Kusudamas!

Armed with fresh origami paper and a brand spankin' new book, I'm tackling my latest fascination: kusudamas. Kusudamas are modular origami paper balls, usually made in floral or geometric units and made in multiples of 3, 6, 12, 24, 30, etc. They can get quite complicated and look freakin' amazing, usually much more impressive than they actually *are* because they don't LOOK modular. Some of the kusudama diagrams are a tad difficult to decipher, but that's part of the fun--if it was easy it wouldn't be a challenge!

I've got two different kusudamas in the works right now, one a basic floral made from map paper I recycled from a 1966 world atlas (from the thrift store, previous owner wrote in it, tore pages and it was going bad, so I didn't feel bad about cutting it up)--here it is under construction:

And another in pink/blue/peach origami papers using three different folds:

My next one will be much more daunting, it's a pattern called 'Arabesque' and each modular unit takes 43 folding steps, THEN you have to put them together, another 23 steps. We'll see how much I ruin it--gonna for sure practice with plain paper before committing to the fancy, more expensive stuff!