I have a thing for pumpkins lately. Seriously. It's a bit of an obsession. Yesterday I published a Fabric Pumpkin Tutorial and showed you some photos of some fabric pumpkins I made last week. A few days ago my DIL, Meghann, and I got together to paint some pumpkins. If you follow me on Pinterest, you know that I have my share of painted pumpkin pins.
We started our project by buying some pumpkins from Michael's and Hobby Lobby. Both stores have all their autumn items on sale these days, so they were very reasonable. I like to buy pumpkins and gourds that are oddly shaped, because they look more natural.
Before I started painting I rough them up a bit. Most craft store pumpkins are made of a foam composite, so you can push on them with your finger and make a little dent. They look a little more natural with a few blemishes like real veggies.
I'm not sure I can express adequately how much I love the colors of these pumpkins. We used Waverly Chalk Paint to cover these beauties. I bought the paint at Walmart. Most chalk paint that I found at craft stores were $10 each. The Waverly paints I found at Walmart were only $6 each. (Many people use acrylic craft paints too.)
For this type of a project I would buy the colors you like and add a couple of neutral colors like gray and white. That way you can mix the more colorful paints with neutral colors to make them lighter or darker. This will help you shade and give definition to the pumpkins.
Here is a "before" photo. Frankly, they weren't very inspiring...
Now they are a mix of beautiful soft autumn colors...
This is the first time I'd used chalk paint. I know. I know. I'm way behind the times, but I did love using this medium. Chalk paint gave these pumpkins a matte chalk finish. The paint layered beautifully and was easy to distress.
We used the clear wax and the antique wax to seal the paint. A little buffing after the wax has dried creates a matte finish.
Meghann sent me these pictures of her creations the day after we got together. Seriously, don't these photos look like still life paintings?
Seriously. Gorgeous.
Sneak Peek...
Have you ever noticed that the stem is one of the most important things that make
an imitation pumpkin look more real?
In the next couple of days I'll show you how to change a cheap dollar store pumpkin into a
more expensive looking, realistic pumpkin.
It's all about the stem...
