Jerry Sisk, volunteer for Simcha Gifts, helped pack and deliver beautiful flowering plants in honor of Shavuot to area Jewish seniors this past spring.

SIMCHA GIFTS NEEDS VOLUNTEERS! — As the holidays approach, Simcha Gifts is preparing to make a holiday delivery to Jewish seniors who live in nursing homes, retirement centers and in their own homes. The Simcha Gifts program is run by Chabad House, under the tutelage of Blumah Wineberg. She said the program needs “more wonderful volunteers to help pack and deliver Simcha Gifts before the High Holidays. It is such a beautiful mitzvah!

Volunteers will be needed to pack the gifts on Shabbat evening, Sept. 5. {mprestriction ids="1,3"}That’s the night of Selichot, which is also during Labor Day weekend. The evening will begin at 8:45 p.m. at Chabad House Center and will include Havdallah and an End of Summer Ice Cream Social.

“If you can’t stay to pack, please come by for a quick treat and pick up bags to deliver on Shabbat evening after 10 p.m. or Sunday by appointment,” Wineberg continued.

To volunteer, learn more about the program or to provide a name of a Jewish senior who would appreciate a gift, contact Wineberg at or call 913-940-1113.

A handful of HBHA kids competed in the first-ever Kids Q at the Kansas City Kosher BBQ Festival including Basha (left) and Isaac Baran. Basha won in the older division. Here the siblings are sharing some of their kosher barbecue with HBHA Head of School Howard Haas, who was volunteering at the event.

HEARD AT THE KOSHER BBQ FESTIVAL — The Shul — Chabad of Leawood was passing out hilarious stickers to all the Jewish mothers out there that said, “I Don’t Do Calm, I’m a Jewish Mother.” It certainly fit me perfectly! Esty Perman found it while Googling calm images.

The men wrapped tefillin and had their own saying …”Keep Calm and Wrap On.”

JURY SELECTION BEGINS IN TRIAL OF SHOOTER (JTA) — Jury selection began Monday in the trial of Frazier Glenn Cross Jr, who is representing himself, The Associated Press reported. Jury selection is expected to last a week.

Miller, 74, shot two people — William Corporon and Reat Griffin Underwood — outside the Jewish Community Campus. He killed  Terri LaManno outside Village Shalom.

During an appearance in U.S. District Court in Johnson City, Kansas, last month, Cross said he would argue that he committed the April 13, 2014, attacks in order to stop “the Jewish genocide of the white race.”

Cross, a former Ku Klux Klan grand dragon who also goes by Frazier Glenn Miller, is charged with capital murder. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty in the case.

Cross told the Kansas City Star last month that he began planning the attacks when he became so sick with emphysema that he thought he would die soon and that he conducted reconnaissance missions of the JCC and Village Shalom in the days before the shootings.

“I wanted to make damned sure I killed some Jews or attacked the Jews before I died,” he told the newspaper. None of his three victims were Jewish.{/mprestriction}