The Book of New Family Traditions (36 page)

A Great Website for History

The first English colony in Plymouth, Massachusetts, has been re-created near the original locale at a so-called living museum. There are period-appropriate buildings and people in costumes who reenact daily life in that place and time. This project is affiliated with the Smithsonian Institution and is well worth visiting. The fantastic website includes a wonderful section with resources for families: Plimoth.org/Learn (yes, that is correctly spelled as Plimoth.org).

Included is good information about the history of Thanksgiving and the first feast. One of the best features for kids is an interactive exercise called “You Are the Historian,” in which kids can explore some historical items and documents, and read a letter written by someone who actually attended the first feast.

Sharing the Bounty of Thanksgiving

A great time to start philanthropic traditions and link gratitude for what we have with sharing.

Feast for the Animals

Nancy Mendez and her family share their feast with “the birds and beasts.” Before they eat, her children and their cousins take a walk in the nearby woods (with a grown-up), carrying a bucket of seeds and food scraps. The bucket includes cranberries too mushed for the family’s sauce, bread crumbs left over from the stuffing, and so on. They scatter the food for the birds and animals. On the way back home, the kids fill the bucket with twigs and kindling for the fireplace.

Feed the Poor

Some families try to work some part of the Thanksgiving weekend in a soup kitchen, but there are other ways you can help as well. One is to buy a duplicate feast: If you’re having turkey, buy a second bird; if you’re making mashed potatoes, buy a second bag. Pack this feast and deliver it to a local homeless shelter or agency that serves the poor. (Make this arrangement before buying the food.)

Make a Helping Others Jar

Take a used, clean coffee can and cut a slit in the plastic top. To decorate the can, cut white paper the height of the can, wrap this paper around the can and secure with glue or tape. To decorate, use crayons or markers, or paste magazine photos on the paper. Display the can in the kitchen, and put some money in while discussing a weekly plan of family giving. Talk about how that money could help others and discuss possible charities.

A Great Charity for Kids

Heifer Project International has over fifty years’ experience in donating farm animals to the world’s poor and has a great website,
www.heifer.org
. Also, the picture book Beatrice’s Goat, by Page McBrier, about how a Heifer goat changed the life of a real African girl, makes a big impression on kids.

Hanukkah

Like other Jewish holidays, this features elements that can make for great celebrations, including appealing history, food, music, and rituals. Also, this is a holiday where kids get gifts.

Hanukkah, also spelled Chanukah, isn’t nearly as big a deal within Jewish history and religion as Christmas is for Christians, but it has gotten built up a bit over the years. Some Jews feel that the gift-giving part of the holiday has gotten overemphasized, partly as a way for Jewish parents to compete with Christmas. So, just as many Christian families are trying to lessen the materialistic aspects of Christmas, many Jewish families stress the meaning of the holiday rather than gifts. Here are some Hanukkah celebration ideas:

Theme Nights

The Elkins of Boston used to give their kids a present on each of the eight nights of Hanukkah, just as they had been given nightly gifts as children. But Judy Elkin and her husband decided that with three kids, the practice was expensive and not sending the right message. Now, the kids get a gift from their parents every other night. On the first night, the kids only get gifts from each other; one night is “family fun night” featuring an activity like bowling; and one night is
tzedaka
, or charity, night. Every Friday throughout the year, before their Shabbat dinner, the family has put aside money for charity, and on the Friday night within Hanukkah, they decide on who should get the donation.

Focus on Food

Ellen Brosbe tries to emphasize the food, which is fried in honor of the miraculous oil that burned for eight days in the story celebrated by this holiday. Her kids take turns picking the menu: One night it’s fish and chips, another night tempura, and so on. Instead of gifts, her kids get money, $1 multiplied by the number of candles lit each night.

How to Play Dreidel

A dreidel is a top with four sides, and each side has a Hebrew letter. Together, they stand for the phrase “A great miracle happened there.” Some families play for pennies, whereas others use nuts or candy. First, the pennies or treats are divided evenly among the players. Each person puts one piece in a central pot or cup, perhaps two if the group is small. Players take turns spinning the dreidel and react according to what symbol is facing up:

Gimel
Take all; then each player puts one more piece into the pot.

Hey
Take half.

Shin or Pey
Add one to the pot.

Nun
Do nothing.

Websites and Apps for Hanukkah

Produced by an organization of observant Jews,
www.virtualchanukah.com
is rich in history and activities. There are stories, prayers, and many videos, including several with directions on how to light candles in the menorah, the special candleholder, during the eight days of Hanukkah.

One of the most popular Jewish websites is
Aish.com
, maintained by a nonprofit organization based in Jerusalem. If you click on Holidays in the menu bar, you’ll find a wealth of Hanukkah resources, including kid-friendly videos like one with an animated menorah.

An excellent website called Judaism 101 is maintained by a passionate Jewish individual who isn’t affiliated with a specific organization but writes primarily from an Orthodox perspective. There is a great deal here about how to celebrate holidays like Hanukkah, and the history behind them. One of the pluses of this site is that much of the information is organized by the reader’s level of knowledge of Judaism: The categories are “Basic, Intermediate, Advanced, and Gentile” (non-Jewish).

As expected, there are multitudes of apps for Hanukkah, ranging from the seriously religious to the seriously silly. For kids, there are a number of apps for iPhones and other gadgets, to play virtual versions of dreidel, a gambling game that is very popular during the holiday. One of them is called the iGevalt Dreidel Simulator (a playful take on the Yiddish expression “Oy, gevalt!” used to express surprise or alarm).

Winter Solstice

The shortest day of the year, which varies between December 21 and 22, has been celebrated for centuries by many diverse cultures. Traditional celebrations usually include fire and light and quiet contemplation.

Solstice Dinner

Jeanne Mollinger-Lewis’s family has a special dinner emphasizing “food the sun grows,” like nuts and fruit, and the kids get a major gift on this day. They line the walk to their front door with luminarias, candles inside paper bags weighted down with sand, and light sparklers and small fireworks they’ve saved since July 4.

Solstice Wreath

Rain Mako, who lives in a cabin in the Ozarks with her husband and children, made a wreath from a long, bare grapevine she found near their property. To decorate it for solstice, the family cuts evergreen boughs and inserts them in the twisted wreath, adding tiny white lights. Rain always felt her kids weren’t grateful for all their gifts when they got a pile of them on Christmas, so her sons get one present a day between winter solstice and Christmas, left near the wreath.

Here Comes the Sun!

At our house, we sit down in the living room after dinner in total darkness. We talk about how the lengthening of the days would have seemed glorious to people before electricity and about the balance of light and darkness in our lives. Then we light a bunch of candles and throw open the front door, yelling “Come back, sun!” We make sun shakes of orange juice and ice cream in the blender, and play the Beatles song “Here Comes the Sun.”