Masquerade

Look who's ready for the masquerade ball! I love fairies, don't you? The Fair Folk are a fun subject to paint.

I adore this design! The fairy is winsome, her hair is wild, and her mask is lovely. What's not to like? Again, I was hoping to keep this one and enjoy it all autumn, but alas, this pumpkin was bought toot sweet (that's pumpkin-painter talk for "pretty darn quick") and went home with a farmers market shopper. I'm sure they'll be very happy together. Maybe I'll paint myself another one...

I decided to decorate the fairy's mask with red and orange fall leaves and white birch twigs. I thought the colors stood out nicely in front of her dark hair. I used metallic gold paint for her wings and mask which took quite a few coats to get good coverage and shine, but I think it was worth the extra painting and drying-between-coats time.

Today is the day after Halloween and I am planning on buying a few more pumpkins today so I can do some more fall theme designs for my portfolio. I can't imagine that I'll sell any, but I'll be happy to gift my family and friends with autumn/thanksgiving painted pumpkins for their yards or dinner tables.

Also stay tuned for a step-by-step tutorial on where I get my inspiration, how I paint my designs, what products I use, etc...

Yes, another witch

Trick-or-Treat! Just put the candy in the cauldron! This little cutie witch in purple with flowers on her hat was a big hit and was bought the morning after I painted her.

I like her black cat with the green wings a lot. Thank goodness cats don't really have wings! They get into enough mischief as it is. Can you imagine what destruction would ensue if they could fly?

The Autumn Fairy

I was looking for inspiration for paintings when I came across simplifies version of this fairy on a cross stitch pattern website. I loved her poofy dress, her soulful look , and the spotty mushroom and I knew I must bring her to life myself.

Since the cross stitch pattern was all black and white, I got to choose the colors for everything. I knew I wanted to do her wings like fall leaves, all in fiery colors, so I made her dress gold to coordinate with that palette. I did change the shape of her wings to look more leafy too. The pattern wings were more like your typical butterfly wing.

I love the way she turned out and I secretly hoped that she would not get bought so I could keep her all Fall! I actually ended up giving her to my best friend as a Halloween gift so I can go visit this pumpkin fairy all season long at my friend's house.

Hello Kitty - the dark side

How adorable is Hello Kitty as a little devil? I bought some Hello Kitty stickers that had her dressed in different Halloween costumes and I thought this picture was perfect for a small pumpkin. Hello Kitty pumpkin found a happy home with a little girl and her Mom who are both Hello Kitty collectors. Nice.

Which Witch?

I'm beginning to think that 2009 will be remembered as my year of the witch! I can't help it, I love painting them! This lovely magical girl looks a little like Angelina Jolie, don't you think?

Once again, thanks to the inspiration of Molly Harrison and her wicca art.

A very happy customer went home with this special (and large! must have weighed 12 lbs at least!) pumpkin at the We Love Long Beach pancake breakfast last Saturday morning. The We Love Long Beach folks are nice enough to let me show up and face paint at their community events, and it's a lot of fun for me to connect with families in my own home town. I grew up in Long Beach Ca and I think it's still one of the most beautiful coastal cities in southern. California.

I have more witches in store for 2009, keep your eye out for future blog posts and pics.

Enchanting

This lovely witch is an homage to one of my favorite fantasy artists Molly Harrison. I have her "pagan" calendar and I love her style! She also paints mermaids, fairies, dragons, cats, and many other fantastical beings. Thanks for all the inspiration, Molly.

I like the way the colors on this all work together. I like the way her hat pops up out of the frame. I like the way her hair turned out: I added both low lights and highlights to the basic hair color which gave it a lot of dimension. I also tried a new technique on the moon: I painted the white circle first, and once that was dry I put a wash of watered down paint on top in both a light blue and a grey. The pink background is also done with a watered down color wash. I wanted the background to kind of recede so I tried to do a very soft color behind the subject.

All in all, I'm very happy with the way this witch turned out. Now if only I could get my hair color to be that pretty and dimensional...

Don't fear the Reaper

I said, More Cowbell Baby!

Yes, he's coming for us all so why worry? Actually I rather like the idea of death looking like young Robert Redford in that old Twilight Zone episode "Nothing In The Dark". Now there is a "Crossing Over" a girl can enjoy!

This fellow is a little more scary. I found this design on a patch of all places. It just goes to show that you can find inspiration in a lot of places. I loved the perspective of this design, with the reaper's bony hand prominent in the foreground and his scythe up over his head. Nice! I chose a vibrant dark blue for his robe because I thought it would add the right amount of punch to the picture while still looking suitably dark.

The painting is done in plain old acrylic craft paint and coated with a spray acrylic sealer top coat.

Disney inspired pumpkins

I get a lot of special requests for characters on pumpkins, and folks love Disney!

Winnie-the Pooh is going out trick-or-treating dressed as a bee. You can't see it in this picture, but Pooh is wearing a cap that has bee antennae on it! This was a really cute one:

Pooh Bear

Mickey Mouse is going out trick-or-treating too, dressed up in his best ghost costume:

Tinkerbell is always a favorite character of the Disney crowd. The first Tinkerbell pumpkin was a huge one so I had a lot of room to paint. She got lots of glitter on her wings and her green dress. The second Tink is dressed like a witch, and riding a broom sidesaddle like the animated Samantha on the beginning of the old Bewitched tv show:

Bewitched Tink

Jack and Sally from the Nightmare Before Christmas are SUPER popular. I think I painted them 7 or 8 times at least last year. They were a big seller for sure!

Large Jack & Sally Pumpkin

Small J & S

Jack's ghost dog Zero was a great design too:

The popularity of Pirates, spurred on by The Pirates of the Caribbean movies, made the old skull & crossbones popular:
This is the back side of a smaller skull & crossbones pirate pumpkin. I liked including the parchment scroll warning that "Dead Men Tell No Tales"

I am planning on painting more Disney character inspired pumpkins this year. I'd like to do Lock, Shock & Barrel from Nightmare Before Christmas, maybe Oogie Boogie too, he's creepy! I'm sure we'll see more of Jack , Sally, & Zero.

Maybe we'll see Mickey in his sorcerer's apprentice outfit, or Minnie Mouse dressed to go out trick-or-treating. If anyone has any ideas for Disney pumpkins, I'd love to hear them!

Don't you love pumpkins?

Ah, pumpkins! They're adorable, aren't they? When they start showing up on store shelves you know Halloween isn't far behind. When pumpkin flavored treats start appearing on menus, even better!

Shakespeare mentioned pumpkins in his play The Merry Wives of Windsor. Pumpkins make an appearance in the fairy tale Cinderella, and Washington Irving's spooky story of early American fright The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Pumpkins were eaten by Native American peoples. The early English-American colonists ate them too, even baking cleaned pumpkins filled with milk, honey, and spices in hot coals. Pumpkin pie baked right inside the pumpkin shell! Peter Peter, Pumpkin Eater had nothing on those clever cooks.

Personally, I love pumpkins. They signal the coming of fall, my favorite season. I never liked the start of school as a kid, but I could deal with it because I knew that soon the night air would start getting crisp. The fall colors would start creeping into the foliage of my mother's beloved garden, the magenta and yellow and purple and orange chrysanthemums bursting out in bloom just as the summer flowers wound down for a winter nap.

And of course, pumpkins mean Halloween. What is Halloween without a bunch of jack o' lanterns grinning into the dark night as trick-or-treater make their merry rounds?