Leah's first night of Hanukkah

For her very first night of her very first Hanukkah, Leah helped light the candles and then picked and opened a present. She seemed interested in the candle lighting and blessings, but not exactly participatory. Then I let her pick her gift from the stack of 8 wrapped and waiting for her. She put her hand on one and I helped her open it.

She tore off a piece of the wrapping paper and was very excited to crinkle it and wave it around. And then she cried a little when I took it away from her and helped her to continue the unwrapping process. We went through that a couple more times until all the paper was off. Then of course she wanted to play with the box. That actually worked out well because the packaging on toys these days is so complicated it takes a few minutes to get the toy completely out of the box. She played with part of the box while I worked on the rest of it.

Then she actually got the toy...a v-tech baby laptop. It's very cute - it opens and closes like a laptop and has a little attached mouse that looks like a mouse (the animal kind). It has buttons where the keyboard would be that are different shapes and colors and it has pictures that light up where the screen would be. It has 3 different modes for learning and discovery and music. When you press the buttons it has different light patterns and sounds depending on the mode and how many times you press the button. Leah definitely took to it right away. She can open and close it herself and she can press the buttons.

All in all a very successful first night of Hanukkah...looking forward to the next 7.

Leah liked watching the candles burn:

And she picked out her present:

And successfully unwrapped it:

And had fun playing with the box:

And finally she got to play with the toy: