Illustration by Lea Kron
We wanted to give our mother a break post-Yom Tov. How hard could it be with five brothers working together?
Six months ago, we were sitting at the Simchas Torah seudah, and my father mentioned how delicious the food was and how hard my mother had worked making Yom Tov. I started thinking about all the work and time and energy my mother had put in, and I announced, “The boys are making Shabbos this week!”
We’re mostly a boy family, so my brothers were excited at the thought. I added that the girls, if they wanted to contribute, could make dessert. The girls were like “No, we didn’t sign up for this.” I could see they were unsure of how it would turn out! My mother, for her part, was very excited at the idea. I could see my father was a little less enthusiastic, but he wanted to give my mother a break, so we were in business.
I like working within a specific time frame, so I knew everything had to get done at least an hour before Shabbos. We started Friday morning at around 10 a.m. I walked into the kitchen, ready to roll. My brother Yisroel was there already. I thought we would be able to do this leisurely, at our own pace, but then my mother walked in and asked, “Is there anything we can do to get things going for Shabbos? It looks like there won’t be any food this week!”
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