How To Pick My Child’s BMitzvah Date?

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Dear Miriam, 

How do you choose the right date for your kid’s BMitzvah if they have a summer birthday? Just do it around their birthday even though it’s summer? Do it in the fall when more people are around? Wait until the kid is a little older and ask their preference? 

Signed, 

Pick a Parsha

Dear Parasha,

Some factors are in your control here, and some are not. Things you can control: how you communicate with your kid about this life cycle moment, how you make decisions as a family, the community in which you choose to celebrate this moment. Things you cannot control: when your kid was born, the scheduling procedures of the community in which you choose to celebrate, other people’s opinions about when you schedule this event. There are of course, more of these in each category, but you get the idea. 

Many synagogues schedule BMitzvahs two or three years in advance. They may give you a date without your input, but they may also be willing to make adjustments based on your preferences and their availability. Many synagogues also avoid scheduling BMitzvahs in the summer because of the difficulty of working around vacations and summer camps. Since it sounds like you have some time, start these conversations with synagogue leadership now, just so you know what your options may include. 

If you have enough time to look into dates this way, I’m going to guess that your kid is too far away from being 13 to have a solid opinion. If you ask now, you’re likely to get an unhelpful answer. But, if you wait and base decisions on your kid’s opinion, you may time yourself out of working within a synagogue’s schedule. I think you are going to have to make some moves towards a date without their input (though when it gets a lot closer and you’re actually planning, as I’ve written before, involve your kid as much as either of you wants!).

Practically speaking, the summer is hard but not impossible. People might be away, but you can send save the dates far in advance to maximize availability. Friends may be at camp, but maybe that’s not the priority. If your kid goes to camp, you can talk to camp leadership to find out what your options might be for a camp-based celebration with, perhaps, a sponsored kiddush back with the rest of your community in the fall. 

Also, practically speaking, the fall could be its own kind of scheduling challenge. I recommend looking at the calendar for the year in question and determining what dates are even available around High Holidays. This year, for example, with the holidays quite late, all of September is open for BMitzvahs. But some years, you might not have a clear week until mid-October. Which is also fine! You don’t have to have a BMitzvah celebration the minute your kid turns 13, and you might find a way to mark their birthday somewhat separate from the actual ceremony if that’s what you need to do to make things work.

Finally, as your sign-off suggests, you can pick a date based on a parsha that you (or your kid?) connect with. If your child stays involved in Jewish life, as I’m sure you hope they will, “This was my BMitzvah parsha” might be a sentence they find themselves saying every year. Given that you have a lot of imperfect options, you might as well choose a parsha with a nice story or a rainbow rather than, I don’t know, skin diseases or adultery. But more important than the parsha, more important than the specific timing, more important than the location, is that when the time comes, you craft a celebration that reflects your child, your family, and your priorities, giving your child the opportunity to shine. With the right planning, that can happen anytime. 

Be well, 

Miriam