06/16

How To Make A DIY Kite

The wind may not make for a great hair day but it does make for a fun day with the family. Brooks’ has recently developed an obsession with kites—he literally won’t stop talking about them! He’s my little creative one so of course we couldn’t just go buy one at the store. We ended up making our own!

Okay, so he didn’t engineer the entire kite but he did offer a lot of help. Especially when it came to color choices!

This project is a challenge but it makes for a perfect rainy day activity. Plus nothing is better than seeing how proud Brooks’ is when flying his own custom kite!

Here’s the step-by-step:

Supplies:

• Spool of basket-weaving reed measuring 2-3.5 millimeter in diameter
• Large colorful sheets of waxed paper
• Monofilament multi-purpose line
• 1/4” dowel
• Craft paper
• Hot glue gun/glue sticks
• Small handsaw
• Glue Stick
• Scissors
• Wire cutter
• Kite string

STEP 1: On craft paper, sketch out designs for your kite. This can be really anything from simple geometric shapes, to hearts, to some type of bug or animal but you want to keep the designs simple. I chose to do a butterfly and a rocket. As the reed tends to want to remain circular it is good to incorporate circles or curves into your design.

STEP 2: With the reed trace the outside lines of your design. The butterfly shape is basically 4 circles attached together with an oblong shape for the body. The rocket is an oblong with wings and other details.

STEP 3: Using your wire cutter trim the reed to this shape allowing the ends to overlap slightly. Secure first with hot glue and then wrap multiple times with the monofilament line and tie to secure. For the rocket, cut a dowel to use as a center support.

STEP 4: Choose the colors of wax paper you want to use and trace the shapes of 
the kites onto the paper one inch bigger than the actual shape. Best to 
ask the experts who the kites are for what colors they want!!

STEP 5: To adhere, cut notches into the paper, fold around the reed and secure 
with the glue stick. This is something younger hands can definitely do 
though use a kid’s scissor!

STEP 6: Finish the by adding flare as you see fit! Definitely add some long strips to the bottom so they are extra pretty when flying.

STEP 7: The last step is to add the kite strings and this really depends on the
shape of the kite, you will want to attach at two points to the frame but 3 or 4 is better. To attach thread the monofilament onto a needle and poke through the wax paper to wrap around the reed and back to the front. You want the front to be facing down when it flies to attach the strings to the front.

STEP 8: Now just wait for a pretty breezy day and go fly a kite!