How to Make Practice Poi

Today I'll be showing you how to make pair of practice poi;

Poi have been used in many cultures, (most notably the Maori in New Zealand) as a way of building hand and arm strength and coordination for battle, they were also used by women to improve flexibility for weaving.

Today poi come in a huge variety of styles; flag poi, contact poi, practice poi, glow poi, fire poi etc...

Poi are great fun as well as being good exercise, they are also small enough to carry around with you.

There are many websites selling poi but I personally prefer to make my own since they are cheaper and you can make them according to your preferences.

Anyway, enough talk, lets get on with the tutorial...

So to make these you'll need

• A pair of tights; you can pick these up for a couple of $ / £ in a thrift shop, (or just find an old pair lying around the house)
• 2 old tennis balls
• 2 zip ties

You'll also need a pair of scissors.

Cut off the legs of the tights and drop the balls into them as shown.

Now use the zip-ties to keep the balls in the feet of the tights, and tie knots at the open ends.

Now you're finished ! You've made yourself a pair of practice poi for a fraction of how much it would cost to buy them, so find a nice open space and start spinning!

Here are some links to online poi lessons:

Good range of instructional vids

A wikihow page on poi spinning

A huge range of lessons for poi, staff, hoop and pretty much any circus prop you could imagine

I hope everyone found the tutorial useful, if you did, please comment, follow and vote for me in thecontest :-)