Homemade Ninja Gear
Ninjas, popular in today's fiction, were historically mercenaries or assassins evoking mystery and an air of excitement. They are known for a practice called 'Nonuse'. According to Enter the Ninja, "Nonuse ("the art of stealth") was first introduced to Japan in 522 A.D. as a religion practiced by priests." You can make your own Ninja gear for holiday costumes or pretend play using all-black clothing and some common household items, as well as a few items from a toy or costume store.
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Things You'll Need
- Black cloth or pre-purchased gi
- Black ski mask
- Black bandana
- Black socks
- Black shoes
- Plastic Katana with sheath
- Cardboard wrapping paper tube
- Brown acrylic paint
- Paintbrush
- Cardboard
- Pen
- Scissors
- Ruler
- Bottle cap---metal or plastic
- 4-oz jar
- Aluminum foil
- Rubber cement
Instructions
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1
Put on the gi (Pronounced 'gee'; the outfit consists of a shirt and pants). (You can also wear a black sweat suit ) Tie the shirt around the waist with a black cloth belt. Put on a black ski mask. You can sew your own gi at home, but there is quite a bit of sewing involved. McCall's and Simplicity both offer patterns for Karate uniforms and ninja costumes. You can use a black pajama-pants pattern and a short bathrobe pattern. Many resale shops offer used gis for a fraction of the cost to make your own.
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2
Fold a black bandana over horizontally, four times, into a rectangle. Tie around your forehead with the knot at the back of your head.
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3
Purchase plastic Katanas or swords at a costume or toy shop. Wear black socks and black shoes.
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4
Tie a long, black strip of fabric around a plastic katana or ninja-to (shorter sword) sheath and affix it to your back. Tie the fabric snug over your right shoulder and under your left arm.
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5
Make a bo, or wood staff, from a cardboard wrapping-paper tube. Make a bo, or wood staff, by painting a cardboard wrapping-paper tube brown with acrylic paint. Allow the paint to dry completely.
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6
Measure, with a ruler, and draw, with a pen, a square with 3 ¼-inch sides. You are making throwing stars, more properly known as 'shurikens'. According to TBO-Tech, "steel ninja throwing stars (shurikens) are an ancient weapon of choice used to inflict damage and injury from a distance. Accurately throwing these shurikens [was] a hallmark of the Japanese Ninja."
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Cut out the square, or several squares of similar size. You can make multiple shurikens.
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8
There are many different shapes and designs of throwing stars, called shurikens. Center a bottle cap on the square and trace around it with a pen. Cut out the center.
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9
Place the opening of a small jar slightly over one edge of the cardboard square, about ¼ of the jar's diameter, just so the roundness of the jar opening creates an arc to trace. Trace the arc with a pen. Move the jar to each side, so that the arc points form sharp points and the sides are semi-circles. Cut along the tracing.
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10
Cover the cardboard shuriken with rubber cement on one side. Press the shuriken onto a piece of aluminum foil. Smooth the foil with your hand to work out as many wrinkles as possible.
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Use aluminum foil to cover your cardboard shuriken. Use your finger to poke through the foil through the hole in the center of the shuriken. Glue the fragments of foil onto the cardboard.
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Cover the other side of the cardboard with rubber cement. Press the cardboard onto a piece of foil. Trim the edges with scissors as straight and smooth as possible.
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Tips & Warnings
There are many different styles of shurikens that you can trace. See Resources below for full-size photos that can be printed and traced and made in the same manner as the four-point shuriken. For gi sewing, there are patterns available: McCall's Sewing Pattern 2940 or Simplicity Pattern 8438.
References
Resources
- Photo Credit karate kid 12 image by Paul Moore from Fotolia.com young samurai two image by Paul Moore from Fotolia.com wood sticks close up image by laurent dambies from Fotolia.com ninja rouge image by Unclesam from Fotolia.com wrinkled foil image by Igor Zhorov from Fotolia.com
