Celebrate! It’s Purim!

02 Monday Mar 2015

Tags

American Heritage Girls, Girls, Homeschool Girl Power!, My Father's World 1st Grade, Purim

Did you know this weekend is the celebration of Purim?

The Festival of Purim, commemorated by Jews every year, tells the story of an attempt thousands of years ago to annihilate the Jews. Sound familiar?
The story behind Purim is found in the Book of Esther in the Bible, which records how God used a man named Mordechai and his niece, Esther, married to the Persian King Ahasuerus, to thwart a plan to kill every Jew — from the youngest to the oldest — scattered throughout the 127 provinces of the Persian Empire.

We began celebrating Purim as a family when we were using My Father’s World 1st Grade curriculum. Last year, I kinda threw it together at the last minute and we just watched One Night with the King. Great movie, by the way, though there are a few scenes that are a little intense!

This year, we decided we’d celebrate Purim with our brand new American Heritage Girls troop, and we had a blast! I think we might have started a new annual tradition!

I have to be honest, I don’t really have much time to plan things nowadays. Pinterest has been a godsend to me, really. I can do tons of research in just minutes, because everyone else has already done the work – I just need to view their pins and pick the things I like!

First, after our regular opening ceremony, we split up the girls and did two crafts:

First, we made a “Gragger” noisemaker to drown out Haman’s name! I did not use a paint stick- we just put beans in cups, and then I gave the girls rolls of decorative duct-tape (leftover from a birthday part craft last year), to cover the cups with.

Then we made Paper Plate Crowns. We had the plates pre-cut for them, so the girls could decorate them more quickly.

Once the girls had completed their crafts, they then dressed up! We all brought in princess-type costumes, and the girls had a blast sharing clothes (ahh, yes, it has begun already) and dressing up like Princess Esther! As an added bonus, I had recently cleaned out the girls’ playroom and was able to gift each girl with several Mardi Gras bead necklaces, because all Princesses need beautiful jewelry, right???

Once they were dressed we assembled and sat in our “ceremony area” once again, and we all tried Hamentaschen cookies (a Purim tradition). I was able to get these at Costco, hallelujah, but you can also check your local bakery or make your own! We then watched two short videos about Purim!

I learned quickly that we needed to be ready with “extra” activities to keep these girls busy! So here are some coloring pages and other activities I found to share!

Purim Coloring Activities
More “Gragger” Noise Makers
Purim Word Search
Purim Finger Puppets
More Purim Finger Puppets

I really love celebrating this story each year. It seems like every year we all learn something new and get something awesome out of it. Plus, it’s a fabulous female role model for our girls!

Celebrating Purim

09 Friday Mar 2012

Posted by MP31W! in Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Holidays, Jewish Holidays, MFW Homeschool Highlights, My Father's World, Purim

Since we recently finished My Father’s World’s kindergarten curriculum before leaving Alabama, we decided to jump right in to the first grade curriculum upon arriving in the DC area!

This particular curriculum leans heavily onto history and the Bible, and first grade is no different. What makes this year so interesting, is the focus on the Bible history, and specifically the history of the Hebrews, since the Bible and Christianity begins with them.

As part of our study, we’ve been looking into Jewish customs (attending a service at a local synagogue – more later) and Jewish holidays. So I was very excited to realize that we could celebrate Purim right here in the US.

When doing a quick search, I found these online resources for Purim:

Not being fully prepared ahead of time, I was able to find a great Palestinian restaurant, The Jerusalem Restaurant. (I also used a sale on Restaurant.com to get a gift certificate dirt cheap, which saved us a ton on our bill! Get on their mailing list to find out about their great deals!) This is great, because part of celebrating Purim is having a feast, and what better way to celebrate with “local” food!

The food, by the way, was FABULOUS. And dessert was even better, except I ate it without taking a picture. (Baklava. I’m a sucker for it.)

The girls had chicken kabobs. Meat on a stick is always a winner.

Keeping two little active girls occupied while waiting for the food is always a challenge. This time I was prepared with coloring sheets from the Esther story:

Later on, we cut out the colored characters, and then created these “puppets” to tell the story of Esther.

We really enjoyed our experience celebrating Purim, and next year I’d like to do it again, this time letting the girls dress up as “Princess Esther” (since we’re obsessed with princesses anyway) and act out the story, perhaps recruiting some of their friends to join us!