Happy Rosh Chodesh!

Happy Rosh Chodesh Adar! What sweet memories Rosh Chodesh Adar brings...no, not all the pre-Purim drinking memories, the Beth Yehuda dance through the hallway memories, when Sim kidnapped me from kindergarden, and I went dancing with the rest of the school into the resource room until my teacher came and stole me back....

Scooplefying

I have been reprimanded for not posting for a long time and told that there are some people who want to hear from me; so let's see.
Mr. Littlest started throwig up shabbat afternoon and continued throughout the night every 20 min. So Sun. I took him to the doctor and she was gonna send me home with a speacial drink and if it didn't work then we would have to go the hosital to put some fluids into him. But I asked if my friend, the nurse, could just give it to him in the kupah. After the speacial drink didn't stay down, we hooked naftali up to an IV and gave him fluids. He got a bag and a half and then we came home, but he didn't get better for a bunch more hours. He was up all night asking for food though. Today he is slightly pathetic, but doing much better. I am on two nights of no sleep and am tired!!
In othr news, we now have all the basics so Oldest can be Harry Potter for Purim, Thing 2 wants a pretty dress, 3 wants to be a ninja turtle and 4 was told he can be a purple dinosaur that did not fit him last year.
And thats the scoop!

The Zoo

In case you are wondering taking your kids to the Zoo in the freezing cold weather is a bad idea.
I was going to take Jonah to the mall and let him run around the play area and have a good time tiring himself out, while I sat on a bench and watched. Then I ad the idea to ask our friends (Noa's parents) if they wanted to come, and they opted for the zoo.

So off we went to the zoo. Jonah enjoyed the indoor butterfly and bird house. But the rest of the time there wasn't fun. There were only a few animals that ventured out, most animals had Te sense to stay indoors. Whenever we did see an animal Jonah wanted to get out of his stroller and see what we were looking at, and he never wanted to return to the stroller.

He threw a huge fit after we saw a polar bears, so I promised him graham crackers. The problem was he was wearing mitten with no fingers, so he couldn't hold the crackers and eat them. So he took off his mittens and ate, but turned into a freeze pop.

Once he thawed out he told me he did enjoy himself, so that made it all worthwhile

Purim

It's been a longstanding tradition to celebrate Purim with our family and teh hochheisers (and then other families who joined as the years went on) We'd see the elderly get drunk, and lots of throw up. Dad once got a cotton candy machine, Dassie H once threw a crystal bowl at me for squirting her with water.

But the crowds were getting older the Hochheiser boys (except shuie) left town and didn't return, and Nat and I were thinking of doing something with our friends. But we were all talk, or so we thought, we couldn't leave the family seuda.

Then, on Friday, I was at the motherhouse, and Mom asked Dad if he wanted to go to Israel for Purim and I knew that it was time for our own party.

So, should you find yourself in Detroit for Purim, the party is at our house Nat doesn't want anyone throwing up ;( Throwing up aside, we should have a fun time.

Greetings from Detroit;
Its official-We are going to Israel for Purim. We've done Chanukah- Paseach- Tu b;
'shvat- Tish B'av- and now PURIM ( not mention Shushan Purim and Taanis Esther)- We have worked out an exciting itinerary for our short visit
Sunday Arrive at Lod. Bar Mitzva at Bet Shemesh and sleep in Jerusalem
Monday- drive to top of Israel
Wed- drive to bottom of Israel
Friday - Drive to top of Israel
Sunday-Drive to bottom of Israel and go home Whoo! I need a rest
Love DAD

our trip by BZ

WELCOME TO NYC!!
PEOPLE JUST DON"T LISTEN TO THE POSTED SIGNS

NY has a weird effect on chanalana's hands

so other than children never going to sleep on time and always waking up early, which just leads to a midday and evening meltdown, our trip to NY was good. i took some pictures of all the things we said to the kids. I can't remember the last time i had say "don't step in the poop" so many times in one weekend. its like their little shoes are attracted to squishy (and hard) brown plops. why do we have to say watch where your walking? they know its gross. but its like they aim for it. well luckily nobody stepped inn any this time although shira thought she did but really she missed. (better luck next time) mom in law is doing well, as is cousin dalia who brought her botfriend to our nieces bday party. we had shawarma at YU and a great steak dinner at one of devorah's friends in Flatbush. unfortunately DOUGIES is closed and there is no where to egt a good burger there anymore. we saw friedmans for a short while and also got to see Zevie. so all in all it was well worth the trip, (steak, shawarma, and pizza) and grandma)

The Jewish Chinese Speaking Man From Suriname...

Friday night was interesting. i was at a sorta Shabbaton with about 150 people from around the world. A number of participants were asked to speak for two minutes about their hometown Jewish communities. The first person to speak was from Suriname. Suriname is north of Brazil and east of Venezuela. Very nice. The next person to stand up was from Kaifeng, China. He didn't speak any English, and very little Hebrew, not to worry Suriname Man speaks a fluent Chinese. So Mr. Jewish Chinaman spoke about his community in what can only be described as Chinese sounding noises, and Jewish Suriname Man translated to English. Up next was Mr. Man From Columbia. Aparently there is more then just druglords in Bogata, Columbia they have a nice Jewish community as well. Well, that's what we think he said, it was translated from Spanish by...you guessed it, Mr. Suriname. I don't know how I've gotten this far in life without my own Suriname-ian translator. What am I to do next time I meet some nice Jews from Kaifeng? South America?

My Thumb Still Hurts

Greetings from the DAD.
I know everybody is anxious to hear about our cruise even though no one has actually asked us about it.
Day 1 - Sunbathed on left side of body while lying on right side of ship
Day 2- sunbathed on right side of body while lying on left side of ship
Day 3- Almost died along with Bubbie Hilda,Mom and Cheryl while snorkling in 50 foot waves and zero degree temps off the coast of Mexico. It was well worth the risk because we saw at least 5 fish. Than we SHOPED AND SHOPPED AND SHOOOOPED
Day 4- sunbathed top of head with smaller than usual yarmalke
Day 5- Climbed up the middle of a 650 foot high waterfall in Jamaica while holding hands with sunburned strangers who had body piercings and tatoos in places that they shouldnt have
Day 6- I sunbathed bottom of feet in middle of ship while Reading the new Jonathan Kellerman book.
Day 7 SHABBAT
Day 8 Bought suntan lotion
All in all a good time was had
love DAD

we're going to NY!

we are going to NY for shabbos and we are going to have lots of fun!
and first we're gonna drive 4 hours to get there!
and we're driving during the day because if we go at night the kids'll be up for 3 hours once we get there!
WOO HOO!
we are truly very excited
have a good shabbos

No Chicken Pox for Jonah

I took Jonah for a Chicken Pox shot this morning, he was supposed to get them a while back when he had the rest of his shots, but they ran out of them.

I'm proud to say that Jonah didn't cry at all, he barley flinched when the nurse jabbed him in the arm with a needle, and he didn't even bleed.

I don't remember the Pox being all that bad, I had them twice, I believe I was first and last in the family to get them, and I got to miss lots of school. Poor kids these days, with all the immunization they get, how will ever get to miss a few weeks of school?

Advantage to living in Detroit

Nat, Jonah and I were visiting the Guttmans who were in town. It was 6:00 or so and we Jonah was getting hungry. We could have driven ALL the way home, but we didn't know if Jonah would make it.

Mom and Dad live around the corner from where the guttmans were staying, so we popped over there, right on time for dinner. Mom made an awesome milcheig Kugel, and lucky for us, there was enough for us to partake.

You can't get that in other places.

Thnx

Okay...point taken David...I think you missed my point though...of this being so zacks make funable... that it was worth a mention... Shauli! loved the game!!
In other news...
HOCKEY IS ON ISRAEL!
See yaakov, i don't need to come to the states for my sports...every 4 years they'll play a hockey game or two live here :)

This is for you sar...

The Dick Cheney quail hunt game Thought you might get a kick out of this

For Sar

Cheney will grant an interview to discuss the shooting tonight

Senators are angry with homeland Security's response to Katrina

Chabad is having a power struggle in Israel

Garfield sees a "Do Not Disturb" sign and takes a nap

Willie Nelson releases gay cowboy song

Batman takes on Al Qaida

And now you're in The Loop

Some Loop....

So we have this whole loop thing going on where we should all pretty much know what's going on with each other. Maybe all ya'll american livin' Zacks' didn't really feel this was important...but i heard about this from Jon Stewert on the Daily Show... Aparently the Vice President of the United States of America shot a 78 year old man in the face because he was in his way. At least he brought him flowers...or well, at least he stopped by the hospital.... So there, now everyone knows.

dus iz nit ah blizzard

deep snow
deeper snow
deepest snow that i had to shovel about to go to the upsherin in the sled

officially for a blizzard to be called such. you need 1/4 mile visibility and lots of wind for 3 straight hours. well, we didnt make it for 3 hours but it was pretty bad. it snowed for about 20 hours and the drive was shoveled about 3 times during the day (and evening)
today is our civil anniversary. yup we were officially civily married on valentines day 1999. then we didnt see each other till our religious ceremony. we felt this was the best thing to do because just because one is civily married doesn't allow them live together.
you know those richard scary books that have no point but are just a bunch of pictures with all the pictures labeled, well chanalana is a richard scary book. shes not great with the sentences and all, but she point to every object in the room and out of the room, seemingly randomly, and just says what everything is.
i didn't feel well yesterday, so i stayed home today cuz i also dont feel so great today either, THAT'S WHY.
have a happy st valentines day, and a happy civil anniversary to us.

She's Alive!!!

In a previous post I said goodbye to my new and beloved friend, Mp3 disk on key. She was in two pieces and the store wasn't willing to fix her for free. But then a miracle happened. We called a friend of mine from the army who knows how to fix things and sent the broken baby over to him. He called back two days later and said he had healed her. I went today to pick her up, and overcome with emotion, I hung her around my neck, where she could once again sing to me and store my information while staying close to my heart. She has some scars where the breakage happened, but how many kids dont have scars? The important thing is we have her back!!

My Challot: A Pictoral Essay

The Challa Maker

For the first time, this week, I made challot for Shabbat! We had meat ready made, and we were only eating here friday night, so there wasnt much to make. Shan had to study for a test on Friday, so I made onion soup and scalloped potatoes. But that only takes like 20 minutes. So I made Challa. I have pictures of them but its not working uploading them to blogger. But when I get it to work I will have the whole process in a picture essay. With the help of our new cookbook (thanks to Mom) and Golda and Elisheva (no, none of you know Elisheva), my four challot tasted wonderful.
In other good news, I havent eaten dairy in over a week.

Uncle Moishy and the Marvelous Middos Machine

We decided that Jonah watches far to much TV, and it's our responsibility as his parents to let him watch less, despite the inconvenience this causes us. He loves listening to music, so we've been playing music, nursery rhymes and garbage like that, but after a while, his music is irritating. There is one song that has the lyrics "There was an old man who didn't say his prayers, I grabbed him by the left leg and threw him down the stairs"

Today I stopped by mom and dad's and picked up some tapes that are left over from my childhood, the Marvelous Middos Machine and Uncle Moishy. I know that he is to young to get whats being said, but he enjoys the tunes. TMM has to much dialogue, so I think we probably won't listen to that much, but Uncle Moishy is mostly music.

Thats our exciting news.

My Thumb

I went to a Tu B'Shvat seder last night. (Don't ask to me explain. I don't know.) I was moving my chair in during one of the Divrei Torah and I slammed my thumb between my chair and the table leg. Remember those stars in the old cartoons? Well I saw them flying around. Nobody noticed I think, but it really hurt.

But my thumbs are too fat to be able to tell whether it's swollen or not. All I know is I do a lot of things with my right-hand thumb that the pain is not allowing me to do today. For instance, putting my hair in one of those fishy-clips, doinf Nava's hair, setting my alarm clock, hanging up my clothes, spreading peanut butter on waffles. And don't even get me started on toilet paper.

I think I might have this x-rayed today. Who knows?

SUPER BOWL

so there i was watching the super bowl with my irls and yael asks " how come everyone keeps getting knocked down in baseball?" IS IT NOT CLEARLY A FOOTBALL GAME???
its not like she doesn't know what a baseball and bat look like. she can hit and catch pretty well. am i just doomed to a life of girl sports knowledge? on the other hand she can read 4 letter words in hebrew (if they have the right nekudos) and english (if they're easy)!

Goodbye, My Friend

For my birthday, Shany got me an MP3 disk on key. We were inseperable, my disk on key on I, as we travelled back and forth from Bar Ilan together. Lighter than a Diskman, with more song capacity, I quickly fell in love. I wore her around my neck, and she would lay next to my heart, ready to sing whenever I needed. When there were documents to be copied, it was her I would stick into the computer. Her, and her alone, that would carry all my information for me. Indeed, in times of stress, and times of joy, I knew disk on key would be there. But slowly, slowly, I felt it happening. Every time I would use her to save a file, she would become a little more attached to the computer, a little less attached to me. She started breaking at the seams. I felt her internal pain, her indecisiveness, as she became more and more detached from me. And then, 28 days after our first meeting, 28 days after I fell in love, it happened. She was in the computer for a long time, as I worked on a file. When I tried to retrieve her, she refused, preferring the warmth of the computer, to the warmth of my heart. I pulled again, refusing to give up on her, refusing to let her go. She realized she would never have control to choose, would always be under my control, and she hated me for it. In a last act of revenge, she came apart in my hand, preferring destruction to a lifetime of servititude. As I looked in my hand, I knew it was over, as I held her body, but her head was still in the USB port.
We went back to where she came from, to that store on Kanfei, LaserLine. Too choked up to speak, Shany explained to them what happened, and asked for them to heal her. To our surprise, we were treated very rudely, and told we would have to pay almost the full price to have her repaired. We showed them our warranty, signed only 28 days before, and good for a year, but they did not budge. Accusing us of breaking her, they refused to listen to our complaint that she was improperly made. Her whole being was there to be inserted, and removed, from computers. If she breaks while doing that, then there is a manufacturers problem, and she should be fixed and returned to us immediately. They were even rude enough to tell us they did not want us as customers, if we think they should fix her for free. Refusing to give into their demands, we left with our broken friend, dooming her to a lifetime of pain, unless we can find another place to have her healed. When we returned to our home, we were broken on the inside. Shany felt I should have spoken up in disk on key's defense, maybe there was something I could have said to have swayed their hardened hearts. I did not agree. We are now at a loss as to what options are available to us. What would you do, if your friend, your music mate, your information holder, was hurting, and the store wouldnt help her for free?

Hectic

Hey all
Life has been pretty hectic in the past week or so for me. Aside from going going downtown one afternoon for a work related meeting, I had to stick around and check out the scene, and take part in the hoopla. It was really cool, I had a lot of fun. So much fun that I went back with Nat and some friend to the NFL Experience at Cobo hall. We enjoyed that so much, we almost went back downtown after shabbos, but didn't because the weather was so bad.

Work is keeping me busy, I met with three school districts in the "Thumb." I don't remember going out that way before, and it's pretty rural, not a lot of things to do, or people to advertise on the buses, but we'll see what happens with them.

I realized last night, after the Super Bowl, that I had some meeting in the Kalamazoo area, so I had to get up at like 6:30 to get down here. Due to lousy scheduling, I had my first meeting at 10:00 and my second meting is at 3:00. I am at the library, killing some time, till I leave for my next meeting.

thats pretty much what I've been up to. Hope everyone else is doing good

hey guys! im writing in red!!

hi!! so in between r and v's exciting car converstaions, mine and jakes finals, and dads learning issues, nothing is goin on in the zacks family. that sucks!!! my life isnt so boring. well...it is. but i can pretend it isnt! im going to florida on sunday and im REALLY excited- for all that dont know, im going with milaine and jazzi and dyna...paaaaaaaaartaaaay!!! hehe...ok! so anywyas we're goin 2 disney world and im gonna get an awesome tan cuz its really hot there apparently...hang on i gotta get my cookies out of the oven-
- ok back. they look good...a little under-done (is that a word? hehe...i know you can be overwhelmed, and u can be underwhelmed, but can u ever just be like...whelmed? i think you can in europe...) but thats the way i like em! and if i get food poisining or wtvr from raw eggs...oh well. its been real. im glad we had this time to bond. hehe...
hey in 5 years im gonna be 20. in 3 years im gonna be allowed to vote. in 6 years im gonna be LEGALLY allowed 2 drink. and gamble. in 3 years im gonna be in israel- FOR SEMINARY! hehe hopefully... (see the halo?)
yea i just thought of that. whatever! so yeah i lied. my life IS actually pretty boring. OOOH GUESS WHAT??!?! i got new shoes!!!!!!! theyre sooooooooo cool. theyre like brown and green and orange and they have the velcro hting like the zig-zag thing thats rly in right now i think aviva has them...anyways theyre coool. (u kno ur life is really boring when ur blogging about ur shoes...)
and...my room is almost done! well..not really. but its almost to the almost done stage. i found an AWESOME bed with like this whole huge headboard thing that has shelves and cabinets, and its all very funky. and i got a dresser with a mirror- first time im getting a mirror in my room! and...what else...im looking for a funky like light thing. like u kno the kind that has the differant colors in it? HOW cool would that be?? so yeah im looking around. the painting is done at least. and we're getting cool carpeting- its like greenish blue with little...what are they called? flicks? of different colors. im so excited my room is gonna be SO COOL!!! oh- i dunno if i mentioned this ever before but I GOT A CELLPHONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! oh and sar i figured out how to change the voicemail. a...friend showed me how. if u wnana know my #, my mother has taught me a valuable lesson. never ever ever put personal information on the internet. (personally, i think that if any freaks have NO lives that they go on random peoples blogs to find cell numbers, it would be pretty funny to have them call me, but thats just my opinion...) so my cell number is the same as sar's and davids old cells- cuz its the same one!! ive gotten 2 calls from people thinking its still one of ur cells (shauli and some girl i didnt know hwo didnt give me her name) and its MINE NOW!! haha i love it!!! :)
k i think thats really all that i have to write about. oh and by the way, anyone who cares- my chocolate is almost gone. yes my 5 pound chocolate. i dont want 2 talk about it, its very emotional for me. all im saying is that i am going on MAJOR DIET when i finally finsih it!!!! ahhhhhhhhh i ate 5 pounds of chocolate!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ok im gonna go before i have a nervous breakdown or something.
shalom!

Another Actual Conversation

This morning we had another actual conversation. It was about certain family members who live in England. It has been "suggested" that I not post it here. So I won't.

But I just want you all to know you missed a doozy of a chat in our car today.