Hanukkah Celebration & Caleb's Birthday

The day we left Grandma Effie's happened to be the last day of Hanukkah. Our friends, the Froeses', were having a Hanukkah celebration near Winnipeg.  So, we spent the afternoon and evening celebrating with them.  We spent the afternoon talking about the book of Daniel then we ate supper.

After supper we lit the Hanukkiyas. 

All the kids.

Afterwards we did some dancing.

The next day we started heading up to Alaska, visiting a few more friend on the way.

Benjamin and Sarah

The 31st was Caleb's birthday.  We worked it out to spend his birthday and shabbat in Whitehorse, Canada.

He turned nine and we had cake, snug in our motor home with all the windows frosted over.  

Being as how his birthday is on New Years Eve everyone celebrates his birthday.  The Canada Games Centre celebrated it with a huge New Years party.  Everything was free and they had snacks, games in the soccer field, a dance, an obstacle course set up in the pool, free skates for the ice rink, fire works and a bunch of other stuff.  It was a lot of fun.

The obstacle course was harder then it looks:P

Sarah and Benjamin had trouble with skates.

We even talked dad into going ice skating.

Channukah

On the last day of Channukah we had everyone up for dinner. After dinner we lit the Martin's menorah and had a great time of praise and worship while the candles melted away.

David is playing the guitar in the background while Regina, David & Lavonne are worshiping at the table.

The kids wanted to give each other gifts for Channukah. I teased them that they were trying to materialize YHWH's Biblical holidays. They love giving and receiving and they did it all themselves so I didn't complain. They picked out clothes for each other from our thrift store, and Deborah, Quentin and Anna made swords and shields for the younger kids. They've been reading a series of books about the medieval times, so they're into swords and shields at the moment.

Hanukkah

This year we learned about Hanukkah and celebrated it along with Christmas.  The Jewish people celebrate it to remember when God miraculously provided oil for them.  In 165 BC the Jews revolted against the Seleucid monarchy.  They liberated the Temple which had been desecrated by Antiochus IV.  They rededicated the Temple but tradition says they only had enough consecrated oil to keep the menorah lit for one day.  Miraculously the menorah stayed lit for eight days which was the amount of time it took to consecrate more oil.  We made a Hanukkah menorah (it has nine candles whereas the one God described how to make for His Temple has seven candles).

We made donuts one night and Latkes (shredded potatoes in an egg and flour batter fried) on Sunday.  Foods cooked in oil are traditional for Hannukah.

The kids took turns lighting the menorah each night.

Sunday everyone donned their dancing outfits and we did a little Hanukkah dancing.