FS, I dont want to join your "defining the SAHM" discussion. I just want to make one correction. No one is, or even wants, a 9 hour childfree day. The preschool day is 6 hours, not 9. Anyway, I cant participate in that dicussion from a stupid cell phone.
FS, do you know anything about chassidus and shmiras einiyim? Boys learning in the city while the public schools are on summer breaks? Won't happen even if thei parents will have to sell shirts off their backs.
And, yes, suburban mosdos are forgoing camp this year do to the economic decline.
Ok, just to play devil's advocate and keep the thread going, should the "Chanies" who are getting tzeddakah for camp have to sell one of their expensive strollers to help defray the cost?
FS, do you know anything about chassidus and shmiras einiyim? Boys learning in the city while the public schools are on summer breaks? Won't happen even if thei parents will have to sell shirts off their backs.
And, yes, suburban mosdos are forgoing camp this year do to the economic decline.
Chevra, you are all great, I love this thread.
So what happens when September comes, its Indian summer, and public school girls are walking to school, and hanging out on their way home, in tight hip-slung jeans and tank tops, or mini skirts and tank tops? Are they somehow protected because its September?
And not to push it even further, but we were driving through the Monticello area recently, and saw a not insignificant number of women walking around in shorts. Do the boys never see them?
FS, do you know anything about chassidus and shmiras einiyim? Boys learning in the city while the public schools are on summer breaks? Won't happen even if thei parents will have to sell shirts off their backs.
And, yes, suburban mosdos are forgoing camp this year do to the economic decline.
Chevra, you are all great, I love this thread.
So what happens when September comes, its Indian summer, and public school girls are walking to school, and hanging out on their way home, in tight hip-slung jeans and tank tops, or mini skirts and tank tops? Are they somehow protected because its September?
And not to push it even further, but we were driving through the Monticello area recently, and saw a not insignificant number of women walking around in shorts. Do the boys never see them?
The boys don't leave their camps.
They come home b'erech when PS starts. We can't blindfold them, but we can try limiting their exposure.
1) Kitov - there are still people who think that even with all the explanations about how chassidim need to send their kids to camp because the Rebbe this and that and the third thing, there are still posters like me and others who will ask: "if camp is necessary to continue learning for boys, and there are more and more families who can't afford it and need to take zedoko, why are the community leaders today, the rabbonim and mechanchim perpetuating a situation which requires more and more people to take zedoko instead of moving the "camp" back to the city to cut costs? I go back to my explanation of why so many people including rabbonim and the "Fresh Air Fund" thought that camp was important in the 1940s and 50s. Because of epidemics during the summer in the city. Punkt.
We no longer have summer epidemics of polio, TB and other choleras (literally) like that. So why can't one have a learning "camp" in the school building inside the city? Because you don't have "grounds"? Too bad. There are public parks and if an entire school of boys goes there to play on an outing (I know day camps that used to do that in my time in Queens) the ruach can be kept frum etc. They can't take public transportation? I have to pay for someone elses shmiras einayim with my zedoko so that he can rent a private bus?
2) I think that Saw is saying some very important things. And from a psychological point of view one could ask, "what makes a person think that their choices are so important that they would rather take charity to pay for them, rather than to make drastic changes in their lifestyle in order to be able to afford these choices?"
I agree with that but at the same time I can sympathize with those mothers who have trouble coping. Life can be rough and sometimes unforeseen circumstances come up. However I do agree that lifestyle changes and planning should be encouraged in a gentle and sensitive way.
Even though I seem kind of cold on here, I'm not.
I absolutely believe in helping those who can't cope, but that doesn't always mean throwing money at the problem. I would rather help people learn how to cope than to pay for their kids camp, even if it costs more. Its a better, long term solution.
Its like teaching a man to fish. Sometimes he needs to be taught, sometimes he needs the fish.
But I still maintain if you are choosing SAHM as your profession, watching your own kids for a few weeks should be feasible instead of choosing tzedaka.
And thanks FS :-D
Once again, I'm not disagreeing with most of the content rather I am suggesting other ways of delivering the message.
This isn't a support thread, this is the theory thread. In a support thread with a personal story, I would respond differently.
FS, do you know anything about chassidus and shmiras einiyim? Boys learning in the city while the public schools are on summer breaks? Won't happen even if thei parents will have to sell shirts off their backs.
And, yes, suburban mosdos are forgoing camp this year do to the economic decline.
Chevra, you are all great, I love this thread.
So what happens when September comes, its Indian summer, and public school girls are walking to school, and hanging out on their way home, in tight hip-slung jeans and tank tops, or mini skirts and tank tops? Are they somehow protected because its September?
And not to push it even further, but we were driving through the Monticello area recently, and saw a not insignificant number of women walking around in shorts. Do the boys never see them?
The boys don't leave their camps.
They come home b'erech when PS starts. We can't blindfold them, but we can try limiting their exposure.
Yes, but public school starts at 8:30, and gets out at 2:30. Five days a week. The girls are running around dressed as I said lots of hours. So they boys will see the girls in April, May, June and September, maybe even October. What makes July and August so different?
FS, do you know anything about chassidus and shmiras einiyim? Boys learning in the city while the public schools are on summer breaks? Won't happen even if thei parents will have to sell shirts off their backs.
And, yes, suburban mosdos are forgoing camp this year do to the economic decline.
Chevra, you are all great, I love this thread.
So what happens when September comes, its Indian summer, and public school girls are walking to school, and hanging out on their way home, in tight hip-slung jeans and tank tops, or mini skirts and tank tops? Are they somehow protected because its September?
And not to push it even further, but we were driving through the Monticello area recently, and saw a not insignificant number of women walking around in shorts. Do the boys never see them?
The boys don't leave their camps.
They come home b'erech when PS starts. We can't blindfold them, but we can try limiting their exposure.
Yes, but public school starts at 8:30, and gets out at 2:30. Five days a week. The girls are running around dressed as I said lots of hours. So they boys will see the girls in April, May, June and September, maybe even October. What makes July and August so different?
Two things,
For one, there's a certain dress code during the PS year, so less tankinis around. Sundays takkeh are problematic.
The tzveiteh zach iz, July and August are the warmest months, calling for the least body coverage, in terms of clothing. Most street fire hydrants are turned on in those months, and the PS kids dress in bikinis and splash in the water, on streets where heimishe yidden live.
For me, as a full time working mom who has always worked, a Working mom has the following jobs. And in my world she does all of them herself or with the exception of the first, to whatever extent with her dh if he is at all around to do some of the stuff:
1) full time work out of the house plus commute
2) shopping for food, sometimes at multiple stores
3) shopping for clothing, furniture, shoes, other household or personal goods
4) cleaning the house (dusting, vaccum, wash floors, sinks and toilets and bath or shower, wash outsides of closets in bedroom and kitchen, wipe down walls, do trisim and windows - all weekly at least)
5) cooking the food, serving, cleaning off, washing up dishes, drying and putting away dishes and pots
6) washing laundry, hanging, taking off the line, folding and putting away laundry
7) scheduling doctors appointments, houshold repairmen etc.
8) paying bills
9) taking care of banking, checkbook balancing, etc.
To that one adds things like
1) taking kids to doctors, treatments, dentists etc.
2) taking kids to friends for play dates in the late afternoon
3) having to go to your own doctors and dentist appointments
4) picking up clothing from dry cleaner
And of course depending on personal inclination"
1) sewing clothing for family
2) crocheting or knitting clothing for family
And then there are child related activities:
1) playing with your children
2) listening to your children
3) teaching your children Jewish and secular matters
4) teaching your children discipline and boundaries
And that doesn't even include special situations like:
1) caring for aged or ill parents
2) chessed communal volunteering
3) school, yeshiva or communal events you have to not only participate in but add to (like baking for a festival, a raffle etc.)
What about the husbands? When both a husband and wife work full time, why does all the house work, cooking and child rearing still fall on the mother?
When I worked and my husband was in kollel, my husband did more in the house than I did. Your list sounds right on the money for a single mother or a disfunctional home. A husband should take part more in the household duties if the mother is going to be working.
1) Kitov - there are still people who think that even with all the explanations about how chassidim need to send their kids to camp because the Rebbe this and that and the third thing, there are still posters like me and others who will ask: "if camp is necessary to continue learning for boys, and there are more and more families who can't afford it and need to take zedoko, why are the community leaders today, the rabbonim and mechanchim perpetuating a situation which requires more and more people to take zedoko instead of moving the "camp" back to the city to cut costs? I go back to my explanation of why so many people including rabbonim and the "Fresh Air Fund" thought that camp was important in the 1940s and 50s. Because of epidemics during the summer in the city. Punkt.
We no longer have summer epidemics of polio, TB and other choleras (literally) like that. So why can't one have a learning "camp" in the school building inside the city? Because you don't have "grounds"? Too bad. There are public parks and if an entire school of boys goes there to play on an outing (I know day camps that used to do that in my time in Queens) the ruach can be kept frum etc. They can't take public transportation? I have to pay for someone elses shmiras einayim with my zedoko so that he can rent a private bus?
2) I think that Saw is saying some very important things. And from a psychological point of view one could ask, "what makes a person think that their choices are so important that they would rather take charity to pay for them, rather than to make drastic changes in their lifestyle in order to be able to afford these choices?"
I agree with that but at the same time I can sympathize with those mothers who have trouble coping. Life can be rough and sometimes unforeseen circumstances come up. However I do agree that lifestyle changes and planning should be encouraged in a gentle and sensitive way.
Even though I seem kind of cold on here, I'm not.
I absolutely believe in helping those who can't cope, but that doesn't always mean throwing money at the problem. I would rather help people learn how to cope than to pay for their kids camp, even if it costs more. Its a better, long term solution.
Its like teaching a man to fish. Sometimes he needs to be taught, sometimes he needs the fish.
But I still maintain if you are choosing SAHM as your profession, watching your own kids for a few weeks should be feasible instead of choosing tzedaka.
And thanks FS :-D
Once again, I'm not disagreeing with most of the content rather I am suggesting other ways of delivering the message.
This isn't a support thread, this is the theory thread. In a support thread with a personal story, I would respond differently.
It's a theory thread but some people take it personally so I'd rather error on the side of support then on the theory side.
On another note, did Shalhevet abandon this thread? Did we give her permission to do anything besides work, clean the toilets and post here???
Pickle, I agree with you. When my husband and I are both working full time, we share the household responsibilities. Now that I'm home, I do the lion's share, but he still does things around the house.
There is support, there is theory, and there is lecturing.
Support is if one actually asks for help, theory is when states one's ideas on a subject and backs them with supportive statements, lecturing is when you state your opinion and basically assert that anything else just doesn't work, it is my way or the highway.
OK, fill me in, what have I missed?
Where are we holding now?
And how can I contribute, I'm pretty sure with a little push we can make it to 100
today or tomorrow.
I can do working mother vs SAHM
Just give me a few points of contention.
This thread made me wonder what I'll do about camp in a few years from now. Not that there aren't kids my kids' ages in "camp" already, but when they're old enough for science camp or art camp or whatever middle school aged kids do.
I can imagine my father offering to help pay for camp - if it was one of those places where they basically stick the kids together in groups and toss them in the woods somewhere with an ancient tent and a vague warning about not getting eaten by bears.
I don't think we have anything like that in Israel. Not enough bears .
Maybe I really will set my kids loose on the streets for protest season (what you Americans know as "summer"). Pick a cause, any cause, and go tent out about it for a while. Maybe hunger strike too, then I'll really save money.
The idea of camp that's just basically just school for another month - bleh. A respectful "bleh," since apparently gedolim endorse the idea. But really, the main benefit of camp (like the main point of school, IMHO) isn't the kind of learning you can quantify. If there's a benefit to camp it's in getting to start over again in a totally different social setting, about getting away from the teachers who annoyed you all year (instead of being stuck with them for a tenth month), about success being measured totally differently from the way it's measured the rest of the year, about learning new skills, etc... In many cases I'd be more happy to pay for camp middle-of-the-woods than camp sit-and-learn-some-more.
Maybe I'd compromise, for my kids, on a camp where you only fight off bears for half the day, and learn the other half. Like hesder, but with camp. And bears.
Machane BA is pretty much like that, but only for a few days (as I said about 15 pages ago, in Israel people don't send to long summer camps), I think some of the batey sefer sade, have outdoors camps for tweens and teens, but also only for several days up to a week, I've seen them advertised and they sound like fun.
No bears, but we do have dear.
Last edited by chanchy123 on Wed, Jul 27 2011, 12:31 am; edited 1 time in total
PSA: don't leave a helium balloon on a string in a room where there is a fan going at night. It's likely that the string will get twisted in the fan and cause the motor to burn out, even if it's a brand new fan that you really like.
FS, I dont want to join your "defining the SAHM" discussion. I just want to make one correction. No one is, or even wants, a 9 hour childfree day. The preschool day is 6 hours, not 9. Anyway, I cant participate in that dicussion from a stupid cell phone.
I can see it now:
NEWSFLASH:
Hey, imamothers, did you hear? Mama Bear is going to buy a SmartPhone!
Is it my imagination (or not), but the guys on the first video appear to be BORED OFF THEIR MND during Davening. One appearently is even reading a magazine and another is collecting Tsedaka that people noisily thow into the box during davening....hum...
PSA: don't leave a helium balloon on a string in a room where there is a fan going at night. It's likely that the string will get twisted in the fan and cause the motor to burn out, even if it's a brand new fan that you really like.
I'll keep that in mind next time we have a helium balloon. And a ceiling fan, which right now don't work anyway. Designed obsolescence and all that.
PSA: don't leave a helium balloon on a string in a room where there is a fan going at night. It's likely that the string will get twisted in the fan and cause the motor to burn out, even if it's a brand new fan that you really like.
How was your ceiling fan until it's untimely death. DH just suggegsted we might consider buying one for our room. Do you think it's any better than a regular fan? We don't have AC in our bedroom (we don't really need it there anyway since a fan is enough for us at night, and we don't really use the bedroom during the day.
What kind of fan did you have?
.
.
