Large turnout for first menorah-building workshop

Several hundred people showed up at Home Depot in Valley Stream on Sunday for a workshop where kids could build their own menorahs for Hanukkah.

About 175 children took home handmade menorahs after the two-hour event, which was organized by Itty Goldshmid of Chabad Outreach Center and Home Depot. Her husband, Rabbi Yitzchak Goldshmid, said people seemed to enjoy their projects.

“People had a great time, you can see by their faces,” Goldshmid said.

Home Depot sponsored the event, which was organized at Itty Goldshmid’s request. Store employees researched do-it-yourself menorahs on the Internet so they would know what materials to provide. Two designs were chosen, one featuring metal nuts and the other using PVC piping.

Itty, who is her congregation’s Hebrew School director, said the project served as a way to teach children about the meaning of Hanukkah while having fun and making something they will use. “All the eight candles must be on the same level, only one of them can be higher or lower and they must be in a straight line. They have to know all these rules in order to make it,” she said. “The main thing of Hanukkah is lighting the menorah, eight days, and adding light to the world, adding goodness. So the kids know that light represents good, and just as we’re adding candles every night, we have to, every day, add something good to the world through good deeds and being kind.”