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Since it’s almost two weeks to the Children’s Day on May 5, some households have already decorated koinobori, carp streamers, in their yards and balconies. Traditionally, households with children decorate koinobori from April to May 5 in the hope that boys will grow up healthy and strong.

It is not rare to find five meter or larger streamers in countryside but many people have smaller streamers in big cities because there are no spaces in yards and balconies. No matter what size it is, koinobori is a seasonal decoration that always gives us early summer feeling.

Today, I want to share this free download koinobori. You can make two cute paper koinobori; one is on a toothpick and one is on a pair of chopsticks.

You can download the sheet from @nifty Kids@nifty Craft Koinobori/Carp Streamers.

Click the blue bar with a triangle (PDF: 840KB) (You need Adobe Reader to open PDF), and print it out.

The upper little parts are for the toothpick koinobori, and larger ones are for the chopstick koinobori.

Cut the parts out.

The little one is easy to make. You can just glue the parts on a toothpick in the right order. The yellow part is going to be a ring and put the wheels on the side of the ring.

Now, the chopstick one is a little tricky.

First of all, fold the clasps like these in the picture below. And make the yellow strips curvy.

Fold the fishes into half and put glue only on the tabs (don’t glue the whole thing. The fishes have to be like tubes) and close the fishes. Stick the claps on the mouths.

Make cuts in the tussle part and roll it. Put glue on the tab and shape it into a pipe.

Stick the carps on a pair of unsnapped chopsticks. Make rings with the yellow strips. Cross them and glue together. The one with one tab goes inside and one with two tabs goes outside. Leave the two tabs stick out so that they goes between the chopsticks.

Lastly, put the two wheels on the bottom of the crossed rings.

You can put them into a pen holder or decorate dishes and drinks!

This is JAPAN Style!