My wife signed me up to make lanterns for a Halloween event at my daughter's school. Our initial idea of using mason jars was declined since the event will be for 5-9 yr olds, & you know one of the kids will end up dropping the lantern & it will break.
So I'm looking for easily reproducible lantern ideas that can either hold a battery powered tea light, or maybe take glow in the dark paint. It doesn't have to actually provide significant light, just the illusion of a "fairy light". & being a Waldorf school, no plastic containers. & they need to be easily carried by little kids, so a handle would be helpful.
My wife's idea so far is to modge podge gauze onto a balloon to get the shape and stiffness. Pop the balloon & put the tea light inside. Seems way to messy.
I've seen the tin can lanterns with patterns poked through the sides. But I need 100+ of them, so don't know if I want to do hammer that many holes through the cans.
& I've seen the paper cut out lanterns, but they don't seem to have any bottom, and if they did, they might not have the rigidity to keep their form with a tea light inside.
Any other ideas would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks