My spot! Bamidbar

Earlier in the week Cohava burst into tears right before dinner. Cohava has been very emotional this week. When she had calmed down enough to express herself she wailed, "Gabi is sitting in my spot!"
"Cohava, I am so glad you told me why you are upset. It is exactly what I wanted to talk about in Bamidbar, this week's parasha!"
Somehow we made it through dinner with no more melt downs, and before bed we looked at how the shevatim set up camp. We reviewed each tribe, its location in the camp, and its flag.
The next day, I said to the girls, "As you know, we are probably from shevet Yehuda, and there were only twelve shevatim. But if there were shevet Cohava, Gabi, and Ruti, what would their flags look like?
The girls got to work with some paper and markers, creating their own emblem.

 This was supposed to last only a few minutes, but new baby (she'll IYH get her name on Shabbat) needed a feed and a change, so flags were decorated for a long time.  When Gabi was finished she announced that she needed to find an stick for her flag and choose a spot to set up camp.
When I finally emerged from newborn duties, I presented each girl with a white chair cushion. Out came the fabric markers, and the girls got to work, transposing their flag image onto the seat where they would "set up camp". When I explained that the were for putting on chairs, Ruti ran off and placed hers on Abba's Shabbat chair. She might not have understood the project, but she is very  good at kibud av v'em.

 Gabi's flag theme was 'angels' because of the malach Gavriel. Cohava's is stars for obvious reasons.
 I wonder if they will move the cushions to the shabbat table tonight on their own accord, like bnei yisrael moving their camp. This way they will know their spot with no fighting!

 

 Shabbat Shalom! Chodesh tov!