Preserving Her Culture

It is important to us that to we preserve Nora's culture as we raise her here as a Chinese-American.  One of the most festive and rich cultural holidays is the Chinese (or Lunar) New Year, a fifteen day celebration in China.  Today begins the year of the snake so this weekend we tried to do a few things to celebrate the holiday.  As Nora gets older, we will try to incorporate more tradition into this holiday.

2013 - Year of the Snake

Jack is a Snake!!!

The children all wore red today for "good luck".

We gave chocolate coins to friends and family in red envelopes.  It is traditional for parents and grandparents to give children money in red envelopes on the eve of the New Year.  The boys will also be taking candy filled "firecrackers" to their friends at school tomorrow.

Okay, I had really good intentions of putting together a traditional Chinese meal, but that didn't happen.  What did happen was dipping fortune cookies (totally American culture and not traditional Chinese) in sparkly red sprinkles (added a little orange extract as there is a small orange-type citrus fruit tree that is very customary decoration during the New Year).

We made Chinese lanterns (and will try to actually release a lantern sometime this week or next weekend).

We have been reading some fun books about the New Year.

And, the reason we celebrate - our little Chinese firecracker!