My partner works on a local organic farm, and this spring they were growing some really beautiful tulips. Lucky me — for awhile, he was bringing home flowers regularly. I really love fresh flowers in the home, so that was awesome. But like all good things, it had to end, and tulip season is over now.

I got used to having bright, pretty flowers in my living room, though, so I decided to make some of my own. Kusudama flowers are versatile origami flowers, held together with a little glue, and they’re super easy to make.

I picked up a super-classy department store lookbook from the library’s free magazine pile, picked out some pretty pages, and made a little bouquet for myself. These flowers work well with five “petals,” but since it was so easy to make four squaresfrom one magazine page, I just made four-petal flowers. I love them.

There are lots of kusudama tutorials out there, but here’s how I did it:

1. Divide the page into four squares — my squares were 4.5″x4.5″ — or pick up some pre-cut origami paper. You’ll repeat steps 2-6 on each paper square.

2. Fold the square diagonally to make a triangle.

3. Fold each bottom corner of the triangle up to meet at the top corner. This makes a square.

4. Open up one folded-up side, and flatten it out to make a diamond shape, so that the center crease of the diamond falls along the edge of the square you made in step 3. Repeat on the other side.

5. Fold the top of the diamond from step 4 down so it falls in line with the edge of the first triangle you made.

6. Fold the outer half of the flap from step 4 back toward the middle, on top of the inner half. Repeat on the other side.

7. Curl the paper together so that the two flaps from step 5 meet. Glue the flaps together so that there are three folds inside the “petal.” Make sure you crease the glued edge, this will help give the flower a nice shape.

8. Repeat steps 2-6 on each paper square. Then glue the “petals” together, one at a time.

9. Make a stem from pipe cleaner or wire, or, as I did, cut a long strip of paper or tag board and roll it up to form a “stem.” Insert the stem into the base of the flower before the glue is completely dry.

You can also make a bunch of these flowers, without stems, and glue them together to make a flower ball. I like the bouquet look.

It’s not the same as fresh flowers, to be sure, but I like the little undying pop of color they bring to my living room.