Watermelon Carving Basics: Roses!

Due to the success of the Sunflower Watermelon Carving Instructable and the interest in wanting to see how the Roses were made, I have gone ahead and made this Instructable. An easy how-to for carving Roses into a watermelon. Enjoy and have fun!

You'll need:
One watermelon
Paring knife
Medium circle cookie cutter

Start by using your paring knife to trace a circle on the side of the watermelon you want to carve. Once you have cut out a circle template to follow, use the paring knife to peel away the green part of the watermelon rind, leaving the white fleshy part exposed.

Note: Save some of the bigger pieces of green that you peel off. Those will be needed down the line!

After peeling away the green bits, you'll see that there are darker parts of the rind that you might have missed due to uneven cutting. No problem, just grab the paring knife and clean it up by peeling away as much of the greenish coloring as possible until only white rind is showing. It doesn't have to be perfect though so don't spend hours on it or you'll end up carving away all the white part and hit the fruit instead!

So remember those green parts I had you save! Grab those and cut out a few leaves. (I made 3 total for mine) Then carve out some detail and put those aside again for later. At this point you can dispose of all the rest of the unwanted rind.

To start the rose, grab your circle cookie cutter and press it gently into the watermelon, no more than 1/3 of the cookie cutter in. You aren't cutting out shapes, just making an outline to follow.
After you cut the circle, use the paring knife to cut a ring around the circle and carve out some of the watermelon around it, making it appear more 3D.

Take your paring knife and cut a small sliver off the circle in the shape of a crescent. Make this first cut straight down.
Next cut a sliver in front of the one you previously cut, but make this one at an angle towards the first cut. 
Pull the second sliver you made out and you have your first petal made.
Repeat this process around the circle for your first row of petals.

For a better understanding, take a look at the pictures posted that shows this process.

For the second row, you are going to continue cutting a thin crescent shaped sliver straight down, then cutting a second thin crescent sliver parallel to in at an angle towards your first cut sliver. Pull the second angled sliver out to complete the petal.
Repeat this process around the circle to complete your second row.

Again, for a better understanding, refer to the photos I posted.

Keep using the sliver cutting method further into the circle to create more rows of petals, getting smaller with each row closer to the center.

When you get to the point of just a tiny bit of uncut circle in the middle. Use your paring knife to cut a hole in the middle of the last bit of the center. The center of your rose is now finished, time to move on to the outer layers!

Unlike the inner layers, all cuts will be angled in this stage. The first cut you make should be angled at about 45 degrees. Make a wavy/curvy petal shaped cut.
Then behind that first cut ,at about a 20 degree angle, slice a rounded cut encircling your first cut. Pull this sliver out to make the first cut you made pop out from the melon.

This sounds more complicated than it really is, for a better understanding see the photos.

Continue making wavy/curvy petal cuts and cutting away part of the melon behind them to make them appear 3D.
The further from the center you get, the bigger the cuts and petals should become.

See photos for reference!

Go as far out as you would like, making the rose as big as you want. You can have it take up the whole melon, or part of it so you have multiple roses on one melon.

1. In the photos you can see where I stopped, this is how big I wanted this rose. I included a side perspective so you can see the angles and such.

Once you have completed the rose by making as many petals as you want. Finish it by framing it.
Like the sunflowers, cut a large circle around the flower at an angle and pull out the bit of melon.
This will make the rose look like it is popping out from the watermelon even more than it already does.

You can repeat this process to make more roses on your melon, or maybe mix it up with sunflowers and other things. Your choice! For this example I made 2 roses on my watermelon.

Now that you have your roses all carved up, grab the leaves you made from the watermelon rind earlier and place them where you would like on the roses. Just slide them into the gaps. If you need to, use your paring knife to deepen the gaps so the leaves don't fall out and you are finished! Show off to friends and family, then slice it up and serve!

Also included an additional photo of a recent melon I carved that does include using the roses and my first attempt at flames.