Member Questions

Lighting the Menorah (why is it so magical every year?), "inviting" Santa to visit even though we're Jewish, eating latkes and noodle kugel.

Baking cookies on Christmas Eve and watching family friendly movies until we all fall asleep. Then wake up to silence of Christmas morning with the entire family still fast asleep and sprawled across the couch, chairs, and floor.

I come from a family that doesnt have many traditions, I have created our own with mu children. Some simple, some more consuming, but all our very us, and add some predictableness to often busy times. My favorite traditions during the holidays would be 1.) saying gratitudes. we say what we are grateful for. This has expanded over the years. My now teen boys say gratitudes every night, but holidays, we all hold hands and share in each others gratitude. 2.) another one of my favorite traditions came to be after the passing of a loved one, we place a "spirit" plate out with a lite candle for the soul of someone who has passed. Over the years we have a few spirit plates out, they have about a teaspoon of everything being served and after the meal and it is just us again, we go and place it outside under a tree and have some quiet moments honoring our passed loved one. 3.) sipping candy cane hot chocolate on christmas morning :) Peace, Brooke

One of my favorite Christmas traditions that I am going to continue with my kids is opening a gift on Christmas Eve.

This gift is always a new pair of pajamas, soft and warm. I LOVED this when I was little and this year I´m starting it again with my boys, making them fleece jammies for Christmas Ever. There is just something about waking up in new PJs on Christmas morning to open your stocking and gifts. :D

I find taking out the menorah, polishing it (it's a beautiful silver menorah in the shape of the tree of life), then my son and I decorate the house with chanukiah, dradels, chanukah gelt. This year was the first year we learned about the phrase: "A great miracle happened there." This refers to the miracle of the eternal light (which is only eternal if you add oil, but temples never let it go out), when the Macabees were down to what my son calls "just a speck" of oil, they sent a runner for more. It took 8 days, and by the time the runner returned, the light was still burning from just that "speck of oil." I connected so strongly with my ancestors through the stories I now tell my son. At 7, he understands a great deal and thinks our history is interesting, if not a bit strange. He wanted to know why we were always moving around as a people. Then, he read ME the tale of the Macabees beating the Greeks. "Wow, we are always so few, but we always win." My father said: "Jewish history is simple: 'they came;we fought;we won;they left.'" Oh, if only life was so simple.
But on Chanukah, on that last night when all the candles burn so beautifully and the happy face of my chils revels in the beauty of it all (and the cool trinkets he got), it means "a great miracle happened here."

My favorite family tradition happens on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve my two children and I have "special" hot cocoa with a special desert. As the tree is decorated with orniments and lights we sit by it in our pajamies and sing christmas carols. When it is bed time all three of us get into my daughters bed (she is the youngest) and we snuggle up together and I read "Twas the Night Before Christmas." After I am done reading we talk about what we think we are going to get for presents. Then we say our good nights and my son goes to his room and goes to bed.