“EZ LEGO Gragger” with brick flange
The LEGO Gragger for Purim post was the official debut. It’s a “Why-To” with pics. This post is more of an extended How-To.
I’ve been asked for specs, so here are details that should get you started. I’ve already heard from one mom whose kids jumped right in and built their own prototypes. Made my day, I tell you. But some of us (adults) need how-tos, especially with moving parts. So here you go… Continue reading
Lego gragger with canoe paddle flange
For Purim, we call it a gragger, but the generic and rather wicked-sounding term is “ratchet instrument.” Jews hardly have a monopoly on this thing. Throughout the world it’s been a child’s toy, a police call, a poison-gas alert, a football (soccer) noisemaker, a percussion instrument, a scarecrow and a lure for corncrakes. And now, finally, it’s Lego.
World, I give you Lego graggers. They spin, they make noise, and although Continue reading
Filling guide (for vocab and bean bag selection)
Every Purim carnival or party needs at least one station that lets kids haul back and throw something. “Fill the Hamantasch” is a more accurate title, but I do like the alliteration of the H with “Hit.”
I made this for a Purim tot program a few years ago. A giant hamantasch is the target, the middle of which is lined with velcro strips: the “hook” side. The projectiles are blobby felt bean bags in colors that represent traditional hamantaschen filling: black for mohn (poppyseed), brown for lekvar (prune butter, YUM), red for cherry, orange for apricot. The felt bean bag surface will stick to the prickly velcro, no prob.
The giant hamantasch, lined with velcro (hooky side)
I had to mount my fake hamantasch onto corrugated board (S-core board) and then tie that onto an old Little Tikes easel. No way could I mount it on the wall and Continue reading
Pear seedlings from our snack
See the teeny seedlings emerging? Two weeks ago, at the family Tu B’Shevat program I helped plan, we ate fruit and planted the seeds. Yesterday, one pear seed sprouted, and today, another. Baby trees!
For the program, I made little flags so each kid would remember which fruit seeds they chose:
I planted a ______ tree for Tu B’Shevat.
The child’s name goes on the popsicle stick above the dirt line. (We used colored pencils, which are made from trees. No Sharpies that day.)
I wrote about this activity in the post Eat a Fruit, Plant its Seeds for Tu B’Shevat. I know, I know, the resulting seedlings may not grow into fertile adults, what with commercial fruit propagation techniques and whatnot.
The important thing is for a kid to eat a fruit, plant the seeds, watch them sprout, and take care of them. So far, so good…
coconut topping, tree nuts, fruit fresh and dried
Last fall, I wrote about the kid-version of edible apple bowls used as a Rosh Hashanah honey dish. Apple bowls are easy to adapt for Tu B’Shevat. You and your child can hollow an apple—the paradigmatic tree fruit—and fill it with tree fruit salad. It’s easy with a melon-baller, and the only trick is not to get too energetic and pierce the peel from the inside. Kids can even prepare the fruit for the thematic contents using double-handled apple slicer/corer combos and Montessori-style slicing tools. Continue reading
a mini feeder with a mini birdfeeder, but for normal birds
And here’s the mini version of the Tu B’Shevat Pine-Cone Birdfeeder.
Our Playmobil model is shown holding a hemlock cone with a soy-butter shmear and a coating of millet. This hemlock, by the way, is not the poisonous herbaceous plant that clocked poor Socrates, but the lovely and benign conifer tree. Hemlocks also come in handy for decorating tabletop sukkot: the leaflets look like mini pine boughs for schach. Continue reading
Posted in Tu B'Shevat
again with the pinecone
The simple How-To for the Tu B’Shevat Pine-Cone Birdfeeder is at the end of my previous post. It’s the reward for wading through the Ecology and the Rabbinics.
But this late-night post about the Materials is a bonus. Lucky you. Below, I present annotations so obsessive that even I edited them out the first time.
Notes from an overkeen Sunday School teacher:
• Pine-cone. I’m trying to restrain myself here. I want to urge everyone to get a tree field guide and run out to the woods. Cones come in range of sizes, prickliness, and stickiness. (If you find a White Pine, watch out for sticky pitch that I guarantee will never, ever come out of your child’s LLBean parka, not even with lye soap.) Continue reading
Posted in Tu B'Shevat
Heaven forbid I come across as the Earnest Craft Lady. Is that what’s happening? I fear so, especially when the best bits of my articles are removed in the editorial process. By best bits I mean midrashim, ecological interplay, words like insectivorous and other goodies. Alas, what remains are earnest how-tos peppered with exclamation marks. I am grateful any of my work is accepted for publication anywhere, truly, but it is a relief to know I have an outlet here. The beauty (and the horror) of a blog is that the blogger is editor. And here, forthwith, is the uncut version of the Tu B’Shevat Pine-Cone Bird-feeder, best bits and all. Continue reading
Fruit Shakers, Runts, and gummy worms
I wrote an article about using candy as an “enrichment” activity for Tu B’Shevat at Kveller.com: Tu Bishvat in Candy Land. Do read it. The hate mail I received as a result of the article indicates that the haters did not read it, else they would have learned that I do not propose that candy representations of actual tree fruit should replace traditional observance of Tu B’Shevat. Nor do I think that to let kids crush Oreos to produce “Edible Dirt” is an acceptable alternative to planting real seeds in real dirt. The word “enrichment” is a clue, my vigilant friends. Continue reading
In How (and Why) to Let Kids Plant Parsley on Tu B’Shevat, I nattered on about the meaning behind growing parsley on the Birthday of the Trees. Because, really, isn’t it weird that a parsley project is the go-to activity for a holiday about trees? But in a nutshell, the big idea is this: to germinate parsley on Tu B’Shevat links the earliest of Spring holidays—when the sap/lifeforce begins to wake after winter—and Passover, the paradigmatic Spring holiday. Parsley is Spring on a seder plate. It is the most common representation of the karpas category, without which a seder can’t happen. Makes perfect sense, this link and its timing, but still, tree it ain’t. (Well, a curly parsley stalk does rather look like a miniature tree.)
Better we should grow a tree on the Birthday of the Trees, yes? And what if the tree could be an olive or date or fig or pomegranate: four of the Seven Species of the Land of Israel (Deut. 8:8), the rock stars at a Tu B’Shevat seder? How brilliant to grow an olive tree especially, whose fruit could give us oil to light Hanukkah menorahs. Or a an almond tree, the early bloomer celebrated in Israel on Tu B’Shevat. Or a citron tree to grow an etrog for Sukkot. Or a palm or willow or myrtle to harvest for our own lulav. Chills. Continue reading
Tu B’Shevat parsley for Pesach karpas
Tu B’Shevat is the New Year and/or Birthday of the Trees, but the classic Tu B’Shevat planting activity doesn’t really have much to do with trees. We plant parsley. All over America, little Jewish kids plant parsley seeds on Tu B’Shevat. Sounds like Sunday School in Chelm, right? But it does make sense. To germinate parsley seeds and use the plant two holidays later as the karpas on a Passover seder plate connects our earliest Spring holiday to our main Spring holiday, and it lets kids get their fingers dirty fostering green life from dormant seeds. Tu B’Shevat is the official start of the agricultural year, when tree sap (and all lifeforce by extension) begins to rise after winter rest.
Parsley, though, is not a tree. It’s easier, folks say, easier than Continue reading
Edible playdo ingredients
Buying corn syrup just feels wrong. I usually go out of my way to avoid corn syrup in foods, so buying a full, glistening bottle of Karo on purpose is just weird. Yesterday, I felt so conspicuous slipping it into my grocery cart, I might as well have been buying sex toys or country ham or People magazine.
It was worth it. The nervous guilt at the cash register has faded, and the recipe for edible playdough—featuring corn syrup—worked just fine. Continue reading
I should’ve had a V8. Oh wait, I did.
A hanukkah menorah made out of a repurposed V8 distributor cap might not be kosher, I’ll admit. But it sure is cute, and if you live with a car freak, satisfyingly thematic. The function of a distributor cap is all about fire—or at least sparks: it’s part of the ignition system and it helps distribute or control the path of the current.
And Hanukkah is all about fire, right? The miraculous distribution of that wee bit of fuel? Continue reading
an interesting development
My nearly-five-year-old knows how to address an envelope, where to put the return address sticker and where to put a stamp.
What I didn’t realize was that he intended to put these skills into practice with a letter: “Too Santa.” Continue reading
Posted in Jewish kids in nonJewish school
Dark chocolate Hanukkah Gelt S’more
Hanukkah lasts eight days, eight looooong days. Gelt S’mores help keep things lively. Continue reading
When Hanukkah and Shabbat coincide, the challah deserves a thematic tweak. The preschooler and I made a big Menorah Challah and a few little Dreidels.
We learned that using food dye to color the “flames” orange is not worth the trouble. After the challah is baked, the food color merges with the golden egg wash. But it was fun to try, and now we have orange palms for the rest of the day. Continue reading
Lego menorah
Ok, ok, I knew posting about a LEGO menorah that holds real Hanukkah candles might cause trouble. It did. I now present a few ultra-safe models that use LEGO bits as flames. Thus, nobody gets hurt, LEGO doesn’t melt, and nothing will trigger the smoke alarm.
Duplo and LEGO menorahs: upside-down construction
The intersection of Jewish holidays and LEGO again, but this time, with fire. Continue reading
Squirt the Menorah
I live in Nashville, so I’m not so much in touch with the rest of the Hanukkah carnivalling world. Is “Squirt the Menorah” a popular Hanukkah game? The only Google hits seem to be my own.
I should say “Squirt the Hanukkiyah,” but it doesn’t have the right ring to it. Menorah works fine in this case.
Now, usually, when we light Hanukkah candles, they stay lit until they go out by themselves. It’s a no-no to blow them out or extinguish them in any way. Squirt the Menorah involves shooting water pistols at a lit menorah, which sounds pretty treyf to me. But we don’t play it during Hanukkah on the really real candles, the candles upon which we’ve said the commanded blessings and all. No, we play Squirt the Menorah ahead of time, when it’s okay to extinquish the candles with a squirt gun. Odd, but okay. Continue reading
Swim Noodle Menorah
LEGO Gragger
Altoids tin travel menorah
Spin it, Eat it: The Caramel Dreidel
Edible dreidels, regular and mini
Jonah and the Whale Cracker
DIY Lego Mezuzah
PEZ + Mezuzah = PEZuzah
Menurkey (repurposed figurine)
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DIY LEGO dreidel
LEGO minifig Passover seder table
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