I was reading an article in the July issue of Women’s Day called Recession Angels. It’s about three women in different parts of the country who are helping those in need. The first woman profiled operates a child care facility. She offered free daycare service to parents who have been laid off from their jobs, so that their kids are cared for while they are searching for a new job. The second woman organized a Clothing and Toy Exchange. Families donated things that their kids have outgrown, and anyone in the community, whether they donated anything or not, could come and take what they needed for free. The third woman created the Foreclosure Angel Foundation to lend a hand to people who need some help to get through a crisis so that they can stay in their homes.
In the July issue of Parenting - School Years magazine, there is an article called Homeless in the Suburbs. The stories of three families, in three different parts of the country, are reported. They are all experiencing tough times due to the economic downturn.
As I read, I felt very proud of my Sisterhood because I know that we have an ongoing community service project to provide new and gently used clothing to a local elementary school where there is a large population of families in need. Even though I always participate in our group collection efforts, I now feel compelled to do more personally. After reading these articles and thinking “oh how terrible for these families” I could not just close the magazines and walk away from these issues. I wanted to share the information because together we can have the chance to have a positive effect on the people in need in our NoVA community.
This year Women’s League launched a program called Mitzvah Yomit – A Mitzvah A Day. Everyday we have the opportunity to do things to help repair our world. WLCJ has created a 3x5 inch pamphlet that unfolds into a list of Berakhot, as well as a list of ideas to help us all get started with performing a Mitzvah a day. It’s a great tool to remind us all of the possibilities before us and how we can easily fit many of them into our lives. Whether or not you have a copy of the pamphlet in your hands, if we all embrace the concept, and work together, we can make a big impact.
If your organization is looking for a Tzedakah project for the coming year, maybe you will be inspired by one of the women referenced above. Or maybe you will be moved to help families who are homeless. The article on homelessness included a box called “how to help” and gave the following resources: www.serve.org/nche to find your school district’s Local Homeless Education Liaison to help you find the people who need you; www.nationalhomeless.org to find a local group you could volunteer with to lend your expertise in something like resume writing, or babysitting to help job hunters; www.familyhomelessness.org to donate to a group dedicated specifically to helping homeless families. If you start at this site and shop at certain online stores like www.amazon.com, the organization will receive a donation at no cost to you; and at the site for the National Association for the Education of Homeless Children and Youth (www.naehcy.org), you can donate to a scholarship fund.
If you already have a Tzedakah project, please share what it is with the NoVA community. If we are aware of each others efforts, we can all help each other. What are you collecting? What organizations are you supporting? What items are needed? Please post comments to let us know and let’s all share in doing a mitzvah a day.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Never a Better Time for a Book Purchase
It was my absolute pleasure to meet Rabbi Sherre Hirsch this year. I called Rabbi Hirsch to invite her to be a speaker at the Seaboard Region Education Day after I saw her on The Today Show talking about her book, We Plan, God Laughs. There is a subtitle to her book - 10 Steps to Finding Your Divine Path When Life Is Not Turning Out Like You Wanted – but when I saw the show, all I heard was the first part, because at the time, with what was going on in my life, I felt like I had planned and God had laughed. The past three years have held many challenging moments for my family and I didn’t even realize just how deeply the tsouris had penetrated until the day Rabbi Hirsch and I first spoke about this event. I shared with her when I got to meet her in person, the impact that our first conversation had on me. Her words were ones I will never forget because they helped put me back on my path. She said, Susan, God must be smiling on you, because I will be on the east coast then, and it looks like I can do this event. I was beyond thrilled that she would be able to come to Education Day, but I was also thrilled to know that God could be smiling on me. Even with all the “stuff” in my life, and we all have “stuff” from time to time, God can smile on us. I immediately ordered her book and thoroughly enjoyed reading it.
Rabbi Hirsch is one of those people I consider myself so lucky to have encountered in my life. When she speaks, I pay attention. Her insights are noteworthy, she makes me think about things in a new way, and she inspires me.
I check Rabbi Hirsch’s website from time to time to read through her blog and tonight I found this message:
What to do when life hits you over the head
Life certainly hit us over the head. Four months after We Plan, God Laughs was published my mother was diagnosed with Glioblastoma (GBM) stage 4 brain cancer. I dedicated this book to my mother for her courage and how she overcame so many challenges in her life. Now she is facing her biggest challenge yet, and she and many others suffering with GBM need your help.
Today June 16, 2009, my mother turns 65 years old and the paperback of We Plan, God Laughs with a new epilogue goes on sale.
In celebration , I am donating 10% of the profits to the Art of the Brain Fund to help in the fight against brain cancer.
To celebrate with us:
1. Buy the paperback of We Plan, God Laughs.
2. Send this email to three friends and ask them to do the same.
I pray that the new edition of We Plan, God Laughs will heal in more ways than one.
Please check out Rabbi Hirsch’s website for yourself at www.sherrehirsch.com and please consider buying a copy of her book. You will find healing and inspiration for yourself and you will help in the fight against brain cancer at the same time. There has never been a better time for a book purchase.
Background on Rabbi Hirsch
In 1998, after being ordained by JTS, Rabbi Hirsch joined Sinai Temple in Los Angeles, becoming the first female rabbi in its century-long history, where she served for eight years. She developed the popular Jewish Women’s Spirituality Retreat for Canyon Ranch, where she now serves as a spiritual life consultant. In January 2008 she joined MomLogic.com, a website for thinking moms who don't have time to think, as their spirituality expert.
Since stepping out from behind the pulpit, Rabbi Hirsch has brought her expertise to television viewers nationwide on shows such as “New Morning” on the Hallmark Channel, serving as a spiritual expert for “The Today Show,” a relationship expert on “The Tyra Banks Show” and a guest on the PBS series “Thirty Good Minutes.”
It was my absolute pleasure to meet Rabbi Sherre Hirsch this year. I called Rabbi Hirsch to invite her to be a speaker at the Seaboard Region Education Day after I saw her on The Today Show talking about her book, We Plan, God Laughs. There is a subtitle to her book - 10 Steps to Finding Your Divine Path When Life Is Not Turning Out Like You Wanted – but when I saw the show, all I heard was the first part, because at the time, with what was going on in my life, I felt like I had planned and God had laughed. The past three years have held many challenging moments for my family and I didn’t even realize just how deeply the tsouris had penetrated until the day Rabbi Hirsch and I first spoke about this event. I shared with her when I got to meet her in person, the impact that our first conversation had on me. Her words were ones I will never forget because they helped put me back on my path. She said, Susan, God must be smiling on you, because I will be on the east coast then, and it looks like I can do this event. I was beyond thrilled that she would be able to come to Education Day, but I was also thrilled to know that God could be smiling on me. Even with all the “stuff” in my life, and we all have “stuff” from time to time, God can smile on us. I immediately ordered her book and thoroughly enjoyed reading it.
Rabbi Hirsch is one of those people I consider myself so lucky to have encountered in my life. When she speaks, I pay attention. Her insights are noteworthy, she makes me think about things in a new way, and she inspires me.
I check Rabbi Hirsch’s website from time to time to read through her blog and tonight I found this message:
What to do when life hits you over the head
Life certainly hit us over the head. Four months after We Plan, God Laughs was published my mother was diagnosed with Glioblastoma (GBM) stage 4 brain cancer. I dedicated this book to my mother for her courage and how she overcame so many challenges in her life. Now she is facing her biggest challenge yet, and she and many others suffering with GBM need your help.
Today June 16, 2009, my mother turns 65 years old and the paperback of We Plan, God Laughs with a new epilogue goes on sale.
In celebration , I am donating 10% of the profits to the Art of the Brain Fund to help in the fight against brain cancer.
To celebrate with us:
1. Buy the paperback of We Plan, God Laughs.
2. Send this email to three friends and ask them to do the same.
I pray that the new edition of We Plan, God Laughs will heal in more ways than one.
Please check out Rabbi Hirsch’s website for yourself at www.sherrehirsch.com and please consider buying a copy of her book. You will find healing and inspiration for yourself and you will help in the fight against brain cancer at the same time. There has never been a better time for a book purchase.
Background on Rabbi Hirsch
In 1998, after being ordained by JTS, Rabbi Hirsch joined Sinai Temple in Los Angeles, becoming the first female rabbi in its century-long history, where she served for eight years. She developed the popular Jewish Women’s Spirituality Retreat for Canyon Ranch, where she now serves as a spiritual life consultant. In January 2008 she joined MomLogic.com, a website for thinking moms who don't have time to think, as their spirituality expert.
Since stepping out from behind the pulpit, Rabbi Hirsch has brought her expertise to television viewers nationwide on shows such as “New Morning” on the Hallmark Channel, serving as a spiritual expert for “The Today Show,” a relationship expert on “The Tyra Banks Show” and a guest on the PBS series “Thirty Good Minutes.”
Summer Reading List – Suggestions?
My kids will finish school this week and I can feel myself switching into summer mode. This is an automatic, instinctive reaction to the rising temperatures and not at all a reflection of reality. Remember when summer meant carefree days, Italian ices at the beach and hours spent running all over the neighborhood with friends? Summer meant time off from school, homework, deadlines, and projects. It’s been a long time since I had a summer off like my body and mind instinctively want to have each and every year. The reality is that the grown-up world means deadlines and projects don’t really care that it’s summer! But I have decided that I will not give up on a piece of the carefree summer I once knew.
I grew up on the eastern end of Long Island and that meant that I was at the beach all the time. To this day, nothing sounds more relaxing to me than sitting in a chair on the sand, listening to the waves, while reading a really good book. While I have to mostly give up on the beach chair part now, I will never let go of a great summer reading list.
I have some ideas for my list that I want to share with you. Women’s League for Conservative Judaism (WLCJ) maintains a list of suggested book club books for Sisterhoods and I have fallen behind on reading many of them. So, my list for this summer includes People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks, The Faith Club by Ranya Idliby, Suzanne Oliver and Priscilla Warner, and Disobedience by Naomi Alderman. You can check out the whole list of WLCJ suggested books at www.wlcj.org.
I also noticed on Maggie Anton’s website that Book III Rachel is coming on August 4! Here is the description posted on www.rashisdaughters.com: Rachel is Salomon’s favorite and adored by her husband, Eliezer. But everything she holds dear is threatened as the marauders of the First Crusade massacre the Jews of Germany and her father suffers a stroke. Eliezer wants them to move to the safety of Spain, but Rachel is determined to stay in France and help her family save the Troyes yeshiva, the only remnant of the great Talmud academies.
I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy. If you have not yet read the first two books in the series, I highly recommend them and if you start now, you will be all caught up in time for Book III.
What else should go on my summer reading list? What titles can you recommend to all of us? Please share the book titles that you or your book club really enjoyed so that we will all be able to settle in with a good story and a big glass of lemonade, and for a small portion of the day, we can recapture that feeling of the summer break we all used to enjoy.
My kids will finish school this week and I can feel myself switching into summer mode. This is an automatic, instinctive reaction to the rising temperatures and not at all a reflection of reality. Remember when summer meant carefree days, Italian ices at the beach and hours spent running all over the neighborhood with friends? Summer meant time off from school, homework, deadlines, and projects. It’s been a long time since I had a summer off like my body and mind instinctively want to have each and every year. The reality is that the grown-up world means deadlines and projects don’t really care that it’s summer! But I have decided that I will not give up on a piece of the carefree summer I once knew.
I grew up on the eastern end of Long Island and that meant that I was at the beach all the time. To this day, nothing sounds more relaxing to me than sitting in a chair on the sand, listening to the waves, while reading a really good book. While I have to mostly give up on the beach chair part now, I will never let go of a great summer reading list.
I have some ideas for my list that I want to share with you. Women’s League for Conservative Judaism (WLCJ) maintains a list of suggested book club books for Sisterhoods and I have fallen behind on reading many of them. So, my list for this summer includes People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks, The Faith Club by Ranya Idliby, Suzanne Oliver and Priscilla Warner, and Disobedience by Naomi Alderman. You can check out the whole list of WLCJ suggested books at www.wlcj.org.
I also noticed on Maggie Anton’s website that Book III Rachel is coming on August 4! Here is the description posted on www.rashisdaughters.com: Rachel is Salomon’s favorite and adored by her husband, Eliezer. But everything she holds dear is threatened as the marauders of the First Crusade massacre the Jews of Germany and her father suffers a stroke. Eliezer wants them to move to the safety of Spain, but Rachel is determined to stay in France and help her family save the Troyes yeshiva, the only remnant of the great Talmud academies.
I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy. If you have not yet read the first two books in the series, I highly recommend them and if you start now, you will be all caught up in time for Book III.
What else should go on my summer reading list? What titles can you recommend to all of us? Please share the book titles that you or your book club really enjoyed so that we will all be able to settle in with a good story and a big glass of lemonade, and for a small portion of the day, we can recapture that feeling of the summer break we all used to enjoy.
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