Wednesday, November 24, 2010

A Jewish Tree Topper - They Exist!

 As any Jewish or interfaith family that has a holiday tree knows, it can be tough finding Hanukkah themed tree decorations. The past few years have seen a welcome increase in the amount of available Hanukkah ornaments, likely in response to the number of interfaith families and the secularization of the holiday tree. They have silver and gold glass menorahs, colorful dreidels of all shapes and sizes and traditional balls with "Happy Hanukkah" and "Shalom" sparkling across them. Every year I add a few more to the collection and they cover the tree adding punches of color between the snowmen, the Dodger baseballs, and the kitty cats.


 

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Although there are now countless Jewish ornaments available, there is a serious lack of Hanukkah themed tree toppers.
In the absence of a good Hanukkah tree topper, we've been using a light up star that I found at a drugstore.While it's pretty awesome when it's lit up and blinking colors, it's definitely not Jewish and it made one of my family members a little uncomfortable. A year or so ago, one company came out with a sort of tacky Jewish star topper, a silver glitter covered thing that wasn't in the least bit appealing to me. At 19.99 it wasn't too expensive and even though it was a Star of David I just couldn't bring myself to buy it.

So, since 2006 we've had this blinky light up star. Every year around the holidays I search the internet for any new product that might have come out during the year. Thus far the search has fruitless, until this year.  The other day while I was browsing Etsy, I came across some beautiful hand made stained glass toppers. To my great surprise, the artist had a small collection of Star of David toppers! While they were almost double the price of the inexpensive one, they were absolutely gorgeous and could be customized in any color you want. I had to have one.

After contacting the artist Stephanie, we decided on a blue and white iridescent star. It was a tough decision since all the colors are beautiful but we decided to go with the traditional Hanukkah colors to make the tree Jewish enough for our uncomfortable family member.


cobalt&white SOD Aqua & white. Ir.
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In the end, we picked the cobalt blue and white iridescent Star of David on the left, though the aqua and white one is equally pretty. The Star of David toppers are 7" x 6" and fit trees about 4 feet to 8 feet. She has many other sizes in her other toppers and takes custom orders up until December 10th. If you're celebrating Hanukkah it's super early this year, December 1st - December 8th, so I would check them out soon!

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