[purpletheta]

This is old but I wanted to add my 2 cents...
In my chapter, big sisses make their littles kites, which are given at initiation while the girls are waiting for their turn to be initiated. The kites are all unique and gorgeous and lots of families have their own special touches - mine has a fancy ribboning thing around the edges that I can't wait to learn!
The little sisses then generally make paddles for their bigs...there's no set time or anything for this, but they're generally presented on initiation as well.
Most of the other chapters on campus, fraternity and sorority alike, do paddles. When I was adopted by my ∑AM big bro, he made me a super awesome paddle and I made him a kite.
My family also has a tradition of making kites for your significant others with the relationship gets serious...kind of our form of lavaliering, I guess!