One More Heart & Posies Painting Idea

I thought I was done with pink. I really did. But then I went bloghopping and found some wonderful Valentine projects.

Of course, most of them are food-related. And if you know me at all, you know that me & food aren’t the best of friends.

Let me rephrase that: me and cooking or baking food does not necessarily produce something fabulous. It’s more like a 50:50 proposition of whether it’ll be edible or not.

But all these wonderful Valentine’s treats & cookies? In my mind, I see them painted – greeting cards, tshirts, photo albums.

If you ever saw a sugar cookie I baked, you’d understand why I paint instead of bake.

Before we do another Hearts & Flowers painting instruction, I wanted to show you my next ‘real’ (as in $$$ $ project!)

I got a commission today to paint a Name Canvas for a little boy who’s ‘comin’ to town’ in a few weeks. His first bedroom will be decorated with Green Elephants.

Wanna have a little fun? Take a peek at all the bedding and accessories in this picture . . .

. . . now, say you have a blank 18 x 24” canvas. What color would you paint the background? (The bedroom walls are a light beige) Green? Brown? Cream? How many elephants would you paint? (The baby’s name will be ‘Eli’ – at least I hope it will because my whole design is based around that!)

I’ve been playing around with some pencil sketches tonight and then I thought, Hey! I have a whole bunch of talented friends out there that I just know will give me some ideas . . . . right?

That means YOU!

Okay, so say you're not the one painting it. Let’s just say you’re shopping and you see one painting with a green background and brown border, or another with cream background and green border, or  . . . you get the idea. Which one do you think would look best on beige walls and . . . wait, I have to check the furniture color . . . dark wood.

I have an idea which direction I’m leaning towards, but I thought it’d be fun to hear what you think too.

Enough chit-chat. On to the Valentine’s Day project. The last one!

Paint a heart outline. That’s one big heart and one not-so-big heart.

I didn’t draw a pattern for this because you really don’t need one. But if it makes you feel more comfortable, I’ll gladly do one for you.

{Anything to get you to paint, heehee.}

With a darker pink-rose shade, paint a few posies. You can either do the 3 petals on top/3 on bottom like we did here, or just freehand the petals.

Then dab a few buds here and there.

Add some blossoms and buds on the opposite lower side.

Outline the heart with the same rose paint. You can use a liner brush, or practice your floating. If you look closely, you can see where parts of the heart has more shading than others.

Yes, I was indeed practicing my own floating on this.

This is purely optional, but it does add a little dimension to your posies.

Add some light pink to one edge of each petal – and a dab here and there on the little buds.

Next paint a bunch of swirly-gigs with green and a few simple leaves.

I know, easier said than done if you haven’t painted a lot.

Ok, ok, so maybe you will want a pattern to follow for this part.

Then topcoat the posies with the rose paint.

See how some of the light pink highlighting shows thru? It’s subtle, but it does makes a difference, doesn’t it?

Lastly, dot the posies with some white paint. 

And you’re done!

Unless . . .

. . . you have your colored Sharpies! Even if you don’t paint – and why aren’t you, btw? – you can use them for scrapbooking, writing, kids homework, color-coding calendars, etc., etc., etc.

Between Sharpies & Plaid, I really should be getting some sponsor buckaroos for as much as I use their products, shouldn’t I?

(Just in case any of you have an ‘in’ with them )