Kendamas are all the rage now amongst students. What IS a
Kendama, you say? It's a traditional Japanese toy made of wood! Our first close-up encounter with a kendama was a small one that Big One got as a Children's Day's gift from his teacher. Big One practiced really hard and seemed really serious about it, so we got a bigger, more standard size kendama soon after. The price difference between the plain ones (raw wood handle + black ball) and the fancy ones (think lightning paint effects or Spiderman mask on the ball) was about $10-$20! Fortunately Big One was convinced that the plain one was sufficient and Mummy promised to personalise it for him.
First off, let's imprint some initials on the plain black ball! I did this using masking tape as the "stencil":
|
Masking tape "stencil" |
Then, with a silver inkpad, dab on the silver!
|
Inked on |
I happened to have some varnish on hand and gave this 2 coats of it, letting it dry completely in between and there you are, a simple way to personalise your kendamas! These were made as gifts:
|
Customised Kendamas |