How to Throw a Bargain Bat Mitzvah

By Stephanie Sylverne for Kveller

My daughter studied Hebrew for four years, giving up free time after school and many weekend slumber parties in pursuit of Jewish knowledge. After all that effort, she wanted a fabulous party to mark the occasion of finally being called to the bimah as a bat mitzvah.

And I wanted to give her one. She’d worked hard for it. But I didn’t have a savings account marked “bat mitzvah” set aside, nor did I have tens of thousands of dollars open on credit cards. I’m sure that many parents must save for this from the moment they get a positive pregnancy test, but I was a very young parent, a single one until she was in elementary school, and for most of her life I had been struggling to finish college and pay the bills. I wanted my daughter to have a Jewish education. But I couldn’t take out a mortgage to do it.

I was supposed to be excited about this milestone, but as it drew ever closer, all I felt was dread. It became a chore, an obligation, a source of massive anxiety, not a joy. I wanted nothing to do with the words “bat mitzvah” anymore. And that broke my heart.

So after months of agonizing, I made a decision. I was not going to spend a lot on this bat mitzvah. And I was not going to feel guilty about it either.

B’nai mitzvah celebrations are synonymous with overspending, which often worked against me when I began looking for a place to host hers. The moment the words “bat mitzvah” slipped from my lips, vendors thought (probably from past experience) that this was going to be a free-for-all.

I watched their faces turn from eagerness to annoyance when I declined all the extras they threw at us–did we need a team of trapeze artists to provide entertainment between courses? Perhaps the London Symphony Orchestra could perform entrance music? Would our teenage guests prefer the $150 organic free range chicken or beef in their heirloom mushroom sauce? Or we could have a separate buffet that would serve chicken nuggets for the bargain price of $75 each kid. We could add an ice cream bar for an additional $10 a head and unlimited soda refills for another $8. We could bring our own cake from an outside bakery for dessert but it would be $3 a slice to cut it, even if it’s already cut, and if we want the cake they provide instead, it would also cost $3 a slice.

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