Who doesn’t remember staying up late at a sleep over with your trusty flashlight making imaginary animals on the wall out of your hand shadows? I can remember being up until almost morning with my friends making crocodiles, dragons, bears and other wild animals and seeing who can make the best hand shadow puppets. I still do it today any time I get my hands on a flashlight and a dark room.
We would even have contests to see who could make the scariest, the silliest and even the most outlandish hand shadow puppets. We would all end up laughing until our parents would come into the room and quiet us down. For even more fun, we would make our hand shadow puppets on the tent walls when camping. I think for some of us, it would take our mind off of the fact that there really were some of those animals just outside the tent. Still, we would smile until our faces hurt and then smile some more!
Even as an adult, I still find it difficult to do the two handed shadow puppets but try anyway. Those always were the best! You could put two hands together and make an eagle soaring through the sky or a dragon creeping across the ground breathing fire. The more elaborate we could make them, the more it would make us smile.
I believe that hand shadow puppetry is a lost art that should be instilled in our children so that they might carry on the tradition and teach their own children. We would start with the easy ones like butterflies, crocodiles and fish and work up to the more elaborate ones like people, planes and elephants.
If your children are having a sleepover or you are planning a camping trip soon, ready your flashlights and get in some practice so you can show them hand shadow puppetry the way you were taught. They won’t be bored on that next camping trip and they might even come up with an animal or shape that even you haven’t thought of yet.
Have you ever tried your hand at making hand shadow puppets? Click here to leave a comment and share your opinion and experience. Would love to hear from you.
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