by Brenda Ponnay

My daughter and I don’t need much of an excuse to get out the craft supplies. Today we learned about India and studied a holiday called Diwali. Diwali is a religious holiday observed by people practicing Hinduism, Sikhism, Jainism that lasts five days. It’s a lot like the festival of lights that we made Chinese Lanterns for, so today I thought we’d make those lanterns again but with an Indian spin.

First we found some short squatty jars. Usually Diwali lamps are clay lanterns for oil and I thought smaller jars would represent that better. Of course I’m not about to craft with hot oil, so we opted for small jars with tea lights in them. Then I found some soft-colored tissue paper and some miscellaneous decorative items from my sewing stash. Sequins, rick rack…whatever caught my fancy.

We painted the jars with a few generous strokes of white Elmer’s glue and then gently wrapped strips of the tissue paper around the jars.

Then we added another coat of glue (not too much) and some sequins and decorative rick rack. This is an excellent exercise for developing kids’ fine motor skills and also great for some quiet time for mommies. My daughter spent a good twenty minutes completely engrossed in positioning her sequins just right.

Then we lit our tea lights and enjoyed the soft glow of prosperity because that is what Diwali is about. We might not be celebrating the bounty of our harvest like they do in India (Diwali is also an official holiday in Nepal, Guyana, Trinidad & Tobago, Mauritius, Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Myanmar , Fiji , and Suriname) but we can definitely celebrate how wonderful it is to live in a country where we have the luxury of free time to craft!

About the author

Brenda Ponnay

Brenda Ponnay is a stealthy secret agent who juggles parenthood to her adorable daughter by day and freelance graphic design/illustration by night. Whether it's painting, baking, drawing, making castles out of cardboard boxes or just doing the laundry with flair, Brenda Ponnay has learned that what really makes her happy is being creative every single day.

You can read about all her crazy adventures on her personal blog: Secret Agent Josephine.

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