I love introducing Travis to international holidays and festivals, and this cute idea popped up in Little Passport’s blog to mark the International Kite Festival or Uttarayan. Celebrated January 14 and 15 in Gujarat, India, we joined in the fun with a quick homemade kite. This project wasn’t anywhere near as involved as the plastic bag kite we crafted some time back (nor did it truly fly), but it was great fun to flutter about!
To make the kite, cross two wooden skewers into an x and tie at the center with string.
Cut a long piece of string, and wrap around the tip of one skewer. Stretch to the next tip and wrap. Continue until you’ve stretched and wrapped around all four tips, creating a square frame.
Cut a square from tissue paper slightly larger than your frame. Fold the edges of the tissue paper over the frame and secure with tape.
For the tail, add a long piece of string and tie on additional strips of tissue paper for bows.
As mentioned, the kite didn’t fly so great (it has no spool of string to launch it, for one thing!), but Travis loved running with it behind him and having it flutter all over the apartment.
We watched a video about the celebration so Travis could further appreciate what we were making. Add in some friendly insect kites we had at home, and we had a nice little indoor Uttarayan of our own.
One additional note: If you are anywhere near an actual celebration of the kite festival, please avoid using kites where the strings have been treated with glass (a common practice). This can cause serious injury to birds who fly into the strings. Have a happy and humane Uttarayan!
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