Last updated on August 24th, 2023 at 07:07 pm
It’s funny being first-time parents of young children. Every holiday or life cycle event that comes up, you have to decide how “big” you want it to be. Do you want to make a big deal about birthdays? Do you want to make a big deal about Mother’s Day? Do you want to make a big deal about vacations? This year, we have to decide just how “big” we wanted Hanukkah to be.
Hanukkah is a minor holiday in the Jewish calendar, a holiday added much later to celebrate a miraculous military victory against the Greeks. It definitely does not hold a candle (pun intended) to the importance of such Jewish holidays as Rosh HaShana, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Pesach, and Shavuot, but the newer tradition of giving gifts can easily make it outshine the others (groan) (I’m done with candle puns I promise).
Last year, the kids were only a year old and not even very mobile. I didn’t even think about giving them gifts because 1) they constantly received gifts, I really believe every meal was basically “miraculous” to them – look! blueberries! – not to mention visitors bringing gifts; 2) they generally liked the boxes and recycling part of the gifts the best; and 3) I felt like lighting candles was special enough. But now they are two, and they have a better understanding of the world, and I want to give them something on Hanukkah.
Growing up, I always got books on Hanukkah. Many years I got a book every night, and some (later) years we would get a shopping spree at a book store. I always looked forward to my new books, especially when I was older and could pick out books I had been wanting for a while.
I want to pass along this tradition to our kids. So this year I gathered together 16 books to give to the kids – one per kid per night. That is a lot of books! To save on money, and because I’m sure the kids won’t notice, I bought most of my books used online, or asked my parents to bring some up from my old bedroom. We also got some books as gifts from grandparents that I hadn’t given to the kids yet. I had planned on going to some library sales, but ended up not needing to this time.
Buying used books online is actually a little tricky. There are tons and tons of books, none of which you can browse through first, and most of the bestsellers are not among them (or at least not among the cheaper ones). My strategy was to find some current best selling children’s books and buy other books by the same authors. I looked at what other books people bought (look on Goodreads or Amazon to see what other books people like) to get a longer list of authors to look for on the used sites. In the end I had over 20 potential gift books, and was able to set aside the ones that were too long or mature for them now.
Then, I bought a big pack of tissue paper instead of rolls of wrapping paper. I wrapped the books in the tissue paper and put little silver stars on top, the number of stars corresponding to the night of Hanukkah when they would get the gift (Hanukkah is all about counting). I found some plastic dreidels that open up, and will put a few pieces of gelt (chocolate coins) in there every night – definitely something special, as chocolate is usually only for Shabbat!
A book, a dreidel with gelt, and lighting the menorah – that sounds like a nice tradition. Not to little, but not too big, don’t you think?
Online used book stores I recommend are www.thriftbooks.com and www.betterworldbooks.com.
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Robin Sheldon is an artist and therapist, currently staying at home full time with her big kid twins, new baby, and two cats while her husband hunts and gathers. According to her children, her job is making breakfast and packing lunches, what makes her happy is hugs, and her favorite food is cookies. Pretty accurate!
