Ok, I've hashed out a menu with Sue...

Thursday night: Cheese lasagna, 2 or 3 bean salad and breaded and fried cauliflower. Also some nice cheeses from the shuk.

Friday lunch: BBQ (margez, chicken dogs and steaks), pasta/veggie salad and potato salad.

Friday dinner: Beef stir fry with ramen noodles.

Shabbat lunch: Pot luck... I'll be making a chili.

Desserts: Lemon cake, brownies and a cheese cake of some sort.

I've been a complete social hermit this Chanuka... Between Zach working his usual late hours, the weather, then not having babysitters, not feeling like spending money to schmooze with friends, the total exhaustion... bleh...

If anyone is looking for great holiday gift ideas for their kids, check out what the folks at KLUTZ have to offer.

A few years ago, the girls got the iron on book, the embroidery book and the friendship bracelet book... and they're STILL using them!

One of the many reasons I'm glad we moved to Ariel...

From our email list:

At Shvut Ariel, hakafot and dancing during maariv and shaharit.Before musaf, there is usually a decent 'kiddusha rabbah' - more details to follow. Kids are encouraged to dance with parents, and get the communal aliyah followed by loot bags. What kind of activity might you be able to suggest/expect? I would not mind some fun 'shtick' in the shul during services but I've never seen that here.

Motzei chag is 'the' major dati event of the year in Ariel with 'hakafot shniot' at the matnas. Starts with a torah parade from the heh b'Iyar circle to the matnas gym and then includes hakafot and dancing with live music. Separate section for women.

One of the things I really like about this place is their attempts to include the secular folks in Judaism without being pushy and in your face about it. You want to join? Great! You don't want to? Fine also.

They had on the first day of Rosh haShana shofar blowing in the afternoon. For Yom Kippur davening, Chabad had one of the gymnasiums, had Machzorim in Hebrew only and Hebrew with Russian and every so often would call out the page number of where they were.

Shop. Cook. Pray/eat/sleep/pray/eat/pray/eat/sleep/pray/eat/sleep.

Shop. Cook. Pray/eat/sleep/Pray/eat/sleep.

Shop. Cook. Eat/pray/sleep/praypraypraypray/eat/sleep.

Shop. Cook. Pray/eat/sleep/Pray/eat/sleep.

Shop. Cook. Eat/sleep.

Shop. Cook. Pray/eat/sleep/Pray/eat/sleep.

Then 2 whole normal days before...

Shop. Cook. Pray/eat/sleep/Pray/eat/sleep.

Then one normal day before...

Shop. Cook. Pray/eat/sleep/Pray/eat/sleep.

SR has decided she is forbidding chicken for the Shabbat meals. So I'm making a thick veggie soup with kubbeh for tonight and I bought deli for lunch tomorrow.

The Sukkot menu is:
Evening meal: roasted pumpkin soup, chicken pot pie and fresh green salad.

The lunch meal is as I had already posted: stuffed cabbage and meatballs, breaded chicken breast, spinach kugel, carrot kugel, roasted potatoes.

Dessert will be Mexican brownies and pineapple upside-down cake.

We're having Josh over for the first part of the holiday. And for the lunch meal, we're having another 7 people. Yay! Guests!!! Methinks games will be brought out...

Today is cleaning the house as much as I can since we're having guests for the first half of the holiday (joshbrown for the first day and marthag8 and her flatmate for Shabbat). zachkessin is in Tel Aviv for a job interview and a polygraph test a different business wants him to take. When he gets home, we're putting up our Sukkah.

Tomorrow I have an early dr's appointment (GI). I need the paperwork for my annual endoscopy. Then zachkessin and I are going to the shuk to buy the rest of the groceries and he needs to buy his Lulav and Etrog. Then I'm going to visit my cousin who had an emergency c-section over YK. She delivered a boy (her 4th) about 2 months early. Baruch Hashem they both seem to be doing well.

Tuesday is more cleaning and I start cooking. NS also has a well-baby visit and he's getting another round of vaccinations. If things go according to how they went last time, I'm going to have to get as much cooking done as I can on Tuesday because Wednesday may be the cranky day...

On to the menu:

Wednesday night:
Half and half challah
Moroccan-style mystery fish (Zach bought it and has no idea what type of fillet it is)
Brisket (marinaded in soy sauce, brown sugar, olive oil, chopped fresh basil, minced garlic, chopped onion, black pepper) cooked in red wine
Roasted mixed veggies (potatoes, sweet potatoes, zucchini, onions, seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic and paprika)
Kasha Varnishkas
Marble crumb cake

Thursday Lunch:
Pot-luck with neighbors. I'm going to bring a chili pie (brown chopped meat. Mix with sauteed onions and peppers, tomato paste, cooked white rice, canned kidney beans (drained) and either canned or frozen corn. Season with chili powder, black pepper, garlic powder and brown sugar. Pour into a pie crust and bake for 30 minutes) and some of the marble crumb cake.

Friday night:
Half and half challah
Cabbage soup with marrow bones
Beer-butt chicken
Carrot Kugel/cake
Potato Kugel
Lentil Salad

Shabbat Lunch... still undecided. Maybe Chulent? Suggestions would be great.

Then there's the following Wednesday night. I think what we'll do is have big meal before candle lighting and then after shul and the hakafot, have kiddush, challah and chicken-veggie soup. This way, we're not hungry all night. For that meal maybe dairy? A cheese lasagne and um... baked potatoes?

Thursday lunch I think I'll do chicken schnitzels, potato kugel, cole slaw and a green salad.

I know, I know, we still have to get past Yom Kippur before we get to Sukkot, but since we don't eat on Yom Kippur, and Sukkot is only 4 days after, I want to get my menu planned and start grocery shopping.

We're having Josh join us for the first day of the holiday and lunch on Thursday will be a pot luck meal at neighbors. I plan on making my chili pie and maybe an apple pie.

Wednesday night's meal will be... gefilte fish to start off and then a brisket (marinaded in soy sauce, brown sugar, olive oil, minced garlic, chopped basil and red wine) with roasted mixed veggies and kasha varnishkas (I froze the leftover kasha from Rosh haShanah).

Friday night's meal will probably be a meaty cabbage soup, beer-butt chicken and white rice. Shabbat lunch... I'm kinda hankering a chulent with kishka...

And then the last day of the holiday will be leftovers... or dairy.

I'm hashing out the Rosh haShanah Menu.

Wednesday night:
Homemade half and half challah
Different symbolic foods: dates, pomegranates, apples dipped in honey, gourd, black-eyed peas, leeks, beets, fish.
Chicken Marakesh
White rice
pineapple upside-down cake

Thursday lunch:
half and half challah
turkey
kasha varnishkas
broccoli spinach kugel
carrot kugel
cherry coffee cake

Thursday night:
half and half challah
some sort of new fruit
Argentine Chicken Stew
cake

Friday lunch:
half and half challah
cheese blintz casserole
mixed veggie broccoli quiche
tuna-veggie latkes
apple pie

Friday night:
leftovers

Shabbat lunch:
Going away

Edit: Turns out I don't have frozen mixed veggies, but I do have an already made spinach kugel... so adjustments have been made.

Rosh haShanah will be upon us soon enough and I need to get a menu together so I can go shopping.

So far one meal's main course will be turkey. Another may be sweet and sour tongue.

Side dishes will probably be farfel, roasted regular and sweet potatoes, brocolli kugel, spinach-noodle kugel and carrot kugel.

Dessert will be the cake I posted previously and pineapple upsidedown cake.

Any other main course and side dish suggestions? What are my Jewish flist folks making?