This eco-friendly craft is fun, festive, and all-around fantastic! It’s also a great way for kids to learn the Hebrew letters on a dreidel — Nun, Gimmel, Hey, and Shin, which is an acronym for the Hebrew saying “Nes Gadol Hayah Sham” and means “a great miracle happened there.” Your kiddos will love making Puffy Paper Bag Dreidels in different sizes and different colors and then using them to make your family Hanukkah celebration extra special!

Make the Festival of Lights extra bright with this eco-friendly menorah! Your kiddos will love painting paper tube “candles” and “lighting” each one with yellow tissue paper. The best part is that each night of Hanukkah, kids can add the correct number of candles (setting them up right to left, just like we read Hebrew) and then “lighting” them left to right, lighting the most recent night’s candle first. What a joy it will be for them to participate in this nightly Hanukkah ritual!

Make your dreidel game extra meaningful with Inspiring Gelt! Each paper “coin” has a powerful message and will remind every player of Hanukkah’s deeper lessons. Download the free Inspiring Gelt PDF, and then your kiddos can decorate the “coins” however they like — paint, markers, crayons, and colored pencils all work great! There are even four blank “coins” for kiddos to write their own inspiring messages. They will surely enjoy this super important Hanukkah prep job — making lots and lots of Inspiring Gelt!

This craft has been a fan-favorite with my kindergarten synagogue students for years! Kids (and kids at heart of all ages) will love bringing more joy and light into the world with this fun Hanukkah craft! Make sure you download the free Washi Tape Menorah PDF (pictured here), which will be a great starting point for your kiddos. You could even print eight copies so that there’s one for each night of Hanukkah!

Your kiddos will be proud as a Maccabee when they make their very own FELT DREIDEL TOYS! It’s so fun to sew with felt (it’s the perfect material for beginning sewing) and these sweet Hanukkah toys are surprisingly easy to make, even for little hands. Your family Hanukkah celebrations will surely be extra festive with some colorful FELT DREIDEL TOYS!

Mamma mia — what a beautiful menorah! Who knew that you can make a menorah out of pasta AND that it’s pretty easy?! Just glue nine pieces of ziti (for the eight candles, plus the helper candle) to a lasagna noodle, spray paint it, and then add birthday candles, which fit perfectly. Wow! This sweet little menorah will surely add extra joy to your Hanukkah celebration, but just to be on the safe side, please use it as a decorative and/or play menorah that you don’t light. Chag Hanukkah Sameach!

Kids love this menorah activity board with Velcro candles and flames because they can put them on and take them off as many times as they like! I made this board in 2005 when my older son started preschool, and we’ve used it many times through the years when my kids and I were asked to talk about Hanukkah at their schools. It’s perfect for that and also very fun to play with at home!

Celebrate Hanukkah AND honor the Jewish values of shomrei adamah (guardians of the earth) and bal tashchit (do not destroy) by reusing an egg carton to make a festive menorah! This menorah is practical, too, because kids will be able to put the craft stick “candles” in and out each night of Hanukkah and also “light” the mini clothes pin “flames.” Add some extra joy to the Festival of Lights with this simple and colorful craft!

This is one of my favorite Hanukkah art projects, and it’s great for any age! Story boards are similar to books, but they’re not bound. They’re great for retelling a story from memory because the pictures help the artist/author remember the main parts. Here’s what you do — read the Hanukkah story with your kiddos, and then have them draw pictures on a series of cardstock or posterboard to depict the different parts of the story. They can also write numbers on the back of each story board so that they can see the order. Alternatively, I divided the Hanukkah story into six parts and created a PDF that can be printed with Avery 8464 Labels (they are 3 1/3” x 4”) and stuck to the backs of the story boards. That link is below in the materials list. Once your kiddos are finished, they’ll be ready to retell the Hanukkah story to family and friends, which is one of the most important parts of celebrating the holiday!

Homemade latkes are so delicious, but there’s something so familiar and comforting about latkes made from a boxed mix — yum! Here’s a fun way to repurpose those latke mix boxes: use the cardboard to make dreidels! You can paint them, color them, put stickers or washi tape on them, or decorate them any way you want. Use them as Hanukkah decorations to make the Festival of Lights extra festive! Chag Hanukkah Sameach!

Not all cities accept plastic bottle caps for recycling; and even if they do, they’re not always really recycled. Here’s a fun way to put those caps to good use — make a dreidel cap collage! Kids love this one because they do a mitzvah (helping take care of the earth), and they get to use lots and lots of glue, which is always a crowd pleaser! It’s a great group project, too, as more than one person can be adding the caps to create that big dreidel shape. Once your family has enjoyed this unique creation, don’t throw it away! You can pull off the caps and use them for a different cap collage or craft — reuse, then reuse again!