Left: Participants at Apples and
Honey and Lots, Lots More stream
through the activities area.

Far le , top to bottom:
Building her own edible graham
cracker house is Julia Simon.

Bracha Leeba gets a hand
painting from IYQ2 the
Clown (Peter Cooper).

Susie Terebelo helps her daughter
Jillian string an apple-shaped
bead necklace.

Cranking down on the apple
press are Yonah - Pollack and
Jacob Abramson.

Taking a break from work at the
event are, front, Julie McGlinnen,
Lisa Soble Siegmann, Cindy Leven
and Laura Bank. In back, Alissa
Pianin and Debbie Rosenberg.

Ilolidasr Suite

Apples and Honey event draws 200 families to the JCC.

Story by SHELLI DORFMAN

Photos by BILL HANSEN

inding her way through a flap in the side of a
10-foot-tall inflatable apple, filled with swoosh-
ing air and multicolored balloons, was 8-year-
old Melissa Marblestone. Back on immovable
ground, she announced that the balloon-catching activity
was more for Haley," her 5-year old sister.
Retreating to the inside area of the Apples and
Honey and Lots, Lots More event Sunday, Melissa
blended back into the cheerful bustle of more than 200
families in the lobby and balcony areas of the Jewish
Community Center of Metropolitan Detroit's D. Dan
& Betty Kahn Building in West Bloomfield.
The event was an extravaganza of crafts, music and
food. Lines of people wrapped around hallway corners
for a turn at creating an authentic shofar. A cider mill
shared apples with those who wanted to take their
wedge to a honey-dipping station instead of watching
it become apple juice.
Near the front door of the building, scout leader
Bob Levine and five members of his Congregation Beth
Abraham Hillel Moses Boy Scout Troop 1579 handed
out yellow paper fish. With instructions to "write their
sins on the fish," guests watched them dissolve in the

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9/3

1999

20 Detroit Jewish News

water of a child's plastic swimming pool, acting as a
tashlich pond (water used at Rosh HaShana for casting
away sins).
Arts and crafts included projects relating to holidays
from Rosh HaShana through Simchat Torah. Strolling
to various stations were guests wearing newly created
apple-shaped bead necklaces, munching on edible
apple people, carrying Simchat Torah flags, etrog boxes
and graham cracker sukkot.
The central floor was reserved for Harriet Berg direct-
ing the Festival Dancers in an interactive swinging of vol-
unteer partners. Rhoea Wallace, 36, said she "is not a pro-
fessional dancer," but was just "in the mood to dance."
IYQ2 the Clown, aka Peter Cooper from the
Michigan Jewish AIDS Coalition, painted faces,
hands and arms in holiday themes. They included
beehives and Jonah the whale and, during mid-after-
noon, a run of rainbows.
Erin Rhodes, 7, her sister Jamie, 4, and Jacob Allen,
7, wandered about fully decked out for the occasion.
With a single apple costume and one bumble bee out-
fit, they smiled their way through the crowd, periodi-
cally disappearing and returning dressed anew.

