Hey guys, my kids are finally at an age where I think we can start implementing family traditions around the Feasts without them losing the overall meaning and message behind the Feasts. One of the things I decided to do for this Feast cycle is to do more long term preparation for the Feasts. I have to admit that all the Feast in 2013 kind of snuck up on me and that was sad and a failure on my part. I also realize that in my effort to shun all things “religious” I was taking too much of a hands off approach to the Feasts. I didn’t want my kids to look at them as “replacements” for the pagan holidays, but I can’t imagine the Children of Israel sitting around thinking “ho hum here comes Trumpets, blah, blah, blah”. If these Feasts are such a big deal for Yahowah that he wants them observed perpetually, then they need to be a big deal for our family, so my husband and I are changing our approach. Now, to be fair – this is an ever changing journey for us so please no tomatoes if next year I have a completely different story to tell!
Many of you all know that I homeschool my kids, so teaching is just always a part of everything that we do. I am a big fan of integrating all the different learning styles and multiple intelligences into our learning, so that is what I am doing with our learning about and celebrating the Feasts. So, while we are going to be doing a lot of “stuff” the goal isn’t to integrate religious traditions into the Feasts, but to make learning about the Feast a whole brain experience for my kids.

So, the learning styles are: Visual/Verbal – written word based learning; Visual – picture based learning; Auditory – learning through hearing; Kinesthetic – learning through doing and using the body
Multiple Intelligences are: Linguistic – word smart; Logical/Mathematical – number smart; Spatial – picture smart; Kinesthetic – body smart; Musical – music/artistic smart; Interpersonal – people smart; Intrapersonal – self smart; and naturalistic – nature smart

My goal is to integrate as many of these learning styles/intelligences into our observation of the Feasts as possible. It is funny because as I have been studying various points Yahowah put in the Torah, He utilized these exact same learning styles/intelligences all throughout the Torah, Prophets, and Psalms (that is another post though). I plan to cycle through this for the entire Georgian calendar year with the cycles looking like this:

Introduction to the Seven Feasts: What are the seven Feasts, why do when observe them, when do we observe them, why are they the only holidays that we observe?
Study and Preparation for Passover, Unleavened Bread First Fruits
Observation of Passover, Unleavened Bread, and First Fruits
Mini Reflection of Passover, Unleavened Bread, and First Fruits
Study and Preparation for Seven Sevens
Observance of Seven Sevens
Reflection of Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, and Seven Sevens
Study and Preparation for Trumpets, Reconciliations, and Shelters
Observance of Trumpets, Reconciliations, and Shelters
Reflection of Trumpets, Reconciliations, and Shelters

I will post things on this thread as I put them together so that if others would like to join in they are welcome. One thing to be clear about is that I am less concerned about observing the Feasts “right” than I am concerned about observing the Feasts. So, we may be off by a day or two (or ten), my family may interpret passages from our lack of knowledge better than our knowledge, and many of the things that we do may not sit right with you or your family. We understand we are not perfect. My goal in sharing wasn’t to encourage people to do it like us, but to share some of the things we are doing so that if others were interested it would be an easy place to pull resources.

Another thing that I have to be clear about is that while I abhor pagan customs and rituals, the pagans do not own the concept of family traditions and making memories. I believe Yahowah wanted the Feasts to be festive times of joy as opposed to solemn religious occasions. My kids actually helped me see this a year and a half ago when we observed our first Unleavened Bread. They actually really enjoyed the challenge of not consuming leaven – they made it fun. While I was looking at it through the lens of “duty” and I will even say from a religious mindset, my kids looked at it as a game. You know what; I have decided to embrace their point of view. They seem to truly have the right idea about these things and seem to have a much more natural relationship with Yahowah – so on this matter I am allowing my kids to take the reins – if they want to decorate our tent for Sukkot with lights and bells and whistles then that is what we are going to do. If they want to make candy coated matzah or go to a farm to pet a baby lamb – that is what we will do. Just to give you an idea of our household, we have also started to kick off Sabbath with family karaoke competitions – we really just want to have fun and show the kids that while religion is oppressive, relationship is freeing and natural and beautiful and enjoyable and it should be desirable. Having seen amazing images of the cosmos through pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope and seen schools of exotic fish from snorkeling in the Caribbean I realize that Yahowah is imaginative, creative, has a wonderful eye for color and beauty and even has quite a sense of humor – that is the Yahowah I want my children to know and love.