On the first night, if it’s raining and it’s not letting up, make Kiddush and eat an olives worth of bread in the sukka without making the bracha of leishev basukah. After that, eating inside is fine.
• Women are not required to go out to the Sukka. Depending on how and where the Sukka is situated, they may need to make their own kiddush or have someone make it for them.
• When coming back inside, it’s preferable to eat some challah at the table.
• We’re required to wait up until 2 hours for the rain to stop unless there are guests, kids, etc. who are hungry and/or tired.
• If it’s raining and the forecast is saying that it won’t stop, you don’t have to wait.
• If it stops raining before you go to sleep, you’re required to go out to the sukka to eat bread again (with lechem mishna) and to make a Bracha of leishev basukka. If the sukka is too wet to eat in, then go to someone else’s sukka, even if you’re not comfortable going there.
• On the second night, wait a little bit for the rain to stop. If it doesn’t stop, start the meal inside, after the meal is over go to the sukka and eat a kezayis worth of bread.
• If you went to sleep inside the house because of the rain and then it stopped you’re not required to go back to the sukka.
• It’s a mitzvah to have a covering over the sukka for when it rains, so that it can be removed when the rain stops and the sukka will be dry.
• On Shabbos, there has to be a tefach (3 inches) covering the sukkah in order to enable covering it completely.
• After a heavy rain, water coming off the sukka cover is not an issue of watering the grass.
• If it’s not such a heavy rain then preferably have the water run onto something before it gets to the grass. Ex. If it runs onto the cement first or onto a tarp first.
• New Sukka decorations and ones that fell can be put up on Chol Hamoed.
