an unprintable combination of the sacred and the profane

In recent years we have occasionally had seder for the 3 of us at home, but this year we had first-night seder for 10 - mostly Mr Y's non-Jewish bandmates, who are all lovely smart interested people, plus my synagogue friend David from the next town over, with his two no-longer-so-little kids (9 and 6 now, though they're still tiny compared to my towering 10yo). So we had a kids' table in the kitchen and 7 adults around the dining table, which is just about as full as we can get without starting to feel crowded. Ms. A was amazing at entertaining the kids and helping them find snacks, everyone enjoyed the matzah ball soup and overnight brisket to the fullest, and we were done by about 9:30pm, with still enough energy to do one load of dishes before we sacked out.

Thursday (second night) we went to the potluck community seder at the Other Shul, which we have attended before but not recently. It's a 90-person affair, of whom I only know maybe 20 (alas, my friend the rabbi was out of town with family, which was apparently a bone of some contention in the community, but that's another story). We sat with another young family, so Ms. A got to work her magic with the littles again. The seder portion was under half an hour (!), but it was nice to be able to sit back and not have to handle anything. They did hand me a reading as soon as I walked in the door, which actually felt nice to know they know me well enough to trust me. :-)

Sunday we had my mom over for what passes for Easter dinner. I had gotten a lamb roast at Costco for the occasion, and way too much chocolate, and I made parsley potatoes and green beans almondine and Rakott Krumpli. This last is a casserole recipe that my mother's family inherited from my Hungarian great-grandmother as simply "potatoes and eggs"; apparently the traditional Hungarian version also involves pork sausage, but the Hungarian Jewish community makes it with just potatoes, eggs, and sour cream (with a layer of butter for good measure). Just one more data point in the "crypto-Jewish" theory of the Rosenberg side of the family.

My mom showed up about 12:45, shortly after church. We hadn't really set a firm time for her to come over, and I was just thinking about taking a nap when she rang the bell, but I tried to rally myself to the table and be a good hostess. Apparently I didn't do a very good job, because she chased me upstairs to take a nap after all ("I'll just lie down on the couch too! Go rest!"), so I came back 2 hours later feeling miles better, and we had a good afternoon and early (for us) dinner.

Kiddo has been on break all last week and yesterday, but had to go to school today, matzah lunch in hand lovingly packed by Mama. Now just 3 more school/work days until pizza night!