How to Utilize Lapping for Magic Tricks

Lapping is a sleight of hand technique in which the performer pretends to pick up an object but actually slides it off the table into his or her lap. It's the start of many magic tricks, but it's especially fun when sitting with friends around a dinner table.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Begin by talking and gesturing with your hands to keep your audience distracted. This is called patter.

2. Nonchalantly grasp an object on the table and pretend to pick it up by sliding it to the edge of the table and taking it in your hand. Instead, drop the object off the table into your lap, and just pretend you have it in your hand.

3. Move the object from your lap to the top of a knee if you intend to drop more objects into your lap. This will prevent two objects from striking each other, making a noise that will give away the trick.

4. Start with an object in your lap and produce it during the trick. The twice-burned match trick begins with a prepared match in your lap. Trim some wood from a match below the head, then color the wood and head with a black marker so it looks as if it's already been burned.

Tips & Warnings

• Always keep up your patter so it won't seem strange when you slide objects off the table or reach into your lap for an object you want to produce.
• Tricks performed with both you and your audience at a table is called table magic.