Mommy Mondays

Hello friends. No, this isn't my (not so) subtle way of making an announcement of a pending baby due - gasp! Or, the announcement of my adoption of a new, furry puppy.  It's the announcement of a guest blog starring my dear friend, Laura.  LJ for those of you know her from other times in our respective lives.  Laura has two adorable darlings who are known to do some pretty funny stuff.  She shares this with me via phone and email and I always laugh and laugh.  And I thought you needed to hear some of it too.  This may happen again.  Or, maybe not.  Just depends on how often her kids do silly, funny, blog-worthy stuff.  And, how often it's Monday.  And, how often I can get my act together to post her fine, clever prose on a Monday.  So, welcome to Mommy Mondays!!  And, welcome Laura.  Okay, your mic is on...

My son, Grayson, is three-and-a-half. He attends preschool one block from our house, and we walk there three mornings a week. We love his school and plan to send his one-year-old sister, Harper, there when she's ready, too. It happens to be a Jewish preschool. Our family isn't Jewish, so we think it's pretty cool that Grayson teaches us things about the Jewish religion/culture ("Hamen is a bad guy!"), new vocabulary words ("Mom, did you eat matzo/hamantashen/challah when you were a girl?") and brings home fun projects (like a "Plague Bag"--including, among other things, a locust, lice, blood, and a dead cow--all faux, of course) on a weekly basis.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, Grayson requested ham in his lunchbox. I told him that ham isn't allowed at his school and that I'd send turkey instead. He proceeded to ask me at least a hundred questions about why he couldn't have ham at school, and I did my best to explain. I said that some Jewish people don't believe in eating pork, and that he should ask his teachers if he wanted to know more. OK, maybe that wasn't the greatest explanation, but I really just wanted him to stop asking questions about ham!

Out of the blue at school that Wednesday, he declared to his teacher, "I'm not Jewish, because I like ham!" Fabulous (insert my red face here). We had lunch at home the following day, and (surprise!) we had ham. At some point, Harper started throwing hers on the floor. Grayson, momentarily glancing up from his iPad screen (mom of the year), wanted to know what she was doing. I told him she was throwing her ham on the floor, and he asked, "Does Harper not like ham?" I said that sometimes babies just throw things. He watched her for awhile, then shrugged and said... "Maybe she's Jewish."

From now on, I'll leave the teachings of Judaism to the experts.

Happy Passover to Harper and all my Jewish friends!