How to paint Lemons

Daily Inspiration
“When Life hands you lemons . . .” is really true. You can’t control everything; but you can control your thoughts. Focus on what’s sweet in your experience.

I painted these lemons to go with this glass of lemonade. It’s for a PIY Party in August. But you can paint them now, if you want. They’re really simple.
In this painting I had already painted the background and the glass of lemonade so I applied white in an ‘egg’ shape with a little ‘nipple’ on one end.

You might notice there’s a tinge of yellow to the lemons. That’s because my first attempt didn’t work. . .

See how the lemons in front are smaller than the slices in the glass? Yeah, it happens. But you can fix nearly anything with paint. Just white it out and start over.

I used Ceramcoat’s Opaque Yellow. Any bright yellow will work.

Then add some shading & highlights. Antique Gold for shading & White for highlights. Shading is really simple – on the bottom of the front lemon, ‘behind’ the front lemon, and just a dab where the it pokes out.
I added a little bit of white to start then decided to add some more.

It’s just paint, remember?

Last step is to apply a topcoat of Opaque Yellow over the lemons. This will soften the shading & highlighting, camouflaging brushstrokes. Cool, huh?
Want to paint the slices? Think ‘wagon wheel’.

Paint a white circle to start. It doesn’t have to be perfect. Lemons aren’t perfectly circular. Then connect the ‘spokes’ to the middle. With a light yellow, create some little wedges. Again, don’t make them all even and perfect.

Then take a pale grey and apply it over parts of the white. This is just to give some dimension to the slice. Add Opaque Yellow to the peel – and that’s it! Easy-peasy!
Here’s the whole picture.

Wouldn’t this be cute in your kitchen or breakfast nook this summer?
Sharing this paint tutorial with these parties -


Colleen