Celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival with your own lanterns and mooncake designs
Decorate your own lantern for the holiday and use it to make a wish for the future
Difficulty: Explorer (Level 1)
As you admire the light of the moon while playing with your lantern, do you ever think about how these crafts came to be?
Lanterns weren’t always made with plastic and LED lights. The earliest lanterns are from the Han dynasty. They were made of paper or silk wrapped around a wood or bamboo base. People later added different patterns to use them as decorations. They would light them by putting a candle inside.
Now, lanterns come in many different colours, sizes and shapes. They could even look like cartoon characters or animals! For safety, many lanterns are now lit with LED lights. These come in all colours of the rainbow.
Lanterns were used as a symbol of a bright and successful future. Now, many people like to carry these colourful decorations around for fun.
Hopefully, you can look at your lantern and appreciate the history that gave us these beautiful decorations.
Make your own lantern
Materials
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plastic cup with a lid
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baking paper
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a small LED light
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pencils or markers
Instructions
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Tear off a piece of baking paper long enough to wrap around the whole cup.
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Write a wish that you have for the future on the baking paper. Add any decorations you like.
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Put the baking paper neatly inside the cup. Your wish should face the outside.
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Put your LED light inside the cup and attach the lid. You now have your very own lantern!
Design your own mooncakes
Instructions
Use the template below to create your own mooncakes. First, draw a special design on the top. You could draw flowers, animals or anything else festive. Then, think about what filling you want inside, and draw it inside the second mooncake. You could choose a traditional flavour or try something new!
