craft foam flowers, in a new drawing style

I really can’t draw but I’m trying to learn. Having two kids who want me to draw something fast with fat crayons really helps. You can’t think too much you just have to draw something that has the simplest relevant details. I always draw the same sort of flowers, large round center with five round petals crowding around the center. It’s taken me about three years to get the petals all about the same size and shape. Today when the girl asked to make flowers I almost drew those same old flowers. Then I decided it was time to try something different. Without looking at anything I took a pen and drew on some craft foam (yeah that stuff I don’t really care for). Admittedly I had to sketch it several times before I had a decent shape I could cut out but it’s totally different! Almost modern looking. I also attempted a different leaf shape than my standard teardrop. Here are a few pictures to illustrate the process of making the flowers less two dimensional. I’m also including a printable PDF with the patterns and instructions to make your own craft foam flowers or simply print, color and cut on sturdy paper. When I traced the flowers into bezier curves in Freehand, I did my best to retain the loose hand drawn shape of the petals. You’ll notice one of the petals is quite lopsided, almost like a boot shape, makes it easier to line up the mirror images!

PS. I also apologize for the fuzziness of these pictures. I’m trying to work on using natural light because that usually produces truer colors but I was having a hard time getting good focus at the same time.

PPS. A good way to use up those leftover bits of colored paper and craft foam is to cut them into relatively small pieces and use them to make a mosaic on black paper. Kids love this!