Yamim Noraim

I woke up this morning thinking about tefila over Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.  What can I do to make the hours in shul meaningful for Chana?

This is the first year in a long time that I see myself spending any significant time in shul.  My youngest is four, capable of playing outside with all the kids and not being in danger of running into the street, or needing his mommy, or needing to be closely supervised.  I imagine that he'll be in and out of shul visiting me, but it means I will hopefully be able to stay in shul for a portion of the time.

And aside from the time spent in shul, I was wondering what to teach Chana in terms of the yamim noraim altogether.  I thought about going through some of Rambam's hilchos teshuva, but she has numerous objections to Midas Hadin as expressed in Bamidbar, and I'm not sure that the concept of viewing oneself as a beinoni would be most suited to where she is emotionally right now.  I was thinking about which themes to highlight that she would find relevant and meaningful.

I'd also like to review the musaf shemona esrei with her.  And perhaps study the Torah readings and maybe look at the haftorah (Chana's story, which of course she knows well) on a deeper level.  And then I was thinking about going through the machzor just basically so she knows the different tefilos and what is happening when.

Then I realized that I'm likely being super over ambitious.  I wonder if it is better to drop Devarim until after Rosh Hashana.  Well, I just looked at the calendar and it's about two weeks.  So I think that is definitely what I'll do.

I'm not sure if the story of the akeida is best to address right now with her, either.

I think today's plan will be
What is Rosh Hashana
Vayikra 23:24, Bamidbar 29:1
Maybe some ideas of the mitzva of shofar.
Maybe some thoughts about the concept of teshuva specific to this time of year.

And now I'm thinking maybe Elazar (grade 3) and perhaps even the other 2 boys might be interested in the procedure of the avoda of the kohen gadol on Yom Kippur.  We'll see if that pans out.