Every male (13 years old and above) at the seder is required by halacha to lean to the left side while:

• Drinking each of the four cups of wine.
• Eating matza for each of these mitzvot: motzi, matza, koreich, afikoman.

Ideally, lean onto something to your left, such as a chair or couch. A pillow is nice but optional.

Inviting friends to your house for meals, even on Shabbat and Jewish festivals, is not hachnasat orchim--unless the friends do not have food or a place to sleep. But inviting friends for meals may qualify as other mitzvot.

One is not an onen whenever a body may not be buried, such as on Shabbat and Jewish festivals, and so there is no onenut on Shabbat or Jewish festivals. An onen says blessings and does mitzvot on those days.

By surrounding ourselves with reminders of the commandments and with objects for observing the various Jewish rituals, we can be constantly aware of what we should be doing to live our lives as Jews.
There are two categories of items used for mitzvot:

• Holy items (tashmishei kedusha), such as tefilin and its boxes, Torah books and commentaries, and Torah scrolls and covers. 
• Items used for mitzvot (tashmishei mitzva), such as lulav, etrog, and talit/tzitzit.

Women
Sacred scrolls (Torah, mezuza, tefilin) may not be written by women for sacred purposes. However, if they were written by a woman, you may study from them. You may not use them for public Torah reading, putting on tefilin, or affixing to doorposts (for mezuza).


Disposal
Both tashmishei kedusha and tashmishei mitzva should be disposed of in a respectful manner. Tashmishei kedusha should ideally be buried. Newspapers with Torah or Torah commentary must be double-wrapped and then may be put in the trash, since they contain material that should not be buried with holy writings (only a newspaper's Torah or Torah commentary contain inherent holiness).
To dispose of tashmishei mitzva, you may wrap in one layer of plastic and throw it in normal garbage.

There are three main categories of blessings:

1. Enjoyment (birchot nehenin), such as on foods and scents.
2. Praise and Thanks to God (shevach v'hoda'a), such as when saying she'hecheyanu, on seeing mountains and the sea, or when good happens to us.
3. Commandments/Mitzvot (birchot mitzva), such as reading the Torah, using the lulav, or lighting Shabbat candles.

The hagada tells us that in every generation, a person must see himself as if he had personally gone out of Egypt.  If so, why didn't our Sages suggest how to visualize or recreate the experience?
 
It is not possible to actually see ourselves as having left slavery. Rather, we should feel our obligation to do the mitzvot (commandments) as the Israelites felt when they left Egypt, as they switched from being slaves to serving Hashem. We can be freed (b'nei chorin) from physical or spiritual slavery.

If you wish, you may say mourner's kaddish for family members other than parents, especially during shloshim (the first 30 days after burial), since the first 30 days after death are the most difficult for the dead person's soul. 
However, you may say kaddish for anyone even after shloshim ends, if you wish, until the end of 11 months (for a shomer-mitzvot person) or 12 months (for a non-shomer mitzvot person. But in a place where only one person says kaddish, you may not supplant another person who is halachically required to say kaddish.

• Before and after eating,
• After waking in the morning,
• At various types of life experiences, and
• In many other situations.

Blessings Formulations

Some blessings begin with Baruch ata adonai only; some blessings continue with eloheinu melech ha'olam.  The shorter blessings come at the end of long (compound) blessings.

ReasonThere is no mention of malchut at the end of a blessing.

How To Say Blessings

When saying blessings or prayers, it is generally best to say the words of the blessing or prayer out loud since doing so can help you to concentrate on what is being said. (The main exception is the amida prayer.)
Normally, you should stand while saying blessings before doing a mitzva, unless the mitzva is done while seated (in which case you sit when saying the blessing).
REASON So there is no delay between saying the blessing and doing the mitzva.
NOTE Although there is not necessarily any need to stand while doing mitzvot, many mitzvot are done while standing due to the nature of the mitzva or for convenience.
If you find you have made an error in saying a blessing or prayer, you may correct your error without having to repeat any previous parts if you do so within 2.5 seconds of having made the error.

Sukkot means “huts.” The Jewish festival of Sukkot celebrates and commemorates the shelters in which the Israelites lived for 40 years after leaving Egypt.
 
Symbols
The main symbols associated with Sukkot are living in a sukka (eating and, when possible, sleeping in the sukka) and the lulav and etrog.
 
Sukkot is observed at fall harvest time.  When many Jews were feeling wealthy due to their produce, we were commanded to live in temporary shelters--in part, to ward off feelings of arrogance or pride in what we had accomplished in the material world. Instead of thinking or feeling that our hard work or great wisdom has made us wealthy, we are reminded that whatever we have comes from God, and that God will take care of us, even in a flimsy “house.”
 
The lulav and etrog have many meanings.  Here are two:
 
Likening to the Human Body
The four components are compared to four parts of the human body:

• Palm branch: Spine.
• Myrtle leaves: Human eyes.
• Willow leaves: Human lips.
• Etrog: Human heart.

When we hold the four parts of the lulav/etrog together, we are symbolically taking the various components of our bodies together to serve God.
 
Likening to Types of Jews
The four components are likened to four types of Jews:

• Etrog smells nice and tastes nice--like a tzadik who is knowledgeable in Torah and does mitzvot;
• Myrtle smells nice but does not have a good taste--like a person who does mitzvot but is not knowledgeable in Torah;
• Palm tree (date palm) has a nice tasting fruit but no scent--like someone who has knowledge but lacks mitzvot;
• Willow does not smell nice nor has a good taste--like a person who has neither.

By holding them together, we show that all types of Jews are to be consider as one nation.

These holy writings (tashmishei kedusha) may not be thrown directly into the trash, but should ideally be buried with like items (sheimot):

• Holy writings that contain God's name.
• Parts of Tanach (24-book Jewish Bible).
• Explanations of the Torah or commandments.

However, if a printed or written page (in contrast to parchment scrolls such as tefilin, Torahs, or mezuzas) contains God's name plus secular content, it must be double wrapped in plastic before being thrown in the trash.
Do not throw into trash, even if double wrapped:

• Handwritten scrolls of Torah, tefilin, mezuza.
• Printed Torah, Talmud, siddur, books of halacha, or Torah commentaries.

Rather, put them into a sheimot collection box or wrap in plastic and bury in a place where they will not be dug up. It does not need to be a cemetery.

Double wrap and throw into trash:

• Newspapers and flyers that have Torah psukim or Torah commentaries and also have non-Torah content.
  Reason Non-Torah material should not be buried as sheimot. 
• Children's school handouts with psukim from the Torah or halachot that also contain non-Torah content (if they ONLY contain words of Torah, they should be buried as sheimot).

For disposal of items used for mitzvot (tashmishei mitzva), you may wrap in one layer of plastic and throw it in normal garbage:

• Lulav,
• Etrog, or
• Talit/tzitzit (but NOT tefilin!)

Shavuot (Yom HaBikurim in the Torah) celebrates and commemorates the giving of the Ten Commandments to the Israelites at Mt. Sinai.
Beginning with the second night of Passover, the Israelites who left Egypt underwent 49 days of spiritual improvement and purification until they were ready to receive the Torah from God (Shavuot ends this 49-day “omer” period).  We can undergo a similar process of spiritual development each year during these 49 days (how to do that is beyond the scope of this website). According to our tradition, the Israelites in Egypt had sunk to the 49^th level of spiritual impurity (tum'a). The Israelites had to raise themselves in 49 daily stages to be worthy of receiving the Torah.  Several books and siddurs portray the 49 days of the omer as corresponding to the Seven Sefirot embedded in the seven weeks.  This awareness can help us work on and maximize the power inherent in each day of the omer to fix that particular sefira in ourselves. We thus relive this transition from slavery to freedom and the service of God each year as we try to perfect our midot (personal characteristics) to again be worthy of receiving the Torah on Shavuot.

 
Symbolism of the Shavuot Offering
In the Temple in Jerusalem, the only communal sacrifice of leavened bread was on Shavuot. Leavening in dough is compared to arrogance in humans (people puff themselves up to look more important than they actually are). During Passover we destroy, and refrain from eating, leaven--just as we try to destroy/remove arrogance from our personalities. After Passover, we continue to work on our personal traits (midot) until we reach Shavuot, when we celebrate receiving the Torah.  At Shavuot, we Jews have a right to feel important, since we are spiritually elevated by virtue of having been given the Torah.
 
Shavuot: Universal Customs
The universal custom is to eat at least one dairy food during Shavuot.
Possible reason  At the time the Israelites received the Torah, they did not have any kosher meat (they had not been required to eat kosher until then) and so the only food they were permitted to eat was dairy food.
Another universal custom is to stay awake all night (if possible) studying Torah.
 
Shavuot: Symbols
Unlike other Jewish festivals, Shavuot has no concrete symbols and no specific unique commandments/mitzvot, other than sacrifices that were brought in the Temple in Jerusalem.