Good luck goldfishes

We're getting all excited about the weekend. It's Chinese New Year tomorrow and we've been doing some preparations for it. We've been cleaning and tidying up and I've been busy finishing some unfinished WIPs (I'm never actually going to finish all my WIPs, there's just too many!!) I'll post about those soon.

Since I made a bit of an effort with Christmas decorations, I thought I'd ought to do the same for CNY. So I made some lanterns with lil man out of the ang pows (little red packets filled with money for giving out to children or unmarried relatives/friends). In the Chinese culture, red is a powerful colour and it's supposed to ward off evil. It also shows that the giver is prosperous and generous in sharing that prosperity.

Apart from the lanterns, I also made some Good luck goldfishes. Here's a quick tutorial on how to make them. Firstly, make a square with some red paper. I used some leftover red packets. Valley fold the square diagonally to make a triangle. Valley fold the 2 corners of the triangle to make a diamond shape. Flip it over and valley fold one of the corners. Make a cut along this fold, leaving it attached in the middle. Cut some scallop edges for a fancy tail. Turn it over again and valley fold the 2 points ( making sure both points touch the top ie fold it in half). Sorry, if this seems overly complicated!! Then fold the points at an angle for the eyes.Then valley fold the remaining triangle (see paper clip below). Then fold up a little nose. Open up and voila, little goldfish decoration all done.

I'll post a picture of my living room with the decorations all up soon. I've got to go back to some cleaning and food preparation. I've got 6 people coming to dinner. As this is CNY eve, it's important to have family coming home for the reunion dinner. Being far away from home, we've got extended family/friends coming. With reference to the cleaning, let me just link you to Polly's post about it.