Chinese Lantern Votive Wraps

Shedding some light on New Year traditions

We celebrate many holidays from around the world - to give our kids a larger perspective. I found this project for Chinese New Year on the HP Activity Center. It was so easy and fast. And the results were impressive.

I downloaded the artwork and simply printed it out. I printed one set on vellum and one on high-quality printer paper. To be honest, they both looked great. I would probably use the vellum around candles I planned to light - although I'm not sure if it's actually more fire resistant.

I folded each lantern in half (using the dotted line as a guide). With the vellum, it's important to score the fold first. Then I cut along the slit lines. The instructions recommended using an x-acto knife but I found it really easy just to cut along the lines while the paper was still folded. The final step was to tape the ends together to form a cylinder.


I had a couple glass votive holders that fit perfectly. I used baby food jars for the other lanterns - they worked fine but I had to fit the lantern around the jar before taping.

As you can see, the finished project is spectacular.