Happy Hanukkah - 1st Night

First Night of Hanukkah is tonight and the girls are soo excited!! Here is a little something for you, since I get asked this all the time.

HOW TO PLAY DREIDEL

There is a long tradition of playing games of chance during the evenings of the holiday.

The Dreidel is a four sided top printed with the Hebrew letters:

These letters represent the words "nes godal hayah sham" and translate into
A Great Miracle Happened There.

Also the numbers in add up to

Nun = 50, Gimmel = 3, Hey = 5, Shin = 300 which equals 358.

Remarkably, this is equivalent to the exact numerical value for the word
"Moshiach" (Messiah).

Mem = 40, Shin = 300, Yud = 10, Chet = 8 which equals
358.

The Rules of the Game:

Everyone in the game starts with 10-15 tokens (gold foil chocolate coins,
nuts, raisins, pennies). Each player puts one of these into the middle (called
the pot). The dreidel is spun by one player at a time. Whether he wins or
loses depends on which face of the dreidel is up when it falls.

Nun
means nisht or "nothing." Player does nothing.

Gimmel
means gantz or "all." Player takes everything in the pot.

Hey
means halb or "half." Player takes half of what is in the pot.

Shin
means shtel or "put in." Player adds two objects to the pot.

When only one object or none is left in the pot, every player adds one. When
an odd number of objects are in the pot, the player rolling heh, "half" takes
half the total plus one. When one person has won everything the game is over.

Have Fun!!