I visited the JCC in Squirrel Hill to meet with Diane Troderman.  Diane's husband, Harold Grinspoon, has helped, with local communities, to develop and fund the PJ Library program.  This groundbreaking initiative sends families with preschool aged children, age appropriate books with Jewish content.  The idea is that parents read to their children and if they have Jewish books, those will be read.  We visited the JCC to see a PJ Library story time with some of the Pittsburgh PJ Library Families.  We have, with funding from the Fine Foundation, supplemented the distribution of books with high quality programming. 
 
So, what are the habits we are helping to form? 
    1.  Parents reading Jewish books to their children
    2.  Jewish children being exposed to Jewish content
    3.  Jewish families participating in Jewish programming
    4.  Reading, in general
 
Thank you to all of the donors who have helped to make PJ Library* a great success.  Over 1,000 Pittsburgh children have already participated.  What can you do?  Make it your habit that when you hear of a Pittsburgh family with a new child or of a new family with young children moving to town, that you refer them to the PJ Library page - CLICK HERE. 

Maybe, just maybe, by the end of March, I’ll stop writing “2011”.

Shabbat Shalom!

*PJ Library in Pittsburgh is programmed through a partnership of the Jewish Federation of Greater Pittsburgh, the Agency for Jewish Learning, the Jewish Community Center and Community Day School.