive. I do have Pesadikh china for the Seder and also Pesadikh plates for the rest of the holiday. I do NOT kasher glassware. Usually, the klutzes of the family break enough glassware that it is worth getting a new set of drinking glasses every year in time for Pesach.

I do have special stemware for Pesach, however. This I got from my mother-in-law, may she rest in peace. I never knew her, but Bruce was given her crystal and I use it only for Pesach.

Here is N., removing my "Longest Tram in the World" souvenir beer stein. Beer, being fermented grain, is Chametz (levened stuff). During Pesach, we are commanded to remove the Chametz (foods made from wheat, oats, spelt, and rye) so the beer stein is definitely NOT Pesadikh.

Like I said, everybody helps. Bruce even gets out the Passover cartons that hold the dishes and some of the ritual objects. But then he disappears into his office. His job is to the get the taxes done before Pesach so that he can enjoy the Seder.

When the sun went down tonight, we conducted a ritual called "Bedikat Chametz" which is the search for levening.

I hid 10 pieces of bread around the house while N. took the dogs out. Then N. took a candle and a feather and a wooden spoon and searched out the Chametz. Yes, I hid some behind the plant! We said a blessing for fulfilling the commandment of removing the chametz. Then we recited a legal formula that says:

"All Chametz in my possession, which I have not seen or removed, or of which I am unaware, is hereby nullified and ownerless as the dust of the earth."

In this way, we acknowledge our honest effort at removing chametz from our lives--those things which enslave us or remove us from our true selves--but we also recognize that the job can never be completely done.

The kitchen is now turned over. I have started my chicken soup and the brisket. The turkey is slow roasting. Tomorrow I will make the side dishes and prepare for the Seder. I am actually ready! I have a lot of cooking to do tomorrow, but I know it will all get done!

Now the fun part of Pesach begins!