Crane #109 - #116

Yes, there was crane making at Igfest. I met up with Dom from the Optimist's Society and some other local optimists for a spot of coffee before playing games. Upon spying some origami paper on the table, I couldn't resist, and began making cranes. A few people opted for a lesson, and soon after, a small family of cranes came into being. This was followed by someone making an origami boat, which I really need to learn to make.

Soon after I bumped into Dave and Jess from Team Hat, and presented them with their gifts - origami cranes with their own origami hats.

Crane #107 and #108

Otherwise known as the cranes who went swing dancing... I've recently taken up lindy hop dancing, and the lovely Mithi (who teaches some of the classes) had got excited when she found out I was doing the project.

So I made Mithi a crane (and one for my friend Craig too).

Crane #104 - #106

My friend becky and I met up for a long overdue coffee and catch up. In typical disorganised fashion, I hadn't had time to get her a birthday present, so I made her a crane while we were sat there. This then led to me teaching her how to make them, and thus 3 cranes were created...

Alpacas and Winery Tour

Itching to have a getaway day trip from Portland, my partner and I just drove to Sherwood area.  While looking for a place to visit, we found out that this weekend, an alpaca farm in Sherwood is open to public, while many wineries in the same area are open for wine tasting.  Ever since I heard about alpaca wool being much warmer than sheep wool and hypoallergenic, I've been curious about alpacas.  I wanted to see what they are like.

The alpaca farm is just 30 minutes drive from southwest of Portland in Sherwood, Oregon.  We enjoyed the drive through the rolling hills.  As we arrive the farm and come close to these animals, I keep hearing funny noises that they make, different from any other animals I've heard.  It's hard to describe or try to imitate the noise.  They are just as funny looking as they are funny sound,  but soooo cute!

After the visit to the alpaca farm, we visited a winery nearby for wine tasting.  Unfortunately, I am ultra sensitive to alcohol so I just let my husband enjoy it.  But it happened to be sunny at the moment, and the scenery there was beautiful, so it was definitely worth visiting.

It's so gorgeous out there that made me wish that I could sit on one of these chairs and fold paper all day!  I bet I can be so inspired by the beauty there.

Looking at the alpacas at the farm made me want to make an origami alpaca after I got home.  I seem to do this every time after I see an animal.  I didn't know of any origami alpaca instructions, but I realized that I do have a book with an origami llama. Which made me think what's the difference between alpacas and llamas anyways? 

I ended up researching on the web, and I found out that the llamas are roughly twice as large as alpacas.  Llamas have very coarse outer coat over softer inner coat, as opposed to alpacas, which have very fine, single coat. In addition, llamas produce far less fiber than alpacas, despite its much larger size.  This is because alpacas have been domesticated and carefully bred for thousands of years as a luxury fiber-producing animal. On the other hand, llamas have been bred for the same amount of time as pack-carrying animal.  But they are very similar in looks.

So here it is, my origami alpaca.  He currently lives in my succulent garden pot.  But I will eventually move him in my origami farm diorama.

The origami llama/alpaca instruction can be found in Fun with Animal Origami by John Montroll.  I should do a book review on this sometime.

Crane #101, #102 and #103

I love the kingsdown wine vaults - it's got to be one of ky favourite pubs in bristol, and I really don't go there enough.
In an attempt to rectify this, I went to the quiz there on Monday night with my friend Ali. Despite sucking at quizzes we had fun, and I made a few cranes as a thankyou. Take particular notice of our answers in the 'identify the book' round...

Crane #97 - #100

First milestone of 100 is reached whilst having a break from paper writing in cafe kino. Only three are pictured as I gave the fourth to my friend Kate.
Only 900 to go...

Crane #80 - #96

My friends opened up their house for lovely music as part of the southbank arts trail. So I got to spend all afternoon sitting in their garden listening to music and drinking tea. And I made one or seventeen cranes, including teaching someone how to make them.
Oh and check out the awesome paper stars Lizzie made...

Crane #79

Thankyou cafe kino for being such a lovely place to sit and work.

Crane #74 - #78

I had an especially long train journey on Wednesday, and by the end couldn't even concentrate on my book. So I made some cranes. Fifteen to be precise. This led to odd looks from some of the passengers. Especially when I started timing myself to see how fast I could make them. Turns out I can make a crane in under 100 seconds, and do it blindfolded in less than 3 minutes...
I left 5 of them on the train and took the others home for my project box...

Crane #70 - #73

The crane contingent at my At-Bristol desk has grown from three to seven, all made from scrap paper and old post-its from around my desk. As the building manager Tim wrote me a poem (of the funny and slightly insulting variety), I gave him one as a thank you.

Crane #66 - #69

My friend James has been in Canada since January. He just came back, and turned up on my doorstep last Sunday with the suggestion of a pint in the pub. Little persuasion was required and so I made a celebratory crane (I'm so rock and roll). This led to a lesson for James and one of his friends in how to make cranes, and thus 4 cranes were made...

Origami for Scrapbooking

My new library program for adults, Origami for Scrapbooking will be offered at Hollywood Library on this coming Sunday, the 22nd from 2 to 3:30pm.  This program is about making scrapbooking more fun by adding embellishments made in origami. You will learn to make easy origami photo corners as well as pretty embellishments including origami bows, hearts, stars and flowers that you can add to your scrapbooks or use for stationary or greeting cards.

This program will also be offered at three other branches of Multnomah County Library over the summer:
Tuesday, June 14  6-7:30pm at Holgate Library
Saturday, July 30 3-4:30pm at Fairview-Columbia Library
Saturday, August 7  3-5pm at Rockwood Library

They are all drop-in classes and of course, free of charge.  Hope to see you at one of these classes!

Origami Kawasaki Rose

Dear Reader,



The Kawasaki rose was invented by a designer in Japan. It really gives the illusion of overlapping rose petals. To see how to fold this elegant and beautiful design, check out our Origami Kawasaki Rose instructions.


Best regards,
Origami Instructor

Succulent Garden Pot

Today my husband and I did planting and replanting of our house plants.  We were especially excited to create a potpourri with a mix of succulents that we had collected for the last few months in a donabe (Japanese earthen pot).  Ever since I broke its lid, we talked about doing this and were slowly collecting little succulents that we like.  Now the pot holds a mix of beautiful succulents instead of a mix of yummy food.  It's almost as good as having food inside. 

Crane #63, #64 and #65

There was a mini festival in st pauls yesterday, and so I ended up hanging out with a few friends. I'd just got some lovely new origami paper, so was itching to try it out. So I taught Rachel to make cranes, and then George and I made teeny tiny mini cranes...

Crane #59 - #62

It was my friend head's birthday on Tuesday so we went out for a drink in celebration.
I made an origami koi for her birthday, but decided to make a crane too. One crane turned into several, which turned into everyone at the table.making a variety of things.
And the we gave a couple to the guys working in the chip shop on the way home...

Crane #57 and #58

Lizzie and I went for coffee yesterday (I swear this is the hardest job ever), and left the nice staff a couple of cranes.

Origami Kawasaki Rose video

Dear Reader,

We've made a video showing how to fold the basic Kawasaki rose. This is a challenging but fun origami. Check out our origami kawasaki rose video.

Regards,
Origami Instructor

Crane #54 - #56

I went out for a few drinks for a friends birthday and made a couple of cranes for people. So Geoff, Elaine and jodie are now in possession of these...

Crane #51, #52 and #53

Small, smaller smallest...

Making use of scrap paper at work...

Crane #47 - #50

I was in kino doing some work this morning and fancied a bit of a break. And so I brought the tally up to 50 cranes...

Origami Lucky Star

Dear Reader,

The origami lucky star is fun and simple to make. It's traditional to fill glass jars with these.

View our origami lucky star instructions.

Crane #46

It's my dad's birthday today (happy birthday dad!). So I sent him a crane in his favourite colour in with the card...

Crane #45

My friend charlotte sent me a really awesome (possibly foreign) scrabble badge. I had to send her a cd with photos on, so I stuck a crane in there for good measure...

Crane #42 - #44

It was the simple things festival on Sunday, and inbetween dancing to some great bands at the bierkeller, I started making an origami crane. This led to a bit of a late night origami making session, culminating in the making of some pretty tiny cranes...

We also made some dragons and fish too.

Crane #41

I went to the arnolfini artists book fair on Saturday with a friend. He had made me a couple of origami elephants, and so I folded him a crane to say thankyou.

Origami Alphabet

A couple of weeks ago I was asked to make a sign with the children at my school.  The sign was to urge car drivers around our playground to slow down.  Without a doubt, I decided to make the sign in origami.  I know the instructions for origami alphabet letters.  I taught each child to make one letter from one sheet of square.  We just finished making the sign, laminated it and hung it up on the fence with zip ties.  Here is what it looks like.

This sign stands out so well even from across the street!  For the origami alphabet letters, we used what's called The Greengrocer's Brownbag Paper, cut to 8.5x8.5 square from letter size.  100% recycled, this paper is grocery sack brown on one side and cranberry tint color on the other.  In order to be readable, each alphabet letter needs to be made by a squared paper that is different color on each side, and the back side color needs to be the same as the background color (make sense?).  So using the brown bag/cranberry tinted papers for letters and a piece of natural brown butcher paper for the background worked out very well.

Here is another origami alphabet letter sign that I made a while back, using regular origami papers for letters, glued on white background.  The stand is made by origami too.

Origami Club has the instructions for origami alphabet.  There are two sets of fonts!

More and More Paper Cranes for Japan

I just read another update on the Students Rebuild's Paper Cranes for Japan project.  Last time when I checked, which was about a week ago, they had received over 610,000 cranes, well over their goal of 100,000.  This tireless effort from all over the world triggered Bezos Family Foundation to decide to double its initial donation to $400,000.  Since then, Students Rebuild continued receiving more and more cranes, reaching 1,000,000!  They had also just received anonymous donation of $100,000, raising $500,000 in total for Japan!

Origami in Denmark

I've been in Denmark for 3 months now, and of course, I brought origami with me. I've been folding almoust everyday since I'm here, and I've been spreading the origami virus around, so now many of my collegues started playing with the paper as well, which gives me an extraordinary feeling. :)

Here are some photos from our hostel: