Riverdale Temple holds crafts fair and bone marrow drive

Posted

Members of the community gathered at the Riverdale Temple this week to buy handmade gifts, taste artisan food – and to sign up to perhaps save somebody’s life in the process. 

The Reform synagogue, at 4545 Independence Ave., combined a craft fair with a bone marrow drive Sunday, indulging two of the most popular wishes of the holiday season: to shop for gifts and to help those less fortunate. 

Joining the registry as a potential donor of bone marrow or blood stem cells required a cheek swab and a brief questionnaire, said Libby Unger, a drive organizer from the Gift of Life foundation. Donors – who had to be between 18 and 45, according to her group’s brochure – would go through further tests and procedures if they turned out to be a match for a person awaiting a transplant, she said. 

By early afternoon, a couple of hours after the gathering at the Riverdale Temple started, about 10 people signed up, Ms. Unger said. 

Others, meanwhile, browsed crafts such as sterling-silver jewelry, handmade soaps, textiles and artifacts from as far away as India and artisan cheeses from as close to home as Yonkers. 

Rita DiLeo, a craftswoman selling handmade soaps made with herbs, spices and essential oils, pointed out a few bars scented with spearmint: She had grown the plant in her own garden, she said. 

A few steps away, Brent Delman, the owner of The Cheese Guy company, was offering visitors a taste of his artisan cheeses – all of them kosher, and some of them aged more than two years, he said. Mr. Delman has turned the basement of his Yonkers home into a cheese-aging “cave,” he said. 

- - 

For more information about Gift of Life or to order a free swab kit for potential donors, visit www.giftoflife.org.  

To learn more about Ms. DiLeo’s handmade soaps or to order, head to www.simplyspicessoapwithmore.com

To browse or buy The Cheese Guy company’s cheeses, visit www.thecheeseguy.com. Some of the company’s cheeses are also sold at an array of local stores, including Riverdale Kosher Market, 5683 Riverdale Ave., Key Food at 540 W. 235th St., Whole Foods and Fairway stores, Mr. Delman said.

To check out more upcoming events at the Riverdale Temple, visit www.riverdaletemple.org.

Riverdale Temple, bone marrow drive, Gift of Life, Libby Unger, Rita DiLeo, Brent Delman, The Cheese Guy, craft fair

Comments