Idea #3: Cookies and Milk
Don’t roll your eyes; I know you’ve seen this one done many times. It’s not exactly original, but it is quick and easy and our take on milk and cookies goes one step further, so keep reading.
Gather together:
brown paper bags
ribbon
a hole puncher
scissors
white printable shipping labels
cookies
chocolate milk drink boxes
dollar bills
One year, in early February, there happened to be an excellent sale on Yoohoo drink boxes in Costco. When I bought them, I wasn’t sure how I would use them for Purim, but I knew I had to have them. They sat on our porch for weeks and each time I’d leave the house, they’d taunt me. I had no clue how I’d tie them into Purim until one day…
I baked and baked and baked so many chocolate chip cookies and packaged them up in packs of a dozen in clear cellophane bags. Those cookie packages, plus a chocolate milk box went into the brown paper bags, along with a brand new dollar bill, which apparently you can get from the bank when you bring in your old money.
Playing on the milk commercial’s slogan, “Got Milk,” we printed up the shipping labels in the same font with the phrase: “Got Mitzvah Gelt?” And in a smaller type, we wrote: “Be sure to give this dollar to tzeddaka on Purim day!”
We closed up our bags with some ribbon and the hole puncher. And we had days to spare before Purim – which, in our house, is really the key to a happy Purim.
My husband is a pretty flexible guy but early in our married life, after living through just a few Purims with me, he instituted a few mishloach manot rules:
- The mishloach manot must be made in advance. No pulling it all together after Megillah reading because it never takes “just five minutes.”
- Theme or no theme, it’s up to me, but if we are planning a theme, we need to at least somehow, someway, relate it to Purim, even if it’s a little far-fetched.
- The choice of mishloach manot container is up to me, but it had better stay closed because if the contents of the bags are going to spill all over the trunk every time he makes a left, he’s out of the game.
I think those rules are pretty fair and, also, I don’t really have a choice because he’s my driver of choice on the big day.
Besides, there’s no sense in fighting. Purim is meant to be a happy day and a grumpy husband who’s been coerced into re-packing all the mishloach manot that may or may not have spilled while he was only backing the car out of the driveway, isn’t helpful to anyone.
See what I did there? Marriage advice and a solution to your mishloach manot issues. I know. You don’t have to thank me, that’s what friends are for.