Celebrate Shabbat and the Jewish Day of Love by making a challah baby necklace

We’re a few days into a new month on the Jewish calendar, the Hebrew month of Av, which arrives right in the middle of summer. In just a couple of weeks, we’ll be celebrating a little known Jewish holiday called Tu B’Av (literally named for the 15th day of the month of Av) or the Jewish Day of Love (think Jewish Valentine’s Day)! To get ready, we’ve been thinking about all the Jewish things we love, and one thing that makes our hearts flutter is challah on Shabbat!

how to make mini challah — Mini challahs are just the right size for little hands. Learn to bake them here!

We love baking mini challahs, and we love making challah baby necklaces too, especially when they’re all wrapped up in a dainty challah cover.

Challah babies are especially wonderful to get you and your littles in the joyful spirit of Shabbat. You can join in on the fun! We even have a challah baby template for you to make your own. So let’s go make a challah baby necklace!

Puffy Challah Baby Necklace

Here’s what you’ll need for each necklace:

Challah template or draw your own
2 - 3” x 5” pieces of felt
Small rectangles of felt in black (eyes and smile) and pink (cheeks)
Sewing needle + 1 or 2 straight pins
Embroidery floss
Yarn (about 30”)
2 Cotton balls
Scissors
White glue
Pony beads

For the challah cover:

Piece of lace

Here’s how to make this sweet baby!

1. First we’ll make the dough! Cut two challahs shapes from your rectangles of felt. If you’d like to use our challah template, click here!

2. Now it’s time to braid your challah! We did this by sewing a simple a design with a running stitch in the middle of one piece of felt. Set this piece aside when you’re done with the braid.

2. Take the yarn for the necklace cord and fold it in half and place it on the second piece of felt (the one that was not sewn with the braid design) and dab it with some glue.

3. We’re stuffing this challah to make it puffy! Unroll the cotton balls and place them in the center of the felt, just below the necklace cording.

4. Make a little felt and cotton “sandwich” by placing your braided piece of felt on top of the cotton and sew a running stitch going all the way around. Be sure to go over the yarn necklace cord.

5. Next cut eyes and cheeks from the black and pink piece of felt…and

6. Glue them onto the top piece of felt. This is the best step - when your felt becomes a little challah with a sweet happy personality!

make a challah felt toy — Oh, hi challah baby.

7. Now it’s time for some extra colorful fun! Grab some pony and paper beads, and invite your little to string them onto the necklace! I like to roll a little piece of tape at the end of the necklace to make the yarn nice and sturdy for littles to string beads.

And that’s it, a little challah baby necklace. It’s so adorable! But wait, we’re not done yet!

Since we made this challah baby for Shabbat, we wanted to use a piece of lace to make a challah cover too. Making a beautiful ritual object like a challah cover and using on Shabbat is the Jewish value Hiddur Mitzvah (beautifying a mitzvah).

We made our challah cover by cutting our lace and gluing it into the shape of a tiny sock. When it was dry, we dressed our baby in the challah cover.

Aww. This challah baby is so darling. It was made with love, for the Jewish Day of Love - Tu B’Av and for Shabbat.

You can extend the fun of “baking” a challah baby necklace with littles by singing the song, "I Made a Little Challah" (which happens to be the same melody as “I Have a Little Dreidel”).

I made a little challah. I made it all myself.

I put it in the oven. I put it on the shelf.

Now listen little challah. You must not run away.

I need you for the Shabbat. Oh challah please do stay.

Oh Goody Goody Goody, Goody Good Shabbat!

how to make a felt challah necklace craft

Now that you know that there’s a Jewish Day of Love, do you plan on celebrating? How about making challah heart-pops or a puffy heart necklace with your littles! Let us know if you do something special in the comments below! And also let us know if you make a challah baby necklace.

If you're looking for more ways to celebrate Shabbat, be sure to check out our Shabbat Round-up! For even more Shabbat love and inspiration, our friend Ariel, of the Jewish motherhood and lifestyle blog Ariel Loves, is sharing more ways to celebrate Shabbat this month on her Instagram page Jewish Family Magic, and she’s even doing a family Summer Shabbat Challenge - you’re invited to participate too! There are even fun prizes for participating!

We hope your Shabbat is filled with lots of love (and puffy challah baby necklaces too)!

Shabbat Shalom,

~Jennifer