Haveil Havalim: Jewish/Israel Blog Roundup, Metzorah 5774

Founded by Soccer Dad, Haveil Havalim is a carnival of Jewish blogs -- a weekly collection of Jewish & Israeli blog highlights, tidbits and points of interest collected from blogs all around the world. Hosted by different bloggers each week, you can find out more about how to participate through our Facebook Group. 

It’s Nissan and the fruit trees are blooming everywhere here!  If you see one, remember to make the bracha.  More details, from oukosher.org.

Even though everybody but me is totally busy and occupied with Pesach preparation, here’s some of the great stuff that’s going on in the “underground” Jewish web world of blogs and bloggers and our heads.

There is a special place in my heart at this busy time of year for anyone who actually took the trouble to submit blog posts for this roundup… so I will try to repay them by not forgetting any.

Pesach

(a pomegranate tree in bloom)

It’s on our minds… so why not blog about it?!?

• Don’t we all need a lesson right about now in How to do your Pesach Cleaning Cheerfully in Less than One Day ???  Here’s one from Rav Shlomo Aviner.
• Fellow Toronto journalist and blogger Frances Kraft offers her Passover Country Potato Pie and lots of other food-related posts, if you’re looking for something yummy.
• Ever wondered what goes on at an Orthodox seder?  Or wanted something to share with non-religious friends and family that might explain things clearly?  Ruchi Koval, who normally blogs at Out of the Orthobox, guest-posts this week at Mishegas of Motherhood, on My Big Fat Orthodox Seder.
• Preparing for Pesach through poetry:  daily themes from Ima on the Bima, including #blogexodus 2: Tell.
• Yeshiva University’s small Canadian branch held its convocation last week, and The Rebbetzin’s Husband Kvetches about having to wear A Cap, Gown and Kittel – and how they can make rituals like the seder more concrete.

Family Life

(a peach tree in bloom)

• Ima2Seven blogs about Baby #8, the main reason her blogging handle is now seriously out-of-date.  This post is about choosing a name for her Chanukah baby.
• Seriously jealous of Mommzy, who continues to homeschool even as we’ve dropped out of the race for the time being (due to aliyah so it’s for a great cause!).  You can find tons of great Pesach resources at her blog, A Jewish Home School, including a picture book for kids called Pesach, Pesach, What Do You See?
• Another homeschooling blog I love is Breathing Space, where a busy stay-home home-educating mom blogs this week on why I haven't called.
• Another one from Frances Kraft, as she reflects on What’s strange about writing my book, “a memoir about the year I lost my dad and said Kaddish for him (the traditional Jewish way of mourning a parent).” 
• Are things really greener on the other side?  Not when it comes to marriage, says Rivki Silver of Life in the Married Lane, in But That Spouse Looks So Much Better Than Mine!
• A mikveh post… from a man.  Ben-Tzion Spitz writes at ben-tzion.com about the mikveh as A Secret of Jewish Marriage.
• Batya supports a mother whose sons have chosen to make aliyah and enlist over at her blog, me-ander, in HaDassah, Letting Go to Support Aliyah.  And don’t forget the I'll Need a Miracle to be Ready for Passover Kosher Cooking Carnival, in which she hosted all things food (Pesach and otherwise) for this month.

Israel

(a fig tree in bloom)

• Deconstructing the story: Mini-Interview with Writer/Illustrator Rinat Hoffer In which I interview the wonderfully co-operative Rinat Hoffer, Israel’s leading kids’ book author, over at my kids’ book-writing blog, Write Kids’ Books!
• The Hebrew language never ceases to amaze me as a (relatively)new olah.  I wrote last week here on this Adventures in AliyahLand blog about Losing lashon hakodesh, gaining a language.
• Elder of Ziyon writes about the restoration of an historic synagogue – and the fallour, in Major synagogue destroyed by Jordan in 1948 to be rebuilt. PLO freaks out.
• Batya offers a sense of history and a sense of perspective at her Shiloh Musings blog in Menachem Begin's Palestinian "Genie;" It All Started With "Autonomy".   And then, coming right up to the present day, she shares Olmert Convicted, Teflon Finally Off about the fallout from his recent bribery convictions.

Jewish World

(an olive tree in bloom)

• In the significance of the shape of tefillin straps, Reb Gutman Locks writes about finding beauty in observances small and large, in Why, over at Mystical Paths.
• A large community of supporters worldwide has rallied to say Tehillim and other activities for the zechut (merit) of Karmiel mom Avivah Werner, who was badly burned in a kitchen accident early last week.  It looks like she’s on the mend, and baruch Hashem, her fingers still work… in Update on Avivah.
• Will Jonathan Pollard by free by Pesach???  Devash wonders about this at Tomer Devorah in Birthpangs… and the ensuing bureaucracy and confusion in Talks Falling Apart.
• Meanwhile, Esser Agoroth asks if he should be traded for prisoners (hint: the answer is no) in Pollard for Prisoners:  NO!  And he seriously questions the decision-making of IDF chief rabbi Avichai Ronsky in this post.  He also has some serious words for Danny Danon, Deputy Minister of Defense in Danny Danon: Watch Me Pull a Christian out of my Hat.
• On being Jewish in print, from guest blogger and memoir writer Nancy Miller in a guest post at The Whole Megillah blog called My Memoirs Made Me Jewish, or How Jewish Is Enough?
• A Day of Little and Larger Miracles is about one of those rare days when things work out, as if by Design, just right, from Ruti at Never Ruthless.
• And another post about how things work out, this one from Batya at me-ander, in Siyate d'Shmaya, G-d's Hand, Amazing How Things Work Out.

If I’ve missed your post(s), I’m sorry!  Be sure to stop by the facebook page and find out who to submit to for next week’s sure-to-be-great Pre-Pesach HH!!