2024 is the year of the dragon and February 10th brings us the first day of the lunar new year. Those born in the year of the dragon are considered to be lucky, strong and charismatic. Why not celebrate by making a dragon puppet? Tag @boom_magazine_derbyshire in photos of your crafty creations!
You will need:
Coloured paper and card
White paper or card
Feathers
Googly eyes
Two chopsticks or straws
Feathers or tissue paper
Two different sized plates/bowls
Black felt tip
Tape
Glue (a glue gun would be even better for sticking feathers)
Scissors
Instructions:
Make the head and mouth
Draw around a bowl onto coloured paper, cut it out and fold it in half.
Repeat with a smaller bowl on red paper and stick this inside the first circle for the inside of the mouth.
Cut out some zigzag teeth from white paper, leaving a gluing flap at the bottom.
Stick these inside the mouth.
Make the eyes and nose
Draw two arch shapes which will fit googly eyes at the top and leave space to create a gluing flap at the bottom for attaching to the head.
Draw and enclosed M shape with space for a gluing flap at the bottom and add two nostrils.
Stick google eyes on and add black felt tip circles for nostrils.
Cut all these out and stick them to the top of the head.
Decorate with feathers or tissue paper.
Make the body
Cut strips of paper (about 2cm wide and 20cm long) and glue/tape/staple them together to form a paper chain.
Draw a triangle for the tail and stick this to the final paper chain loop
Decorate with feathers.
Assemble
Attach the head to one end of the paper chain.
Securely attach a paper straw or disposable chopstick to the back of the head and the final loop or tail and your dragon puppet is complete!
Hopefully your small people will enjoy playing with it as much as our biggest Boom kid did!