26 | JANUARY 25 • 2024 J
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OUR COMMUNITY

Editor’s Note: “Celebrating
Shabbat” is a continuing series.
A

mit Weitzer of
Huntington Woods,
her husband, Evan
Major, and two children,
Raviv Weitzer-Major, 5,
and Lior Weitzer-Major,
2, like making Shabbat
special. Growing up in West
Bloomfield, Amit’s family
had Shabbat dinner together.
“It was really prioritized and
tended to,” she says. “Friday
night would have a different
tone and cadence, and I really
appreciated that.”
Having Shabbat dinner
together meant having
relatives and friends over and,
as she got older, it also meant

navigating the expectations
around secular life and Jewish
life when it came to being
home for dinner versus out
with friends, she says.
These days, her family takes
part in a monthly Shabbat
potluck that rotates among
the homes of a handful of
other families.
“It’s people who have
known and loved each other
a long time and become
parents together,” she says.
“It’s a group of families
that wanted this regular
connection and chavurah
to look forward to being
with. We’re all connected
to different synagogues or
institutions, but this was
something supplementary

or complementary; this was
wanting our kids to feel
excited about what Shabbat is
and what Shabbat can be.”
They grab challah or
something challah-like,
Weitzer explains, and, in the
spirit of Shabbat, they make
a more traditional blessing,
or sometimes say a poem
about food and where the
food comes from. They light
candles and bless them, or
sing a song that makes the
blessing more accessible, she
says. “There’s a real feeling
of connecting and honoring
of ritual, and sometimes
it’s expressed differently
depending on the gathering
and who’s leading.”
Their meals are vegetable-

forward, she says, and the
evening is informal, with
people sitting on the floor and
kids running around.
“Ritually, we sing songs,
not always the same ones;
we have songs that map onto
the different blessings,” she
says. “So, there’s some similar
ritual each time we gather,
even if the songs are a little
bit different; there’s a real
playfulness, and I think the
key thing is the expectation
of this being a monthly
gathering we can all look
forward to.”
She and her friends have
tried to model the weekend
as a time to reset and be
together, she says, similar
to what she saw growing

Shabbat is special for chavurah.

KAREN SCHWARTZ CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Sharing the Spirit
of Shabbat
Friends gathered around a board
game on a Shabbat morning:
Let to right: Jen Rusciano, Noam
Kimelman, Oren Brandvain, Raviv
Weitzer-Major and Evan Major.

CELEBRATING SHABBAT