What To Do, What To Do? Family fun for the Festival of Shavuot. ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM AppleTree Editor is 2050, and your family is gath- ered together, and it's time to rem- inisce: Remember the good old days, when everyone used to sit around for hours and hours and watch television? Wasn't it great when the TV was on day and night, for 10 hours straight some- times, and we saw every infomercial ever made and the children could liter- ally recite commercials backward and forward? And remember that time our TV broke, and we had to walk 10 miles in the snow — and we were glad to do it — in bare feet to buy another? Can anything, anything ever duplicate our love for that dear appliance? Boy, do we miss those days! Well, maybe. One of the nicest features of a Jewish holiday like Shavuot is that it can mean genuine quality family time — no shopping, no school projects, no TV So after services, and cheese- cake, and a nap (if you're lucky), what to do with all this quality time? Here are a few ideas that require nothing more than your imagination. #1) One aspect of Shavuot is its link to agriculture. Challenge young chil- dren to "build" a garden of blocks in their playroom. Have older children imagine a new kind of tree, or ask them to make up a story about an unusual tree, such as one that blooms only in the winter. It's fun to have one person begin the story, then stop in the middle and have another take over, continuing on until each fam- ily member has had a turn to add #2) On Shavuot, we celebrate God's gift of the Torah to the Jewish people. Ask your children what mitzvot, or com- mandments, they like best of the 613. Or, ask your children to create their own Ten Commandments. Another idea: ask your family which of the commandments they find the most difficult to observe and which the easiest to observe. Is being shomer Shabbat (Sabbath observant) easier or more challenging than the mitzvah of respecting your par- ents? Do some mitzvot seem more important? Why? #3) On Shavuot we are told to rejoice. What does that mean to your family? Ask your children what are the happiest times in their lives, and why this is the case. "He found that one edge of the star was a slide, at the bottom of which was a cheesecake made of honey and gold. The fish took the cheesecake on a pic- nic. He sat on the grass and ate his cake and drank orange juice, then went home to write all about it on his com- puter." These can get very silly, and fun. (Note: For younger children, or adults with a lot of children who may feel they have lost the capacity to remember any- thing beyond the location of the front door, try starting with five items.) #5) Look at all your books and imagine replacing, or adding, a dairy word, or One of the nicest features of a Jewish holiday like Shavuot is that it can mean genuine quality family no shopping, no school projects, no TV time #4) Play a game that also will help you improve your memory. Ask one child to list 10 objects, another child to remem- ber the 10 objects and tell a story hav- ing to do with Shavuot (be very flexible here) using the objects. For example: A child lists: fish, shoe, balloon, star, slide, gold, honey, grass, orange juice, computer. A key to recalling objects is to quickly link them in your mind in an image, which also provides a great tale. So the storyteller might say, "Once there was a fish who wore shoes that had balloons tied to the toes. One day the balloons were overfilled with helium and the fish flew to the sky, where he sat on a star. more. Do your children like the writing of Bruce Colville? How would they like reading Vampires Don't Go To Cheesecake School? Or are your girls fans of the Babysitter Club, or Little Sister? How about Little Sister: Susie's Cheese Kreplach Par ty Is A Headache! For younger readers, there's nothing like Green Eggs And Ham, Actually Soy Protein Disguised As Ham, Which We Enjoyed On Shavuot Because The Green Reminded Us Of The Greenery On Mt. Sinai. #6) One of the most difficult, if not the most difficult, mitzvah is to love your fellow Jew as yourself Ask your chil- dren, and yourself, what ways you can better accomplish this commandment. #7) Do you scream for ice cream? In a memorable episode of "The Cosby Show," Cliff Huxtable describes in extensive detail the utter joy of tasting a chocolate-covered cherry. Ask your chil- dren to imagine that they are eating ice cream, and talk about exactly what they are experiencing. #8) No one is certain of the precise location of Mt. Sinai, where the Jews received the Torah. Do a little research and learn more, or even solve the mystery yourself. #9) Survey your yard, or a window sill, and find a place to plant your own greenery for next Shavuot (maybe you'll even have enough flowers to fill your home!). A great book to get you started is Kids Garden by Avery Hart and Paul Mantell (copyright 1996, published by Williamson). Here you'll learn how to get a garden started in a yogurt cup and an egg carton, how to make your own scarecrow, recipes for vegeta- bles that you've grown (like cold carrot soup with ginger and orange juice) and how to attract butterflies — and get rid of bugs. #10) All right, you've done a great job avoiding the TV. Now it's time to turn it on — in your conversation. The most famous figure of this holi- day is a convert to Judaism, Ruth. Ask your children to imagine that the characters on their favorite TV show have decided to convert to Judaism. How would their lives change? What could episodes of the show focus on now? (You can also do this with comic-book characters or any favorite book). E.