By Elana Kahn-Oren

March 21st, 2003

Local stories relate mezuzah miracles of The Chronicle staff

After three years of trying to conceive a second child, Miriam Moses-Winston and her husband, Jay Winston, had given up, resigned to accept that their daughter, Alaina, was meant to be an only child. And then, nine months later, came the mezuzot.

On the suggestion of the attorney hired for their house closing, the couple invited Rabbi Moshe Rapoport, program director of Congregation Agudas Achim Chabad in Mequon,to come to the house and check their mezuzot.

“The rabbi told us stories about these miracles that happen in people’s lives. I wasn’t even thinking about having a baby. I had every contractor in my house. I thought, ‘Why not a rabbi?’” said Moses-Winston, a member of Congregation Shalom.

She discovered that some of their mezuzot had never been kosher and three were no longer kosher. (For a mezuzah to be kosher, each letter must be formed correctly and it must be handwritten on parchment.) The couple immediately installed new kosher mezuzot.

One month later, Moses-Winston discovered she was pregnant.