may the forth be with you

Okay, I am a bit late as usual since it is already June, but Star Wars is an important part of our household and since last month has a certain day dedicated to just that, I thought I should share one of my newest inventions:

Homemade Glowing Light Sabers!!

...Okay, they only actually glow in photos (with the flash used), but they still look cool in person as well.  I would love to give you all a more in depth tutorial on how to make them, but let's be honest, I just don't have time so take what you can get.  Here is the basic rundown:

You may recall, that we had glowing light sabers in a photo booth at the boys Star Wars themed birthday party.  This little trick was taught to me by my father-in-law who is in the Army.  They use special reflector belts on base and someone showed him how they look like light sabers if you use flash photography (don't try with a really good camera though or it won't work; camera phones=best results).  He had some belts and sent them to us.  Basically, they are something like these if you are interested in trying this yourself (pretty cheap if you ask me!).  After the party I had saved them in the boys closet and the kids would always try to get them out and play with them.  Only problem was they weren't really good for anything since they didn't stand up.  I suddenly realized how easy it would be to just wrap them around a wrapping paper roll.  I had two old ones I was saving for just such a crafting opportunity.  One was decently strong and one pretty weak, but we went ahead with it anyway (honestly, I really want to find some heavy duty ones now and remake them so they last longer).  The handles were pretty much ready to go since I had already created them out of paper towel tubes and duct tape.  I just had to cut them down a little bit to fit.  Then I wrapped the belts around the long tubes and covered them with clear packaging tape.  It took me all of 10 minutes and my boys and their friends were so impressed.  I don't know how long they will last at this rate because there have been some pretty intense light saber fights going on, but they will certainly be loved.