Perfecting the cookie

 

Micah has been finding solace in the kitchen.  He is taking a summer school culinary class through UCLA so he finds himself learning about nutrition facts, healthy diets, and much more.  In the meantime, he has perfected the chocolate chip cookie so well that Noah requests that Micah make the cookies!  I try not to feel offended.  Will Micah find a calling in the kitchen???

Happy birthday Daph

Quarantine birthdays via House Party is the new way to celebrate.  It was Daphne's birthday and the cousin's sang to her and wished her the best 10th birthday.  I wonder how long we will be social distancing...  will we celebrate all of the summer birthdays like this???

Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to my partner in life...  this pandemic has really made it very clear that we are in sync in how we raise our boys, how we view our world, and what is important to us. We gifted Jawsh handmade cards, repurposed flowers (which he really appreciated) and Micah pretended that we went out in the world and bought him coffee beans (unfortunately the bag was empty).  Happy Father's Day to the best Dad...  we stayed in this year... what will we do next year???

Post party

After Noah's Bar Mitzvah, we had dinner and then Noah met with his friends for a post party.  We hired a mentalist, Jon Finch, to meet with the teens.  He did card tricks, read minds, and amazed us all.  After the mentalist show, Noah hung out with friends talking and playing video games past midnight.  We think he had a great time.  How will he feel tomorrow???

Noah's Bar Mitzvah

We are so proud of Noah...  he had a wonderful Bar Mitzvah with family and friends Zooming in to watch and support him. He did such an amazing job going through the service and his speech was so relevant and inspiring.  To say that we are proud of him is an understatement.  Even though we had to celebrate this huge milestone distant from all of our family and friends, we still felt the love and support from them.  How will Noah look back at this time in his life???

Noah's photoshoot

The pandemic has affected all aspects of our lives and yet we still are so blessed... we have our health, our home, our jobs,  and Noah's tallit came in time for his Bar Mitzvah.  We are so fortunate to live in Playa Vista because there are so many beautiful landscaped areas.  We went to the Central Park and took some photos of Noah.  He was cooperative, for the most part, as it was hot and he wanted to get out of his suit.  Will he remember these days when he gets older???

Last day of Hebrew class

Today was the last day of Hebrew school for the boys so they celebrated by making a cookie in a cup.  The kids met over Zoom and microwaved all of the ingredients and then they played games with their teachers.  I am very thankful that the boys have a place to see friends and have a little bit of normalcy during this time.  When will they start Hebrew class again???

BLM

 

The Black Lives Matter movement was important enough for us to come out and support our local community.  It was definitely a large turnout of over 500 people.  We found the corner that was least populated and stood firmly for equal rights for all.  It's been so long since we have been around people that it was definitely making me feel uncomfortable at times.  We saw neighbors, friends, and kids from my elementary school with their families which made this feel like a community that I am proud to be a part of.  We have been reading Stamped with the boys, discussing racism, and hopefully the future they live in will learn from the experiences that we are having now.  When will we all be able to say, Black lives matter???