Dia de los Muertos Pumpkin, Step-by-Step ~ a little furin the paint

Hello again!

Here's how I did the Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos) pumpkin...

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I began by folding a piece of typing paper in half and cutting out

a simple skull shape. I folded it a little to fit the curve of the pumpkin

and lightly traced around the pattern with a liner brush,

then base-coated the skull background with white acrylic ~

(I used Golden Liquid Acrylic).

While that was drying, I sketched my design on the paper pattern,

this time cutting out the eyes, mouth and nose shapes.

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I placed the cut-out shapes on the pumpkin and used a liner brush

and pink acrylic (thinned) to trace around them...

(I used pink paint instead of black as it would be easier to blend into

the finished design ~ also easier to cover up any stray lines later.)

I used the brush to free-hand "sketch" in the different elements;

Swirls, flowers, hearts ~ the more the merrier!

It looks pretty messy at this stage...but it all comes together!

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I filled in the main shapes with bright, light to medium colors.

Now for the fun!

Using slightly thinned black acrylic and a liner brush, I outlined all the shapes ~

I then used a small round brush for the larger areas and the negative shapes around the eyes.

I got "dotty" with a brush handle dipped in various colors!

You could just go wild with details...I had to keep reminding myself that

this was just a (perishable) pumpkin!
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Even though it's not going to last all that long, I wanted the skull to have a

nice gloss, so I put a coat of water-based sealer on the painted design only.

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It's a good thing the sealer was dry, Leo!

He has to check everything out.

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Now, this part is really short-lived... (Aren't many really good things fleeting, though?)

but it was fun ~ I had oodles of marigolds, and they are such a significant part

of Dia de los Muertos that I had to do it.

Just a tiny bit of hot-glue holds each flower-head in place.

And they did last until the next day!

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