Sukkot – also known as the Feast of Tabernacles or Feast of Booths – celebrates the fall harvest and commemorates the Israelites’ 40 years of wandering in the desert after their Exodus from Egypt. The week-long Jewish festival is celebrated by building, dwelling, and dining in a temporary booth called a sukkah, which many families and congregations in Tidewater do each year.
Modern-day sukkahs are comprised of three walls with an organic roof that provides shade but remains partially open to the sky. Today, to make the building easier to accomplish each year, some sukkahs are constructed from kits purchased online.
Would the Israelites of millennia ago ever recognize today’s sukkahs with their twinkling beer bottles and strands of globe lights? The answer is obvious, but they might be proud to know that homage is paid to their desert dwellings with a variety of family and communal gatherings and celebrations.
Jewish News asked some in Jewish Tidewater to share their inspiration and the joy they experience each year in their home sukkahs during this festive holiday.
The Bridge Family Sukkah [ Sid Bridge ]
Thanks for your interest in The Bridge Family Sukkah, AKA “The Awesomest Sukkah in Virginia Beach.”
I like to keep things user friendly when it comes to Sukkah building; when we moved to Virginia Beach, some friends came over and added a framework to our backyard deck.
The way our deck is constructed, all I must do is roll out my bamboo matt schach (for the sukkah’s roof) and hang up my lights and decorations. It’s a ready-made sukkah attached to my house.
Our Sukkah is decorated mainly with a seemingly endless stream of novelty lighting. Every year we try to add something new and different, whether it’s twinkling beer bottles, glowing cacti, luminescent guitars, sparkling lanterns… we have it all. Plus, long strands of globe lights and rope lights for plenty of illumination. The middle of the walls still get adorned with the decorations our kids made when they were in grade school, so there are plenty of “traditional” Sukkah decorations as well.
We eat all our meals in it during the holiday, and we host an annual get together for members of our synagogue, KBH. We try to hang out in it when we would otherwise be hanging out inside. I’ve never been out-doorsy enough to sleep in it, though.
Sukkos is all about trusting in G-d and enjoying some time outdoors together. As with any Jewish holiday, I think it’s super important to make sure things are fun. A sukkah should be a fun place to spend time so everyone will want to be a part of the holiday. My kids like to pitch in when it comes to hanging the lights, setting it up, and enjoying time together when the weather permits.
The Leon Entertaining Sukkah [ David Leon ]
I bought my sukkah from Sukkah.com, the metal tube version.
My daughters and I decorate with string lights (Christmas lights), pinecones, and plastic fruit.
We use our sukkah mostly for entertaining, and it feels good having it up in my backyard. I also like that it sets an example for my girls to create fun, positive Jewish memories and experiences.
The Rubins’ Enlightening Sukkah [ Shikma and Danny Rubin ]
We love Sukkot and find it’s a wonderful way to be with friends and family. We like to host dinners, and we realize many people have never been in a sukkah. It’s fun to introduce the holiday to new people, explain the significance, and share a meal together.
We string lights across our sukkah in various directions and string other holiday-themed decor. Over the years, we have also hung our kids’ Rosh Hashanah-inspired art on the walls.
We use our sukkah most often for dinners with friends and family. We also try to eat breakfast when we can and be in the sukkah as much as possible.
We use a kit which has made it easy to build and take down the sukkah year after year.
Barb’s Dream Sukkah [ Barb Gelb ]
Sukkot is my favorite holiday, and it has always been a dream of mine to have a large sukkah and invite people over to share in the celebration. Several
years ago, my husband, Kenny Weinstein, made that dream come true for me.
Rabbi Levi Brashevitsky helped us figure out what we needed, and we purchased a very large sukkah kit. I like to decorate with a lot of lights and fall decorations, and I have fun making the table decorations.
We have a couple of very large dinners in our sukkah and then invite couples or smaller groups for lunch or dinner during the week. I have had Ohef Sholom Temple’s youth group over for lunch and the OST board has been coming for the past three years. It’s a really special experience, and I am filled with gratitude to sit outside and appreciate the good food, friends, and blessings we have.
