I know some women take pride in the fact they don’t need any help, while many others are happy to get help if it’s offered, even if they find it hard to ask outright. Even if your hostess is the former, I’m pretty certain that even she wouldn’t object if her guests kept a close eye on their kids and cleaned up after them.

If you have a personal situation that makes things harder for you, or if you’re the only guest and can’t take on everything, you can still have an open conversation with your hostess and ask her if there are a couple of things that you can help with over your stay that will make things easier for her.

Step by Step

Here’s how to go about implementing this idea:

• Speak to the other guests and get them on board.
• Open a conversation with your hostess and discuss what she’d find helpful.
• Create a shared list of chores.
• While most things will be tasks that can be divided up, some things might require everyone’s involvement. For example, a hostess might say that she’d appreciate if an adult from each family was awake and around to keep an eye on their kids at all times.
• You can break it down by individual tasks throughout Yom Tov, for example, sweeping after meals, or you can break it down further, like sweeping the kitchen. You can even do it in smaller increments like sweeping after the first night meal. You can divide the tasks by time of day — morning, afternoon, and nighttime. Do whatever you feel makes the most sense for your situation. You can also consider each family taking a full or half day to do all the tasks that are needed. They’re on fully for that time(s), but they’re completely off duty the rest of Yom Tov.
• Ask every family to choose what they’re comfortable with from the list.
• If there are tasks left untaken, or you think the weight will be unevenly distributed, you can go around in a virtual circle and have each person take one task at a time until each task is taken and everyone has had a fair chance to choose what works best for them.
• Print the chart and hang it on the fridge or somewhere else so that everyone can easily refer to it.

Since we implemented this in our family, we may no longer be in vacation mode all Pesach, but the time spent together leaves everyone happier. My mother is so much more relaxed coming into Yom Tov knowing she can count on us to be helpful, and we know that she’s genuinely happy to have us all there and is able to enjoy her well-deserved nachas.

The Hostess Wish List

Should we call this a registry? Here are some things that might make it onto your family’s task list. Add as many details as needed to make sure that the Hostess’s expectations are met.

Before Yom Tov

• Contribute to the cooking in your own Pesachdig kitchen (if you have one)
• Come over for a few hours in the weeks prior and help with either cooking or cleaning
• Run errands for your hostess
• Make phone calls to all the guests to get the specs of how many Pack ‘n- Plays each family needs, which yogurts and fruits each family likes, etc.
• Bring linen and towels from home to save the hostess from extra laundry post-Yom Tov or prepare beds with hostess’s linen once you come

Meals

• Clean up after breakfast
• Set table for the seudah
• Heat up food
• Make salads
• Bring drinks to the table and serve
• Clear off each course
• Clear off at the end of meal
• Sweep dining room after seudah

General Clean Up

• Dining room
• Living room
• Kitchen counters
• Dinette
• Playroom
• Hallway

General

• Prepare oil/candles for lighting
• Wash dishes
• Refill drinks in fridge
• Restock paper goods corner, cakes and snacks
• Cut up fruit each day
• Switch linen for next set of guests, or strip linen at the end of your stay

Defusing Difficult Dynamics

We all know that every family has different dynamics, but I think it’s safe to say that no family is perfect, no matter how they present themselves to the world. And a sprinkling of in-law children in the mix brings with it new expectations and assumptions based on their own families and experiences.

As much as you love your family, do you ever get a feeling of deja vu when getting together? There are often unpleasant scenarios that repeat themselves whenever certain people are around, or whenever certain parts of Yom Tov roll around. Often, we can anticipate and prepare for these situations, even if we can’t stop them.

I’ve found the best way to handle challenging scenes that push our buttons is to prepare myself and the kids for what’s likely to happen. When not in the heat of the moment, it’s so much easier to respond in a way that we’re proud of rather than letting our defense mechanisms get the better of us.

For myself, I usually turn the situation over in my mind and plan my reaction and response. I try to visualize it playing out in my head and ending in a more positive way. Then, when certain things happen, or when somebody says something irksome that I knew they would say in real time, it’s much easier for me to either let it go or deal with it more smoothly.

When it comes to the kids, we role play. I’ll play the part of the annoying cousin, or the adult who puts them down, etc., and I work with the child to formulate a response that feels natural and OK to them, yet doesn’t escalate the matter. It’s a great opportunity to develop interpersonal relationships skills and good middos.

Depending on the situation, I try to teach them how to express their feelings while also working to resolve the situation. Often, we decide that the best thing to do is let something go. I encourage them to come over and tell me or my husband when they let something go so they can get it off their chests and get our quiet applause.

Sometimes, there are guests who have special circumstances and need a dose of understanding, or extra effort needs to be made to include them. As adults, we should make sure to take that into account, and help our kids do the same. Small things can make them feel good, like picking up an extra hair accessory that you get your own girls and including them when asking your kids Yom Tov questions.

Be mindful that anything you tell your kids may be repeated, so make sure you don’t say anything that you don’t want passed along.

The Right Set-up

Most often, being Yom Tov guests means having overtired kids who aren’t in their own surroundings, aren’t eating the foods they’re used to, and so on. Sometimes it’s our own kids causing the ruckus or instigating difficult situations; they’re not just on the receiving end of those behaviors. These are things we can preempt, too.

Do your best to set up ideal circumstances:

• The younger kids are often just in need of a good nap. Perhaps you could bring a favorite toy or blanket for them to relax with.
• For older kids, I like to have individual pep talks with each of them. They’re smarter than we think, and they can usually anticipate their behavior as much as we can. They can sometimes even tell us their triggers. It could be they just need a quick fix, like an extra pillow to sleep well, or something else simple. Sometimes they need to be surprised with a secret square of chocolate as positive reinforcement when they’re behaving nicely.
• For those kids who tend to lose themselves, we choose a code word that’s our secret language to remind them about whatever we discussed during our pep talk.
• A ten-minute walk alone with the kid or a bit of quiet reading time away from everyone else can also be helpful.
• The more you plan in advance with your children, the more you’ll be able to prevent meltdowns, and the more they’ll see how much you appreciate them and understand what their challenges are.

(Originally featured in Family First, Issue 788)