Matzo Ball Soup

Our dreidel factory

Yes, we have opened a dreidel factory. We have been using Martha Stewart’s tutorial to make those SUPER FAST spinners.

This is how:
Ori was cutting ¼” wide strips of colorful construction paper. I happen to have a paper cutter I have borrowed from Phil and “forgot” to give it back. You may also cut them with a utility knife or a pair of scissors, or buy some ready made strips at the craft store they are called quilling paper. 

I was gluing the edge of the paper to the toothpicks a little bit above the tapered edge, and realized that we must wait patiently for the paper and toothpick to dry before starting the next step (probably the most difficult part of the process).
Zoe was putting color patterns together and doing a great job at wounding the paper. Oren was assisting Zoe with attaching more paper strips Once we had an approximately 1” disc on the toothpick, we glued the end and gave it a little push with our thumbs inwards, creating a tiny bowl shape. (Reminds me of the movie ticket bowls)




I was providing with nibbles and general assistance When you create the bowl shape, Try different silhouettes, see which spins better.
 
Those spinners look like candies and they are so much fun too make and spin (of course).

Have fun
tali

Our little pot of clay

Our little pot of clay is finally set aside to dry.
It was part of my 8 nights of Chanukah 8 crafty ideas post from last year; we never got to do it then, no good reason, maybe it was too many donuts that made us too   l  a  z  y.

but let me tell you, this is one relaxing project you may want to try. if you are over 21, you may just want to pour that glass of red wine for yourself and join in with your kids. Zoe got a little carried a way, after finishing her little pot of clay, she started ‘fabricating’ some menorahs for Ori and herself, her plan is to paint them after they are dry (kind of like "color me mine", only much cheaper and more fun).




I like working with this ancient material that feels so good and so right for this holiday. Please follow this link for the TUTORIAL.

tali

Star of David foil ornament

My mom has the habit of bringing at list 2 cakes when ever she comes to visit: one cake is usually the girl’s favorite and the other is Oren’s (I am insignificant at that matter…I think she takes me for granted…or that she knows I like any cake, period.). After a couple of days I am left with 2 empty disposable aluminum pans that I cant reuse and I hate seeing them go to waste.

So this is my solution, inspired from some great traditional Mexican tin work I got from my dear friend Karen. I hope you will try this at home.

^{Mexican tin art}

^{our Chanukah tin art}

You will need:

• 1 mom that bakes 2 cakes every other week or any other disposable foil pans (could be take-out containers or baking pans)
• A pen/ pencil with out the tip/ or a thick nail
• Colorful permanent markers (such as sharpies and ArtLine)
• Scissors
• Ribbon
• Hole puncher
• Newspaper
• Star of David template

How to:

• flatten the aluminum pan, using your hands and a towel. you may cut out the corners if necessary
  
  
• Draw firmly a Star of David using a dull pencil or a tip less pen. You may trace this template to do so.
• Using scissors cutout the Star of David. The edges may be a little sharp, younger kids may need some assistance.
• Place the Star of David on a thick pile of newspaper, this is key to get nice texture.
• Use your drawing tool to deboss your design. if you turn the star over to the other side you will get the pattern embossed, the image you have drawn will be raised.
• the project gets even more exiting when you deboss areas in your drawing instead of just drawing a line, similar to filling-in shapes in a coloring book. only instead of using color, you are creating rich texture of raised and indented material. 

• Use sharpie markers (equivalent to ArtLine in Europe) to add color to your star. 
• Punch a hole at the top of your star, tie a ribbon and hang somewhere special. 

 
The sharpie markers over the aluminum are vividly luminous.

variation:

Try different holiday elements such as a menorah, an oil pot, a dradle etc.

Shana Tova cards featuring THE POMEGRANATE

In this post I will demonstrate 2 different ways of making Shana Tova cards drawing a pomegranate.

You will need:
A pomegranate (at list one)
Card stock paper cut to size, you may find Blank Greeting Cards and Envelopes at your local craft store
A pencil (my preference is sketching with Ebony)
Colored pencils
Oil pastels
Glitter
Red sequence
White glue

Drawing from observation:
I dare you to try this one…
Use the making of Shana Tova cards as an excuse to practice your drawing skills together with your child. It is said that one needs to draw the same subject matter repeatedly in order to draw it well. This is your opportunity!

 

How to:
Place a pomegranate in front of you,Look at it carefully, take your time.
Study the shape of the fruit; forget it is a pomegranate, think of it as a sequence of lines that are connected together.
Follow the outline of the fruit inch by inch. Keep your head still and move your eyes only between the paper and the fruit.

Study the colors of the skin of the fruit, how many colors can you see?
Let the light and shadow help you define the shape of the pomegranate.

Try different mediums, see the different results with each one. experiment with water color, oil pastels and colored pencils. Which is your favorite?

Watch this video for some inspiration.

After drawing the fruit on the page, make it shimmer by spreading some glue and sprinkle some glitter.

My 6 year old did it, so can you.

^{Zoe's on the right mine on the left}

A stylized pomegranate:

Draw an outline of the fruit using a dark and soft pencil.

Apply some glue into the pomegranate shape and fill in with red sequence.

  

Enjoy

tali

10 things to do with a pomegranate

As a child, my grandmother used to tell me that the number of seeds in a pomegranate is equal to the number of the days in a year. Every September I was determined to count the seeds of a pomegranate only to find my self loose track in the the process because I couldn’t keep from eating those juicy delicious vital seeds of the pomegranate. Recently I have learned they say the pomegranate has 613 seeds which correspond with the number of Mitzvoth in the Torah. The truth is that the number varies from fruit to fruit. But it doesn’t affect the magic of this glorious queen of fruit the only one I know that wears a crown.

10 things to do with a pomegranate:

1. Eat - learn how to peel a pomegranate, and minimize frustrations
2. Share with a friend
3. Squeeze and drink
4. Pomegranate martini (I haven’t tried this yet, but it sounds promising)
5. Practice you’re counting by counting seeds (great for 1st grader’s)
6. Make a mark
7. Mix with some plain yogurt (great for breakfast)
8. Make a quinoa tabouli salad 
9. Garnish any mixed green salad
10. A subject matter for drawing

How to - apple stamps and glitter greeting cards

There are many different ways of making greeting cards. This year I am all into the experimental style, trying different techniques with different mediums without knowing what’s going to come out at the end. Making cards this way, keeps the process interesting and prevents it from becoming automated. I know each card will come out different and personal. In the following posts I will demonstrate different methods of making cards as a family activity. I want you to keep in mind that as much as the end result is key, the process of making greeting cards together is just as important. while making the cards some we pass around between us and each one adds something to it; while other Shana Tova’s are done by one person only. We inspire each other with new ideas and techniques, and respond to each others' work. The only one problem I found was that we have to make twice as many cards as we actually need because Zoe wants to keep them all…

You will need:
A sheet of Bristol board (card stock). You can get them as pads in the arts and crafts store in the drawing section.
An apple
A cutting knife
Washable paint or what you may call finger paint
Brushes
Red glitter
Colored pencils
Oil pastels
White glue
Envelopes to fit the card

How to:
Slice the apple in 2 the long way.
Squirt some paint onto a dish
Apply a small amount of paint on to the apple.
Press the apple onto the paper, repeat till the entire page is filled.
Set to dry
Fold paper on it self once and cut in 2. Repeat till you get the desired size of card. I like the rough edges so I don’t use scissors to cut the page but I tear the page after creasing.
Decorate the apples, add glitter, and add details with a pencil or crayons.
make sure you don't forget to add your greetings.

  

 

Thoughts and variations:
Some times the print doesn’t come out very crisp, you may enhance it with a colored pencil after the drawing is dry.
If paint is smudged, it means you have too much paint on the apple, use less.
you may check out a friends blog for a different method of printing @ creative Jewish mom

Any questions please email me.

tali

Next post, is my favorite of all - pomegranates.

Shanna Tova - lets make greeting cards

When ever we get home the girls run straight to the mail box looking for something exiting. I calm them down assuring them there is nothing too exiting about our mail, mostly bills, commercial mail and maybe a letter from school or the library letting us know we are late returning those books, again…(sounds familiar?) but it doesn’t stop them from doing it again and again. Until one day a letter does appear to standout… the name is hard to read it’s written in script, the stamp has an image different than a flag, and the envelope is a little more square than rectangle. They jump up and down…"a letter…yey", how exiting. I have to admit I felt a tingle too.

The new year is 3+ weeks away. Let’s make cards and help diversify the mail. Let us nurture the excitement of our kids. Let’s use a pen to wish each other wonders for the year to come. Let us use our tongue to sill the envelope instead of pressing 'SEND'. Let us send cards that one can hang on the fridge next to the Chinese takeout menu and not 'DELETE'.

And most importantly: Let us enjoy writing those notes, do it as a family, welcome the New Year with cards and greetings, lots of creativity, and loads of sparkles. It will make this season a little more special.

In the next few days I will be posting some ideas of how to go about and make New Year cards. I promise it will be easy and fun; there will be something for everyone.

Stay tuned.

tali

Celebrating love on Tu B'Av

Night has fallen on the city of Jerusalem. A cool desert breeze is a relief from the hot summer day of the month of Av.  All the unmarried women of Jerusalem are dressed in simple white clothing; rich could not be distinguished from poor. Giggling and chattering, they are ready for the dance that will possibly help them find love, on the night of Tu B’ Av.  The unattached men are groomed and determined to find the girl they will marry. The surrounding vineyards of Jerusalem are transformed on that one fool moon night, on the 15 of the month of Av, back in the days of the second temple.

2000 years later this holiday is once again celebrated in Israel.
On one hand, instead of the simplicity that blurred the boundaries of wealth, it is a highly commercialized holiday, characterized with stylized heart shape chocolates, heart shape helium balloons, heart shaped cookies, and heart shaped everything (highly influenced by Valentines Day).
On the other hand, if this is what it takes to help us pause from our fast pace life and schedule in our busy calendar a day to celebrate love, so be it!

2000 years later there are vineyards once again, on the surrounding hills of Jerusalem. You may not be able to find dancing bachelors waiting for the love of their lives on Tu B’ Av, but some tasty wine is becoming part of the landscape signature. The ongoing drought  have led farmers to scrap their high consuming in water orchards such as kiwi and apples and replace them with wine making grapes that are native to the area and are very low in water consumption read more.

Israel may be running low on water, apples and kiwis but it is filling up with delicious wines that are perfect for a celebration of love.

In the US you may find some of the Israeli wines at the local liquor store, or on line at:

www.israeliwinedirect.com

www.onlinekosherwine.com

Other posts about hearts:

The origins of the heart symbol

Heart for dinner

Sukka Decorations

Growing up making the sukka decorations has always been my favorite part of the holiday (besides eating and sleeping in the sukka). While the boys in the neighborhood were getting splinters in their fingers from all the wood they were stealing from construction sites (part of the holiday tradition in Israel), me and a few other friends were getting paper cuts while making   m   i   l   e   s   of paper chain links, lanterns, and “snowflakes” cut out to beautify our sukka. 30 years later I enjoy it just as much, the only difference is that now I have some design background to refer to and a child (Zoe) who loves making things even more than I do.   

‘Snowflakes’

(made by Zoe)

We were using coffee filters for this because the filters are very thin therefore easy to cut, and very absorbent and durable which is great for coloring with water colors. But you can use any other paper for that matter (used magazines are perfect for all sukka decorations).

Fold the paper on it self 3 times till you get a ‘thin slice of pizza’. Start cutting shapes out. You can have random designs or specific designs such as figures, doves, hearts, stars, pomegranates etc. Open the paper up. We always say WOW, Its really fun to see what comes out.
After you are done cutting you may add colorful paper underneath or just pin on the sukka walls as is.

To get inspired you may want to check out some Kirigami reference books. Kirigami is the Japanese art of folding and cutting paper.

Lanterns
Our lanterns were an extension of the kirigami work that we have been doing. We took a large tissue paper, the kind you rap gifts with. We went through the same process as we did for the snowflakes; we put extra attention on trimming the edges. After opening the paper and saying WOW (again)….we draped it over a cone we made of construction paper and hung it in our sukka. What we did was very fast and simple but the effect was similar to the light 'midsummer' designed by the Dutch designer Tord Boontje. (see below)

(made by Zoe and mom)

(designed by Tord Boontje)

Paper chain link
A must have sukka decorations, done ‘traditionally’ with used magazines. The chain link symbolizes the chains of slavery that were removed from the Israelites in Egypt when they were set free by Moses back in the days.

Have fun.