A Kite to fly by...

So we went inland to Mandy's house today. We met Renee and her crew, too. These are the three about to be 10 kids...Violet, Kai and Robbi. We have a great time with our friends. We were talking about how they can play for hours and hours and still be going strong. It's tough for Kade to leave this home...and so we are making plans to spend more time there. We all like it there!

While there we talked a bit about the birthday things. We made a few of these cool kites, too(which we had to play with today!).

Materials:

8.5 x 11 paper (we love color, so use construction paper)
Pencil/pen
ruler
tape (we use box tape)
skewer (trimmed to 8". We have found pruners to work best for the trimming)
string (10 feet - more or less depending on space and the size of kids)
a plastic bag (cut in a circular long single piece. Put knots in the bag every foot or so. Measure out 6' for the tail.)
small piece of cardboard (we used a close pin)
hole punch

1. Fold the sheet of paper in half widthwise. Place fold to your left.
2. Keeping the paper folded, measure 1" in from fold and mark it (A). Measuring along the bottom of the folded sheet measure in 2 1/4" from right (the open edges side) and mark it (B).
3. Place the ruler so that it connects (A) and (B). Using the ruler to help guide the crease, fold the top piece of paper over. (This leaves one half unfolded and the folded part as an angle.)
4. Tape along this new fold, securing the fold and making a lip underneath.
5. Place the skewer perpendicular to the taped fold and connecting the two corners. Tape into place.
6. Tape plastic bag tail to the bottom of the kite.
7. Flip over the kite and fold the flap back and forth until it stands straight up.
8. Fold a piece of tape over the flap about 3" from the top of the kite. Punch a hole through the tape 1/4" from the folded edge.
9. Tie one end of the string through the hole.
10. To make the string winder, tie the other end of the string around the middle of the cardboard, securing it with a strip of tape. (We just tie it to the clothespin and wind it on there.)
Take it out for a spin!

Pictures to come..,