Origami Lotus Flower & Pond

Variations of orgiami Lotus Flowers that any beginner can make!

For the Lotus Flower project you will need:

• Colored paper of your choosing (see photos for my preference)
• All paper for flower will need to be cut into 13.5 by 7.5 cm
• Paper used for lily pads were hand drawn and various in sizes
• Ruler (centimeters)
• Scissors or box knife
• Small binder clips
• Rubber band
• A lighter or any utensil you can hold easily and press down on paper to help crease

If this is also your first time trying origami (like it was for myself), I also suggest starting with some generic 11.5 by 8 in printer/copy paper to use as a tester for your folds!

For the OPTIONAL decoration/background project you will need:

• Colored paper of your choosing (see photos for my preference)
• Scissors
• Water Color paint
• Paint Brushes
• Cardboard Circle (used pizza board from a frozen box pizza)

For the first layer of your Lotus Flower, you will need four paper "squares". You can choose two flower petal colors (see end results for reference) or stay with one! In the example photos, my first petal layer is cream, which will be the inside/middle of the Lotus Flower.

For the second layer of your Lotus Flower, you will need four paper "squares". Again, you can choose a separate color, or stick with the same petal color for a typical Lotus Flower look. In the example photos, I chose a light pink for my second petal layer. *I did not take photos of folding the second layer, due to it being the same folding technique* Use the Step 1 folding style for you next set of four paper "squares".

For the third layer of your Lotus Flower, you will need four paper "squares". I typically have stuck with green or brown, as the third layer is consider your Leaves! Notice, this Lotus Flower does have the same style fold for each layer, except your final layer, the last step is simply folding it the opposite direction!

In this fourth step, you will be stacking the three layers on top of eachother, in a set of four "boats". In this step, it is difficult to keep all the paper together, so I used small binder clips to hold each set together while I would work on the next one - I did just hold each set inbetween my fingers as I stacked, but honestly my hands started hurting over the process.

For this step, you will hold all of the "petal boats" together and take of the binder clips (if you used them, if not, hold them all together in your hand). Be sure that these are all faced the same way!!!

All say it a thousand times - Go Slow, Be Patient, but have fund! I have split/torn ALOT of these petals in my process. But that's okay! I'm still a beginner, and so suprised at how I was still able to create something so unique and pretty at the same time.

*I did not take photos of folding the second layer, due to it being the same folding technique* Use the Step 6 folding style for you next set of flower petals - the pink layer!

Use the same pull/fold technique in steps 6 & 7 for the petals - However, do not pull the body section of the leaf up and towards the flower, give it some space! Pull the tip/end of each leaf out and up to build the 3D illusion of the paper Lotus Flower

CONGRATULATIONS - Your Lotus Flower is now completed :D

I decided I wanted to add some more design and background for this project - but if you simply want to only create the Lotus Flower, then thank you for reading and I hope I was able to help you create your own beautiful and complex Lotus Flower!

(OPTIONAL) To create my lily pads, I used the same colored paper from the Lotus Flowers. I grabbed a complete flower, and placed it on the colored paper and drew a simple long circle around it for the size I wanted for my Lotus Flower to sit on. For the smaller lily pads, I drew smaller versions without using the Lotus Flower for size reference. After I cut out the amount of various sized lily pads, I started with the water color painting to help add some effects to the project.

For the pond, I had also bought a delicious frozen box pizza earlier that day, and decided to keep the circle carbdoard the pizza is cut on, for this project! (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle)

I chose a medium blue piece of colored paper, and chose two similiar blue water color paints, and a white. I started by painting sections of the two different blues all over the paper taped to be board - I then put blobs of the white water color all over, then grabbed by largest paint brush and dipped it in some water. I started from the top and made left to right motions while working down till I like the mix of the three colors.

Once all my paper was dry from the water color, I used tape to help keep the paper down - I do want to finish the project with hot glue so I can place this on a wall (but I need to go to the store, so tape will do for now).

I really hope you enjoyed this project as much as I did!