#ColorTheOmer – featured on Bookishly Jewish!
Mazal tov to Bayit builders Dr. Shari Berkowitz and Steve Silbert, author and illustrator of Color the Omer, for this feature in Bookishly Jewish!
Here’s how the interview begins:
Evalyn: Coloring the Omer is a great way to bring the mitzvah of counting the Omer into more Jewish homes. When did you first think of the idea? Was there a particular inspiration behind it?
Shari: I was taking a course on Jewish mysticism with my rabbi, David Evan Markus, early in the pandemic, and we were learning about counting the Omer. I guess I did it as a child but not with any kavanah or deeper understanding of how it maps to the kabbalistic sefirot. So I started counting for the first time for real, and I was definitely enjoying picking up this new mitzvah. But with the pandemic, I would wake up confused…did I count last night? Was today Tuesday still? I was stressing my self out! So I found a page with 7 stars of David and started coloring one point or center each day to help me focus. And it really did help! In speaking with others, I could see that they also wanted to color. I started a sketch book with very rough ideas, and then Steve picked up the actual illustration of those ideas, and R’Rachel polished it all up for publication. It was a very fast, very intense ride as we slid into production just in time for last Pesach…
Read the whole interview here: Author Interview – Shari Berkowitz.
