Hide your peanuts! With this easy origami elephant diagram, hundreds of adorable miniature elephants will be stampeding through your house. So sit back, put on some Dumbo, and fold away.
Don’t forget to download our free printable PDF at the bottom of this page.
Step 1: Start with a square sheet of paper, and turn it so that it looks like a diamond.
Step 2: Diagonally fold the opposite corners together, and make a crease along the full length of the paper.
Step 3: Turn the paper over to the opposite side so that the fold in Step 2 faces away from you, then fold the side corners inward so that the edges meet in the center. The completed folded should look like an upside-down kite.
Step 5: Fold the model in half so that the top point touches the bottom point.
Step 6: Holding the tip of the model closest to you, fold the front half upward using the line in the image below as a guide. This is the first step in making the origami elephant’s trunk.
Step 7: Turn the model over so that the folds from Step 6 are facing the back.
Step 8: Fold the bottom tip so that it touches the intersecting lines in the pentagon shaped-section of the model.
Step 9: Fold the model in half vertically.
Step 10: Read carefully. Pinch the model as shown in the picture below. Then, with your other hand pinch about 1 inch (2.5 cm) above on the origami elephant’s trunk.
With both hands in place you can do what is called a swivel fold. It feels the same as opening a fortune cookie. Using the line shown in the image below and the completed image in Step 11 as a guide, you will see that the point of this step is to make the trunk point more at an angle.
Step 11: Fold an inside reverse fold on the origami elephant’s trunk. (The following images shows you how to do this fold step by step.)
Step 12: Fold a 2nd inside reverse fold on the origami elephant’s trunk.
Step 13: Fold a 3rd inside reverse fold on the origami elephant’s trunk and push the point inside so that it doesn’t show. Birds have pointy noises; not elephants!
Your easy origami elephant is complete!
For a free printable download of this page, click here: Easy Origami Elephant PDF