Pop Patterned Hanukkah Menorah

One of the most beautiful parts of celebrating Hanukkah is watching kids learn to participate in lighting the menorah each night. But it can be difficult to have them help without worrying about their little fingers getting burnt. With our Pop Patterned Hanukkah Menorah, even the youngest of kiddos can safely count the holiday nights too.

Materials:

- My First Arts and Crafts Library

- piece of heavy cardstock or recycled piece of cardboard

- scissors

- glue

- paint (optional)

Steps:

1. Decorate the background (optional) -- if you'd like your menorah to really POP, use paints to paint a brightly-colored background on the cardstock or cardboard.

2. Create the menorah -- the Arts and Crafts Library is full of so many goodies that you can use to construct the menorah. A Hanukkah menorah has nine branches—one for each of the eight nights of Hanukkah and one for the helper candle, the shamash, used to light the eight candles.

Traditionally, the shamash is set on a different height from the other candles. For our menorah, we chose to use craft sticks for the base and stickers for the candle holders, but experiment with using different shapes and materials to make yours unique! Glue the menorah shapes onto the background.

3. Make candles + flames -- Again, there is such a wide range of materials to pick from the kit, but we chose paper straws topped with a gold sticker for lit candles. The first night candle is set to the farthest right of the menorah. Subsequent candles are added right to left, BUT the candles are lit left to right. For example, you'd light the second night candle before lighting the first night candle.

Happy Hanukkah!