Lessons Learnt Journal » cultural traditions

Chinese New Year Dragon Marionette

Pauline — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 11:55:54 +0000

Food, large family gatherings, fire-crackers, more food, red money packets, new clothes, new haircut, more food and of course lion or dragon dancing accompanied by ostentatiously loud festive drums. Chinese New Year. Families gather. Bright colours are everywhere. The food is unbelievably good and bountiful. Being Chinese has its perks.

This year (2012), Chinese New Year falls on Monday, 23rd January. It’s the year of the dragon. I made three Chinese Dragon marionettes for play in light of the festivities to come.

Materials
Disposable cups
Coloured paper
Glue gun
Fishing wire
Needle
Buttons
Christmas baubles
Goggly eyes
Pipe Cleaners
Long craft sticks
Black and red felt
Red, orange and green craft foam

Method

** I used my glue gun throughout the whole project as it made the craft more secure and is much quicker to work with.

1. Cover all the disposable cups in coloured paper.

2. Make part of the dragon’s head by inserting two Christmas baubles into a cup, then sticking goggly eyes on the baubles. The open part of the cup will be where the snout and mouth of the dragon will be placed (in Step 6).

3. Using fishing wire and a button as an anchor, thread cups together forming the dragon’s body. At the end of the body, thread through the first part of the dragon’s head (made in Step 2).

4. Thread through a new piece of fishing wire (with a button as an anchor) between the dragon’s eyes. Attach this fishing wire to a long craft stick, enabling the dragon’s head to be controlled by moving the long craft stick.

5. Attach new pieces of fishing wire to various parts of the body and tie these to long craft sticks, enabling the dragon to be used as a marionette. I used two long craft sticks per dragon. This may be varied, depending on how long your dragon marionette is.

6. Cut half a cup for the dragon’s snout/mouth. Cover the bottom of the cup with black and red felt for the mouth. Glue the snout and mouth to the first part of the dragon’s head.

7. Cut dragon “frills” out of craft foam and attach these to the dragon’s head.

8. Twist pipe cleaners around the dragon’s body for its legs. Cut foam feet for the dragon and attach it to its legs by poking a small hole through the foam and tying the pipe cleaners around the feet.

Enjoy playing and Happy Chinese New Year!

N&M: 3 years, 7 months
E: 1 year, 6 months
K: 1 month

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This post was shared in the following linky parties:

It’s Playtime
For the Kids Fridays
Play Academy
Sunday Showcase
Sharing Saturday
Kids Get Crafty

The post Chinese New Year Dragon Marionette by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.

the Christmas gift

Pauline — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 12:48:41 +0000

Our Christmas tree is up.

Our presents are wrapped.
How cute are these DIY gift bags?
(See Cosmo Cricket’s Blog for a video tutorial)

Now time to marvel upon the Christmas gift that gives new life.

He came down to earth from heaven,
who is God and Lord of all;
And his shelter was a stable,
And his cradle was a stall.
With the poor, and mean, and lowly,
Lived on earth our Saviour holy.
– Once in Royal David’s City.

Happy Christmas!

This post was shared in the following linky parties:

The Play Academy
The Sunday Showcase
Sharing Saturday
Link & Learn
After School
It’s Playtime
For the Kids Friday
T.G.I.F.

The post the Christmas gift by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.

lanterns for mid-autumn festival

Pauline — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 12:21:22 +0000

I am sure I’ve been told the historical and cultural stories behind the mid-autumn festival. Something about smuggling an important message to the masses inside mooncakes and something about a beautiful lady descending from/ascending to the moon? To me though, mid-autumn festival is about eating delicious mooncakes with my family & childhood memories of holding and seeing beautiful lanterns made of cellophane stretched around wire frames. I spent a part of my childhood in Malaysia, and during mid-autumn festival, Chinese children from the neighbourhood would come out after dinner and parade their lanterns at night under the glorious bright full moon. The lanterns can get quite elaborate. My favourite ones were the ones shaped like animals.

This morning we made very simple lanterns. We simply decorated some glass candle cups using crepe paper streamers and mix-a-paste glue.

Here’s how we made them:

1. Cut streamers into various lengths. Placing the rolls of streamers in old ice-cream containers and using them as dispensers worked a treat.

2. Paste the streamers onto the glass candle cups. Old glass jars would also work. N wanted to make a Batman lantern. Unfortunately we did not have any black and grey crepe paper. After much persuasion, he reluctantly used different colours to cover his cup. M wanted to make a Superman lantern. He covered his cup entirely with red.

3. Let the glass candle cups dry.

4. Place candles in the cups.

5. Light the candles and enjoy!

This post is part of the “It’s Playtime” link up.

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keep calm and daddy on: father’s day gift

Pauline — Wed, 31 Aug 2011 07:12:18 +0000

SIGH… Need to get the kids to make something for Father’s Day. When it comes to art & craft, my kids are more about the process and less about the results – which is fine and good, but when you need to use their “art” for a gift, it becomes tricky.

I decided to stick with the traditional and simple, “get the kids to draw something” approach. Of course, I’ll add stuff to it to finish it off…. (please tell me I’m not the only mother who embellishes their children’s work every now and then). There are some great free printable designs out there for Father’s Day. Check out My Pigeon Pair for some ideas. I loved the “Keep Calm and Daddy On” design from The Hand’s-On Housewife.

This year, our Father’s Day gift is a revolving photo box.

I prepared the following items:

Blank glossy photo paper. I had quite a few ready as I knew my boys would need a few goes experimenting before we had some that we could use.
Good permanent coloured pens – (this activity needed to be closely supervised so that my furniture, walls and curtains remained scribble free).
Printouts of the “Keep Calm and Daddy On” design.

Add kids (and lots muttered prayers for patience). I asked them to draw “Daddy”. They got sidetracked and drew turtles. We got there eventually.

I selected their clearest drawings of Daddy, added the “Keep Calm and Daddy On” design, and an hour later, we have one Father’s Day gift ready to go. Yay! Wishing Dads a wonderful Father’s Day this Sunday.

Aug 2011

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