Kusudama flowers (part 1)

While looking at options for making my own bouquet I was inspired by this pin – fabric flowers with a knitting needle as a stem!  I decided to put my stash of excess knitting needles to good use…

(it was a good excuse to organise them really!)

… and try them out as stems for the kusudama flowers I’ve been wanting to try for a while, using some of the leftover sheet music from my last origami project.

I used this tutorial – best one I’ve seen – and it worked out well that the tops of the knitting needles stick out the top of the flowers.  The petals took a while to make – not long to fold, but waiting for the glue to dry.  I wish I’d used a hot glue gun instead of PVA – the petals would probably stick better to the plastic needle too.

I think I will try these out again with a hot glue gun to see the difference, before I decide whether to use these flowers for the wedding bouquet.  More photos of the finished project to come, once the glue is fully dried!