Wednesday, March 31st - the bunny bookmark

Ah bookmarks. Dont get me started on bookmarks. theyre always running off and leaving you when you simply cannot remember where you were in the book. I got so irritated with bookmarks dropping out of my book that now i memorise the page im on and deal without one.
And no, i dont like to fold down the corner of my page. ever since i watched a film where a grumpy author said he hated it when people did that to his book, i havent had the heart to do it anymore.
So this bookmark will be useless to me. It may however be an annoying present to give to someone. I will therefore be keeping the instructions for future usage. I dont quite know how it works as a bookmark though. It seems to be upside down or something....I know i did it right cos it looks like the picture. It just doesnt look much like a functioning bookmark.

Tuesday, March 30th - the swimming turtle act

So today I thought it would be really complicated. There were lots of steps involved and instructions involving quarters of inches and thirds of inches etc. For instructions involving measurements, I tend to guess, hence why some of my origami really doesnt work.
Today it kind of looks like a turtle. However, the point of the thing was that it was supposed to be like a swimming turtle. You were supposed to be able to balance it on the top of a pencil and it would looke like it was swimming. My turtle doesnt like swimming. it likes lounging about by the side of the pool.
I think it looks cool even if it doesnt have a cerebellum to help it with its balance.

Monday, March 29th - the blow up bunny

It starts with a waterbomb base. Which I did wrong. I had to go back and do it the other way round cos i ended up with a square base the first go round.
Then there was a fold which involved tucking in corners. It didnt match the diagram. But there was no physical way of matching the diagram. So i decided to ignore the diagram. It worked.
Then there was blowing air into it. Now the awesome thing about blow up origami is that it doesnt look like anything before you put air into it. it started making sense when i did. I was happy.
It kind of looks like a bunny. And it rocks, which i think is a reasonable substitute for hopping.

wednesday March 24th to Sunday, march 28th

I have to explain. Ive been very busy. And wednesday's origami annoyed me. See on wednesday my workload trippled from being just about doable to completely impossible amounts of work. So i had to spend then evening analysing data. I took a break and tried to do origami. It was the sunfish. The sunfish is stupid. I tried to do it on wednesday and it didnt work. So i decided to put it to one side till i wasnt so busy and try again. I tried again today. It was still stupid. There are supposed to be tabs to pull but i cant seem to find them. And it falls apart within about two seconds. And step 3 makes absolutely no sense.
I almost didnt take a picture but decided you deserved one.

So then i had to catch up on the rest of the week today. Thursdays origami was basically useful to explain how to change a waterbomb base to a square base, which i already knew how to do because id seen that the difference between a waterbomb and a square base is which side you start on. So at least im not completely useless.
Although the next origami activity may demonstrate otherwise. The weekend activity was to make an owl. its done over two days and its fiddly and complicated.
Fiddly and complicated projects never come out how theyre supposed to. My owl looks raggedy and sad. I blame the instructions. Since when is it possible to fold folds that are 0.3 cm wide???
My owl looks evil.

Tuesday, March 23rd - The durable dustpan

This origami creation is designed to be useful, and therefore advises you to use a bit cereal box or cardboard of similar thickness. I didnt, because I already own a dustpan. Also whenever i use dangerous paper or cardboard I always get really bad paper cuts. I hear you laugh at me but I literally get a paper cut a day at the moment. Journal articles are usually the main culprits but it can be anything with a sharp edge really.
The origami provided is actually really good because its not ridiculously sharp.
Anyway, dustpan. Easy, and i reckon it woud work in cardboard. However, I am sticking to my plastic one for the moment.

Monday, march 22nd - the two car garage

Today was nice and easy. I had to fold a two-car garage. All the folds were understandable (although the folds at the back were unexplained, i assume they were to hold it up, at least thats what i used them for). oh and i got to use the organ base for something other than an organ. how exciting hey?
The issue i have with this is that youd need to make a flat car to fit inside it. There is no point in folding a garage that wont fit a car in it.
Also i am now using purple paper, that looks very pink to me.

Friday, March 19th, Saturday, March 20th and Sunday, March 21st - a whale of a weekend

So Friday's origami is used to make a card over the weekend. I havent made the card. Mainly because Im lazy, but i have other reasons.
So i had to make a whale. and im really pleased with it. It looks like a happy whale. and its easy to make. I wont remember, obviously, but im gonna keep these instructions for future whale folding.
The card that goes with the whale is a "get whale" card. Groan? I think not. Yes indeed my sense of humour means that that joke topped my list of awesome jokes for the weekend. I did actually laugh and am planning on sending the card to my next sick friend (be warned).
On a completely different subject, its spring equinox tomorrow woohoo! That means that daytime will be the same length as night time. It is also one of the two days of the year where my PhD work is actually relevant.......

Thursday, March 18th - the pope's hat

I've decided that the diagrams on the instructions arent accurate. I followed the instructions to the letter and my hat didnt come out as curvy as the picture. i think they make the pictures prettier than you can possibly get your origami, so i feel a bit better about some of my previous work.
Im wondering whether this hat is supposed to be worn by a very small person. I think it would fit on a small persons head. but it wouldnt look cool

Wednesday, March 17th - the diamondback snake

So I have the attention span of a walnut. This has been proved by todays arigami, which consisted of a few more folds than usual. The accordeon fold is where you fold the paper over and over to get an accordeon effect.
Unfortunately, it's boring, and by the time id done that I couldnt be bothered with the rest. On top of that, once the accordeon folds were completed it was supposed to be symmetrical. It wasnt.
The origami guide advises you to start again if youve made a mistake. NO WAY was i doing those folds again. They were a pain. So i decided to get the snake over and done with. I managed to get the neck folded properly but the head was just one step too far. I gave up and squished it up.

Tuesday, March 16th - the organ

And now we understand the organ base. The purpose of the organ base is to then make..... an organ. And it was very simple. Very very simple. In fact i managed to make it whilst reading someone's blog and chatting online. very impressed with my multitasking.
So yeah my organ does look like a five year old made it but im impressed with the fact that it stands up.

Monday, March 15th - The organ base

And then I had to make a base. I am perplexed as to why this base is called an organ base. I'm assuming it refers to the musical instrument, the organ. Not the body parts.
Nice and easy. Though I can garantee i wont remember how to do it when I have to make something out of it....

Friday, March 12th, Saturday March 13th and Sunday March 14th - the flower

Luckily for me, since i was too busy to do origami over the weekend, fridays origami was the first part of the weekend origami, so I did it all in one go.
The flower, as previously mentioned, is done in two parts. First the stem, which was easy fun and exciting to do, because i even managed to get it to stand up. Now as march's paper colour is green, i though that was quite appropriate for the stem. I therefore chose some of my leftover pink paper from february for the flower, which i was assuming would be beautiful.
It was not. Its not pretty at all, and I am sorely disappointed. I was hoping to make something really pretty and cool, a pink flower on a green stem. Instead I got a pink blob on a green stem. The blob was so big it unbalanced my stem and it wouldn't stay up anymore. I think you can guess i was upset.

Thursday, March 11th - the toucan

I hate the fish base. It's complicated origami by itself, and by the time ive finished the base, im tired and cant be bothered anymore. So having to then go on to the complicated toucan was a silly idea. especially considering the fact that im starving and that i should never be allowed to do anything when im hungry.
So i failed at the toucan. there were too many complicated folds i didnt understand. And step 7 was 3 steps, not one. My toucan has bits backwarda and green bits that should be white.
Just look at the picture.
Hideous

Wednesday, March 10th - The helicopter

This origami creation would have been AWESOME if it had worked.
It didn't work.
The aim of it was to create a helicopter than spins round when you throw it up into the air. A little bit like those funny seeds we all used to throw around when we were kids right?
Well i made. I followed the instructions to the letter. And it even looked like the picture.
Then i threw it up in the air. It fell back down with absolutely zero spin. I tried many times and nothing happened. I wondered whether i needed a special technique to throw it. Couldnt do it. I gave up. Im a little upset.

Tuesday, March 9th - the rocking pigeon

Today's origami was an absolute pain in the neck. It was really complicated, the arrows made no sense and the folds were too fiddly.
I did manage to do it though. sort of. The tail of the rocking pigeon was supposed to be straighter and i think the base on which the pigeon rocks should have been larger.
But, if you push down on the tail really really gently, it does rock a teeny tiny bit. so im calling that a success.
Im still perplexed by one of the folds though. it took me twenty minutes to get it right and i still dont understand the instructions.
By rights that fold should NEVER work and I dont know how i made it work.
Meh to origami.

Monday, March 8th - the fish base

Today was just learning a base. But it was a really difficult base. Usually bases involve one or two steps. This one had five. And one was just plain horrifying.
Luckily after 2 months of origami i actually understand horrifying instructions and it wasnt too bad. The problem is that the more complicated the bases get, the more likely i am to start off my origami wrong and never be able to do it right.
Happy international woman's day.
And im supposed to be preparing a presentation tonight. You can guess i dont want to right? I love this blog.

Sunday, March 7th - the fancy votive dish

What is a votive dish? Apparently votive is expressing a wish, desire or vow.
its basically a star dish that i made two days ago except that i stick a votive candle in it. i dont know what a votive candle is but i think its one of those ones you can light in catholic churches??
Im really clueless. Absolutely no idea.
I didnt make it. Mainly because i dont have a candle. but also because it kind of looks tacky when its made out of paper.

Friday, March 5th - the star box

Now i have to admit, I've grown accustomed to not understanding the cryptic instructions given to me by my origami calendar.
So i was rather pleasantly surprised to find that today, the cryptic instructions made sense. So when i was asked to mountain fold and squash i knew what it meant, and could actually do it.
I did have trouble with the last step, which involved opening it out and flatting the bottom. But only because when you have the unopened version it doesnt look like theres any way that the bottom will ever flatten out.
I did manage it, and was actually taken by surprise when it flattened out.
And now i have another box.

Thursday, March 4th- the oblique letter fold

Okay, i have to admit that I'm writing this on friday. But if you knew the day I had yesterday, you would understand that yesterday was not an origami day.
The tast was to make an oblique letter fold. Which basically involves folding lots and ending up with a rectangle of folded paper.
I don't know what an oblique letter fold is for.
It seems pretty pointless to me.
Ideas?

Wednesday, March 3rd - The sitting bird

I've had a bad day today. Nothing's worked, things have broken, im wasting lots of time doing things i dont need to do.
Theres only one thing to do to make up for all this. Something else completely useless and frustrating: origami.
i thought today's task looked quite simple. but then it wasnt. Arrows flying everywhere, asking me to do folds that were physically impossible. And step 8 didnt make sens because the bit of paper they were pointing at on the diagram didnt exist with me.
I ignored that instruction and it still looks like a bird.
This one took me a veyr long time to do. I had to have a tea break half way through.

Tuesday, March 2nd - the persimmon

First, a definition:
A persimmon refers to a type of tropical fruit tree, that gives off a stranger fruit. The fruit is also called persimmon i think. I also have a feeling that the persimmon fruit is the one that sometimes randomly appears with your desert and you have no idea what to do with it, and it doesn't taste very nice.
So i had to fold this today.
Nice easy folding to start with. But then it involved blowing into it. And that's when it all went pear shaped (not persimmon shaped unfortunately, hardeeharhar). The first time all the folds kind of undid and i had to start again. The second time i was holding it right and it came out backwards (dont ask me how, it just did). So i went back and held it right and got..... a strawberry.

Monday, March 1st - the tortoise

I discovered today what the difference is between the square base method one and the waterbomb base. the valley folds are diagonal in one and in the other the mountain folds are diagonal.I found this out because no matter how hard i tried to get the square base today, I kept on getting the waterbomb base. It was very frustrating.
I finally actually looked at what I was doing and figured out that once again, I was being retarded.
The funny thing is that once i finished making my square base I honestly thought I was done for the day and was getting ready to take my picture. I then realised that the tortoise doesn't look like that at all....
My tortoise has an unusually large shell.