Family-friendly Passover Guide for East Bay Families

Our Passover Guide for East Bay kids and families is sponsored by the Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund. This year Passover starts on Wednesday, April 8 through April 16, 2020.

Passover is a time for family, friends, joy, and of course, celebrating freedom. We are sharing this list of ideas and events taking place in the East Bay and hope your family enjoys celebrating and connecting to one another. If you're struggling to create new Passover traditions with so much going on in the world, we suggest this perspective: Ma Nishta Na – Why is This Year’s Seder Different Than All Other Seders? along with your own creativity.

Happy Passover, Pesach Sameach.

Shop local!

Afikomen on Claremont Ave. is a terrific local store in the Elmwood district with everything you need to celebrate at home — we are lucky to have it in our neighborhood — they are now offering curbside pickup, call ahead to make special arrangements. This Judaica shop offers wonderful customer service and so many great Passover products for your family. They have seder plates, ritual items, Kosher food products including matzah and special treats. And don’t forget the prize for finding the Afikomen!

Watch the Passover story together

PJ Library has created the Passover Story in 10 scenes on YouTube.

This companion provides an easy way for young children to understand Passover and is a wonderful companion to the PJ Library Haggadah.

Cuddle up with Passover books

PJ Library and PJ Our Way has a large collection of Passover books for preschoolers you can read together with your child and others recommended for elementary-aged children who can curl up on their own.

More Passover crafts and activities

Create: You can make simple Passover crafts from materials found at home such as seder plates or 10 plagues finger puppets (with beautiful printables from artist, Brenda Ponnay, pictured above). If you like to combine your creative flair with food, you will have fun making this matzah house that is both pretty and delicious.

Sing: Shaboom has a wonderful selection of Passover songs. Some of our favorites are Bang Your Hammers, Frogs Here, Frogs There, and Chad Gadya.

Watch: There are many online videos that teach children about Passover. We love these Shaboom renditions of the Four Questions and this story explaining why we don’t eat leavened products (chametz).

Cook: Many Passover friendly recipes are not dominated by matzah. Here are some flavorful meals you can make together with children of all ages.

More: We like this list of eight more kid-friendly Passover activities from With Love, Ima. This website has so many wonderful ideas from puppets, stickers, and play dough to clay and jumping frogs. Learn a new dance and remember your plagues together. Find more Passover story activities on @withlovefromima instagram >

Order in for your seder

With Passover this year looking so different, people who normally go out to a seder at a synagogue or the home of a friend may be in charge of the seder meal for the first time. If you can't or don't want to cook at home, there are delicious options for delivery or takeout seder meals in the Bay Area!

Child-welcoming Passover seders, storytimes, and some virtual community events

Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund is a philanthropic catalyst, connecting Bay Area Jews – of all ages, backgrounds, and perspectives – to the power we have as a community to improve the world. We partner with donors, organizations, and foundations to address the pressing issues facing our community and develop innovative strategies that result in deep and lasting impact locally, in Israel, and around the world.

PJ Library provides free, developmentally appropriate, Jewish books and music to children from six months to eight years of age. For more information or to sign up please click here.

PJ Our Way provides the gift of exceptional books with Jewish themes — that they choose themselves — to kids 9-12. Check it out.

Thanks again to the Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund for supporting 510 Families. Images used with permission.