How to Decorate for Chinese New Year

Celebrating Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is celebrated each year around the months of January or February. In the year 2009, for instance, the festivities start on January 26. This is a time for family reunions, and everything is in red, which is widely believed by the Chinese to signify fire and to keep negative energy and bad luck away. Every family who celebrates Chinese New Year will traditionally spend time decorating the home and making special Chinese food and cookies for family and friends.

Here's how to decorate and prepare your home for a Chinese New Year celebration.

Things You'll Need

• Chinese paper decoration
• Asian cookies and sugar candies
• Lotus and bamboo plants
• Red money packets (laisee envelopes)
• Red Asian clothes
• Fruits
• Poems and red calender
• Tangerine tree

Instructions

1. 

   Visit your local Chinese or Asian supermarkets. Here you will find a vast variety of Asian foods and products, including many red decorations.

2. 

   Buy special red color "lucky envelopes" called laicee. Put some cash into each envelope to give out to family, friends and visitors. It is a tradition at each Chinese New Year celebration to give a "lucky" envelope to a young child or single female. Married people do not get the "lucky" laicee.

3. 

   Decorate a table with Chinese candies, cookies and flowers. It is Chinese tradition to welcome guests to the home during this time and offer food and snacks during their visit.

4. 

   Wear red clothing. Have several choices to pick from. Visit the Chinatown in your city and you will be able to buy many of these items at very discounted prices.

5. 

   Decorate the house with traditional Chinese red decorations that you can purchase at Chinese supermarkets or in your local Chinatown district.

6. 

   Place bamboo around the house. Bamboo is a sign of strength, luck and prosperity. You can also give bamboo as gifts when family and friends come to visit during this festive time.

Tips & Warnings

• This article is written for entertainment purposes only.

Resources

• Jewell TV
• JewellProductions.TV