Hanukkah 2012

We thoroughly celebrated Hanukkah 2012! Captain Adorable and I shared the first nights with Oma and Opa, and had The Best Potato Latkes to kick off the holiday. Everything tastes better when you have help in the kitchen and an appreciative audience! Mmmmmm!

One afternoon I surprised Captain Adorable with a gingerbread house project--icing, chocolate candies, gum drops, and chocolate snowmen. Amazing how much of those building materials ended up in my mouth! Here's a photo of our house behind the menorah.

I bought Captain Adorable his own menorah this year (at his prompting) and he really loved everything about that--getting to have his own menorah, getting to light the candles twice, and having two menorahs going at the same time. He can sing the Hanukkah prayer in Hebrew now.

Both menorahs on the last night of Hanukkah

We celebrated the next 7 nights with Captain Obvious. I rolled and baked rugelach on the eighth night (I say "rolled and baked" because of course I acutally made the dough the night before--it has to be refrigerated overnight). Here are some of those amazing pastries for your viewing pleasure.

Ready to go in the oven

Ready to eat

For a final celebration (which was the night after Hanukkah ended, but who wants to be limited to only 8 nights anyway!?) the three of us made churros con chocolate (our second year making this Spanish treat) .

Me squeezing the churros dough into the hot oil. Capt. Obvious at the ready with tongs. 

Capt. Adorable could not wait for me to take the photo and dove right in!

Oh what a Happy Hanukkah I had this year. Taking the time to sit down together, to ready the menorah, to sing the prayer together (even Capt. Obvious sings), to sit--even for a few moments--in the candlelight and look into each other's faces--these are the moments I treasure. I love to be with my family, to make and do and share: together. We are so lucky to be able to share this holiday season with people we love--family, friends, and neighbors.

Life is so beautiful.