Kusudama Flower Ball Instructions Part 1- Making Petals

Since posting about these flower balls, a variety of people have asked how to make them.  So, I'm going to go ahead and show you, rather than making you go all over the web and search.  (In fact, I have seen tutorials on these with much more difficult instructions, but the same results.  I'd hate to see you stumble upon one of those and throw in the towel on it.)  Don't let the fact that there are a lot of pictures in this post fool you into thinking this is tricky.  After you make 2 or 3 petals, you won't even need the instructions anymore.  I divided the instructions into 4 parts, just to help you find your spot more easily:
Part 1- Making Petals
Part 2- Joining Petals to Make a Flower
Part 3- Joining Flowers to Make the Ball
Part 4- Simple Variations

So, here we go- feel free to write with a question if something is unclear.

Step 1- Get a square piece of paper.  For this example, our squares are 6 inches.

Step 2- Fold the square in half, point to point.

Step 3- Fold the right bottom corner up to meet the top corner.  (Sorry, my pictures downloaded at different angles, and I'm not sure how to rotate them.)

Step 4- Repeat Step 3 on the left bottom corner. Now, you will have a smaller square.

Step 5- Fold the right side flap back (in half) to meet the edge.

Step 6- Repeat Step 5 on the left flap.

Step 7- Fold the two top points back.

Step 8- Now, the last three steps (5-7) were done to create the creases needed for the next part.  So, you will now unfold the each flap and use the creases to press them down flat.  Here, my son is about to open up the right flap to press it down. (This image flipped to the right 90 degrees)

And here is what it looks like pressed down.

Both sides pressed down.

Step 9- Fold  the little triangle to the back. Do that to both sides.  (When you have figured these out, and want to know an easy variation to this step, see Part 4.)

(Just another angle of the same step.)

  

(Step 9 complete. But, again, blogger flipped the image- this time to the left 90 degrees.)  

Step 10- Fold the right and left flaps in half.

(Step 10 complete)

That's all for the folding!  Now, you're ready glue the sides together to form a petal.  I find a hot glue gun to be the fastest method, but anything will work, even double sided tape. Here, I am gluing one side...

...to its opposite. (Bad picture-but you can see the finished petal below.)

Repeat all the steps to make 5 petals.

It only gets easier from here, this was the longest part of this project.  Now, you are ready for Part 2, joining the petals to make a flower.