1000 cranes to remember: How to fold your own cranes

This blog is dedicated to my grandmother, and to all those who have been touched in some way by the art of my origami cranes. I am paying it forward, one small piece of paper at a time.

Senbazuru is the Japanese art of folding one thousand origami cranes. There is a legend stating that whoever folds 1,000 paper cranes will be granted a wish by the ancient bird spirit, but traditionally the feat is performed to wish eternal good luck, benevolence, and one thousand years of prosperity. For these reasons, I felt in my heart that it would be the perfect expression of appreciation, gratitude and ultimately, respectful farewell.

From the moment the idea came to me, I knew I could mould and shape this project into my own expression of something we could share together - a labor of love that she would appreciate, even if no one else in my family could fully understand what it all meant.

Each set of one hundred cranes featured here represents a moment, a memory, a spark in my life that we shared together that helped influence the person who I have become today. I hope you enjoy reading my personal reflections, so that you may fully understand the empowerment this project has had on me, and the inspiring statement of sharing beauty and joy that I learned as a result of folding my 1,000th crane.

Saturday, October 26, 2013

How to fold your own cranes

A lot of people have been interested in my cranes project, even wanting me to teach them how to fold one. I spontaneously taught a couple of Marines at the post office just yesterday.

I decided last night to make an instructional video on how I fold the cranes. Just a humble, low quality vid, with a nice, slow pace so you can fold along with me.

If you'd like to give it a try, go grab yourself a square piece of paper (most any type/size of paper, as long as it's square), and press play..