Wherein Kidlet Gets a Name

So, in Judaism (at least within the modern Reform movement), after a child is eight days old, they are called up before the congregation and given the priestly blessing, in their own name. It is one of three times when a person is given the priestly blessing all by themselves, the other two being at their b'nai mitzvah and the Shabbat before their wedding. Well, eight days in, none of us were in any shape to be seen in public, and then we had the summer, where at least one set of grandparents was out every week, and then... well, suffice to say that we finally went, "November! Everyone will be in town and she will be old enough not to fuss too much."

So, last night, Kidlet had an early bath, put on her pretty holiday dress, and the family drove to synagogue with time to spare. All of which we needed, because we ran into a minor snowstorm. I say minor because it wasn't sticking to the road at all. Other than that, though -- the wind was fierce and driving it straight at us, and there was a lot of precipitation. Traffic was miserable, and we made it there pretty much on the dot.

The naming itself happened very early on in the service; I had expected it to be early, but it was pretty much right after L'cha Dodi. Which was fortunate, because I was just about to put her to the breast.

We went up, along with the grandparents and Bubba Lu. The grandparents all said a reading, and Kidlet tried to grab a grandparent's back. Then the Rabbi talked about the duties of a parent, as listed in the Torah, which are to teach the child Torah, find them a spouse, and teach them how to swim. Yes, Judaism teaches that every parent must teach their child to swim. A practical religion, n'est-ce pas? wanderingfey and I took a two-part vow, to raise our child in a Jewish home; wanderingfey took the half he felt comfortable with and I had the other. I talked about why we had chosen the names we had, the rabbi said some other stuff (at this point, I was just about full to bursting with pride and anxiety, so I really don't remember what was said), and then the rabbi put his hands on Kidlet's head and blessed her.

And then wanderingfey and I held Kidlet up and danced in a circle, while the granparents danced around us, and the congregation sang Siman Tov U'Mazel Tov. Kidlet was not entirely certain how she felt about the dancing; she wasn't smiling, but she wasn't fussing either. I think she was just confused.

And then she had some noms and played quietly for the rest of the service. We all tried to go to the Saffron Grill afterwards, but there was some sort of high school thing going on, and after 45 minutes of waiting, we gave up and went our separate ways. (The Tabarah folks came along as well, and I was very sad not to be able to spend much time with them, but at least we have a visit scheduled in the near future, weather permitting.)

The weather was bitterly cold on the way back home, but we made it home just fine. And then Kidlet proceeded to sleep solidly from 10 pm to 3 am! Yay!

We woke up to a very cold morning, with a dusting of snow on the rooftops, and ice on the grass. I took Kidlet out in the cold so she could touch/grab a rime-rimmed maple leaf. Which she thought was very interesting until Mommy refused to let her eat the leaf fragments.

All in all, a very nice time was had, and I feel like I have ensured an important thing for my daughter.

New books!

My shipment of books for me came in! I'm so used to Amazon's two days that the standard book rate on these used books was a little annoying. But now that I know about Silver Arch Books, I will probably just buy directly from them in the future.

Smart Bitches, Trashy Books had a thread for romance novels with Jews in them, which got me to buy a number of books. The ones I was most excited about was a series by Nita Abrams, about an Anglo-Jewish family in the Napoleonic era who spy for the English. I went and picked up all five, as they are apparently out of print and not in e-format at the moment, and so far, they aren't bad. Not as good as the Pink Carnation books, but not much worse. And loads better than some of the other books I've read lately. These are fairly engaging, and might be worth re-reading.

I also picked up some old Sunfires, which I loved in middle school. We'll see if they're worth the re-read.

And now, shower!