Did You know There Are Only 29 Days Until Hanukkah?

From Home-shuler! by way of Phyllis.

A Jewish Holiday Meme

One menorah, or several? Hillel or Shammai? (just kidding about that part)
We use one large one in the front window.

Do you buy your children gifts for every night of Chanukah?
The girls get one large store-bought combined gift from us and 2 handmade ones each.

Do you and your spouse/partner or any other adults in your life exchange gifts?
No. Our anniversary is in the end of January so we exchange then.

Special family chanukah traditions?
We have eight books that I wrap. Each night we open one as a family and read it together. Aba and I have also discussed "adopting" a family and providing Hanukkah for them. We haven't decided if that will fit into the plans this year. I have hopes of making this a time of giving to others as well as getting gifts.

Latkes or sufganiyot? If latkes, sour cream or applesauce?
Sufganiyot mostly. I've made latkes but that usually happens on day 7 or 8 when we are feeling maxed out on the sufganiyot. When we have latkes it is applesauce. All. The. Way.

Favorite chanukah book?
Light the Candles by Joan Holub was popular last year.

Do you actually play dreidl? If so, what do you use for counters?
We just spin and spin and spin them for the girls.

What relationship, if any, do you have with Christmas and all things Christmas-y?
None.

If you're reading, you're tagged!

On the Second Night of Hanukkah

We drove home from San Diego as fast as we could so that Aba would make it for mincha and then we could go to the Hanukkah celebration. It was fun and Chaya and Shira really liked it. Batya seemed fine until a stranger opened the door for us. The crowd and the loud music didn't help and she spent the evening cuddled with Irias Ohr, Aba or in the onbuhimo.



We were introduced to a new (to us) band called Moshav. I've already downloaded one of their albums, too! I need to get a video of Chaya and Shira dancing to it. Hillarious!

Snow Day!

Well, fake snow. Nothing like the real stuff coating most of the country. (I still need to correct the pictures. The bright ice messes with the light sensor on the camera.)

The Slope

Aba trying to coax a timid Batya into the snow What will it take?

Shira dove right in trying to make a snowman. She didn't seem to understand that it wasn't that kind of snow.

Chaya and Aunt Kathy got right down to the business of throwing snowballs.

The cousins having a snowball fight.

Chaya in the toboggan.

Looks like all Batya needed was a tutu.

Which means everyone needs a tutu for the snow.

Hanukkah Project #4

Well, we did get some crafting in today since Costco doesn't open until 11:00. I brought up an assortment of small gifts and had the girls wrap them. There was a bit of time spent wrapping, unwrapping and re-wrapping, but we got quite a bit done.

Hanukkah Project #3

Today we are out shopping most of the morning and then I have some cooking in preparation for Shabbat and Hanukkah to do so I'm not sure how much time I will have for crafty things with the girls. I'm a bit sad about it because we have gotten into a nice routine of breakfast-Montessori activity-lunch-movie-craft-dinner with a lot of playing and snacking in between. But life does happen and any routine has to be flexible so that we can stock up on food and pick up our next-to-last CSA box (boo!).

In anticipation of no craft yet wanting to continue on my craft-a-day theme for the Hanukkah countdown I spent some time with wrapping paper and books. I haven't gotten all of the books I've ordered, so there are only 5, but it is a good start.

I've noticed that a few mommy blogs I read have advent traditions with a new book each night of December. I like that idea and incororated it into our own celebration. There are eight books (one for each night of Hanukkah, duh) that I wrapped in bought (gasp!) paper and stenciled alef-yud on the front. Each night one family member will open the book and we can read it.

I'm also considering doing this for Pesah from Rosh Chodesh Nissan and for Rosh HaShanah through the month of Elul since those yamim tovim have more of a sense of anticipation and preparation which the original advent idea is meant to express.

Hanukkah Project #2

Again, this project turned out better in my head than in reality. I had envisioned sheets of foil with sponge stamped images on them. Instead the girls used the sponges to wash the foil in paint and also fingerpainted the foil. Oh well. Still cute and I'll still use it.

As an aside, you know those plastic tablecloth covers you get at the kosher market? Those work great to cover the table and let art projects dry inside on a rainy day.

Also, FYI, washable magenta tempera paint stains white furniture.

Hanukkah project #1

I've been cruising the web looking for Hanukkah crafts for the girls and I to do. (I know, I need to get that list of links posted!) I found a tray on Chinuch.org that featured a mosaic-style hanukkiyah and used that as the inspiration for our foam sticker hanukkiyot.


I have a bunch of adhesive foam sheets hanging around so I spent last night cutting squares. I drew the outline of the hanukkiyah on black board and then told the girls to cover the lines with the stickers. As you can see, they did pretty well.

My original idea was to add a candle and flame each night when Aba lights our hanukkiah, but since they weren't interested enough in the project to finish them, I'm not sure how much they would enjoy that. Since I've already cut out the candles and flames, we'll give it a try, though.

Review--Color a Cookie and Paskesz Gelt

Before we left for Israel I got an email from Sam at Oh!Nuts offering some of their goodies for review. When we got home, the package was waiting. Insert an unplanned trip to San Diego and we just got around to decorating cookies this morning. Don't you love craft projects that have a built-in snack?
These cookies are adorable! For the girls' first birthday party I had a table set up with undecorated sugar cookies and various decorations so the older kids had something to do. It was fun, but a lot of work and I had to go to many different stores to get kosher parve frosting and decorations. With these cookies, that work is all done for you.


In each package you get a cookie (in our case they had the outline of a dreidle on them) and four flavored decorating pens. The only downside of flavored decorating pens is that toddlers might decide to suck on them and bite off the tips causing a flurry of screeching from other toddlers in the room. (Chaya, I'm talking to you!) The pens colored the frosting extremely well (I was asked to color in various parts of the design by each of the girls) and they didn't have that food coloring taste. (I sampled a bit of Shira's cookie much to her dismay. She is still asking me why I ate her cookie.)


For $4.99 per cookie it is a cute thing to have around at a hanukkah party for kids to do or just to keep your own kids quiet. The only downside is that messy kids will have blue hands and mouths for a while since the food coloring stains pretty well.


Color A Cookie are certified kosher parve by the Star-K and are Pat Israel.

Sam also sent some chocolate gelt made by Paskesz. These I passed out to some other people to try also. I was surprised that they had a bit of a bitterweet taste and was pleased that they didn't have the "parve chocolate waxy coat in my mouth" thing. Aba declared them "not bad" which is like a B for him. (His grades are "yuck," "I wouldn't mind if we never had that again," "it was okay," "not bad" and "do we have more?")

Batya has decided they are the best thing and is wandering around the house asking for "ch-locate daka" (chocolate tzedakah).

Paskesz chocolate coins are certified kosher parve by Rabbi Weistheim of Manchester. (And are a product of Holland which I didn't know and makes that bit of Dutch in me very happy.)

A Hanukkah Plea!

I have quite a few crafty and parenting blogs on my reader and lately they have been full of holiday crafts and projects for children. Sadly I've only seen one for Hanukkah. I know I am also to blame since I haven't done anything with the girls yet, but come on! There are only 13 days until Hanukah starts. We need to start!

If you have any cute projects you are working on now, did in the past or have seen on the internet, post a link in the comments. I'm going to get on-the-ball and do some things with the girls and hunt down some stuff. I'm going to try to get a decent list up on Sunday for the start of Ima On (and Off) the Bima's Hanukkah countdown.

Hanukkah Shopping

is just about done.

I need to pick out four more items for myself. (Yes, I'm buying all my own gifts.) I have ideas for those last four gifts, but I'm not 100% sure that it is what I want.

I'm going to have the girls make the wrapping paper on Sunday and then I can start wrapping stuff up. Next I need to sit down with the calender and figure out which gifts to give on which day.

Hanukkah Gift Planning

I've been working on holiday lists for the girls. Which naturally gets me thinking a lot about what we need, what the girls would like, what I would like, what will get the most use, what will be the best value. The girls have also asked for some specific things.

Aba and I would like to ask any gift givers to please shy away from electronic things. We like them to have more open-ended toys that use more imagination power than battery power.

For clothing, They all wear about 2T. Target seems to run smaller and they need 3T in most things. Gymboree is a 2T bottom and an 18-24 month top. Children's Place runs small so they need 3T especially for bottoms. Shoes are a 7 or 8.

I'll add as I think of more.

Chaya
Hobby horse (You know, the horse head with stick body. We saw one at Ikea and she adored it.)

Shira
Black horse (Breyer type. This she asked for.)
Camera (She asked for this, too.)

Batya
Baby stuff (for a 16 or 18 inch doll. She has enough babies, but clothing, diapers, cradle, etc are needed.)

For all of them
Dress-up stuff (Lakeshore Learning has some dress-up masks that are animal faces.)
Sand and water table

Guess who has been doing Hanukkah planning?

Yeah, I admit it. I'm excited for this year's gift giving. I think the girls are going the "get" the whole holiday this year. I don't think they are ready for too much of a Tzedakah project, but we will do something (probably collect canned goods for Tomchei Shabbat or children's toys for a local lady who gives them out to families in need.)

Anyhow, some of you know about my (unhealthy) fondness for all things Oompa. I got this email the other day and now I'm thinking about these. Originally I wanted to get the girls some Anamalz, but the Anamalz kind of squick me out with the fabric bits. They just look kind of creepy.

Now, hold my hand because you know I'm tempted to buy them now and "keep" them for Hanukkah. But we know that if I do that I will (a) lose them in the mess of a house (b) the girls will find them or (c) I'll cave and give them to the girls early.