Iain and I are currently studying Jewish culture, religion and customs together. Some of the rituals and ideas I’ve been reading about are truly beautiful. I don’t think it’s for me, right off the bat I could never get behind the whole circumcision thing (funny that jumps to mind first and not the greater philosophical differences), but I do find it absolutely fascinating. I’m enjoying this chance to delve deeper into subjects that I only have superficial (at best) knowledge of. And while I don’t see myself converting any time soon, I feel like there is a lot here that is worth learning.

This week we made an effort at incorporating some of the ideas behind Shabbot into our lives. I’m not quite up to the honoring of the Sabbath completely, but we did have a nice festive meal, while talking about the different practices we might be involved in, if we were a Jewish family. Then we took it easy for the rest of the night. With a class this morning and all of our errands to run after, there will be no rest for us today though.

I love the idea of a weekly sabbath and I’ve always thought how I would love to institute one for myself and our family. A day to come together, to honor and renew our spirit, celebrate and relax as a family. I just don’t see how I could possibly do it right now! I know, I know, the old bit about the creator of the world the whole world being able to take a day off, but modern woman not. I can’t help it though, it’s true. No, the world wouldn’t stop turning, but some very important things would go undone. And I would have to work twice as hard the rest of the week to take that one day off. These days I really don’t think that’s even possible.

Back to what we actually did manage to do… Dinner started off with traditional inspiration, but quickly took on our own flair. With being egg-free and gluten-free, I’m finding it difficult to find appropriate foods to go along with this block! The egg thing makes it especially hard with all of the egg noodles and egg breads and such. We did make Challah bread. It was a pretty ridiculous thing to attempt really….gluten-free, egg-free EGG BREAD. It actually turned out pretty well, considering. We based ours off of this recipe, switching out Egg Replacer for eggs… as well as swapping several other ingredients. We kept the same basic basic proportions though. I baked a couple of banana breads at the same time to have, so that we would have quick food on hand for our busy Saturday. There was salmon with sauce and onions, and meatballs with a dipping sauce for those among us who don’t care for fish. We had delicata squash and peas. I had planned on making greens as well, but I was tired and seeing as we had a whole bunch of broccoli at lunch, I decided not to fuss about it. Oh and there was sparkling grape juice in lieu of wine.

Iain and Elijah made candle holders for the table by taking a set of jars and filling them with some of the crystals they’ve been finding in our yard. They also pressed some pretty leaves between the crystals and the glass. The little Galey boy was intent on having a candle of his own, so I fished out a little homemade one (I actually think it was the one that we used for his first birthday) and he found a candle holder from their play kitchen which fitted it perfectly. After lighting the candles, we said a blessing in our own words, in our own way, over a glass of grape juice. We broke our Challah and shared our meal!