Please! Give Me A Painted Heart
About a year ago my cousin asked us to join her in a family project. She wanted us to paint hearts on a 6-inch by 6-inch piece of canvas. I told her I would love to. It’s a wall-of-hearts from all those who you love. I think it’s pretty cool.
You know I could not find such a 6-inch canvas in our rural town. So a year went by and she was wondering what’s up. Did we still want to paint the hearts?
We told her our dilemma . So she said, I tell you what, I’ll mail you the canvases. So finally we got them. And guess what? They sat around for six months. Shame on me.
So this Thanksgiving holiday we painted instead of going shopping. Now we searched for supplies. We found old paint and some brushes we had over from school projects. We did it as a family.
What Did We Paint?
One painted a yellow heart on purple, another painted a heart as if it was a hot air balloon. You can see a basket beneath the heart. Guess what I painted?
I always had envisioned of painting a heart that resembled a lattice topped cherry pie. I never attempted painting something so complicated. So I wasn’t too sure how it was going to turn out. I did a little research watching YouTubes of mixing colors and making an outline first of the painting. Yes, I was using acrylic paints. So it’s more forgiving than oils.
The Painted Heart Process
First thing was to sketch it out as best as I could with a pencil. I kind of outlined the whole pie. Laid down the lattice and weave the strips of dough.
Then I got the canvas and I lay down a base coat. I always liked very cheerful colors so I made it a sunshine yellow color. Then I mixed a little of brown, some orange, a touch of black, and a lot of yellow to mimic pie crust.
I Love You Cherry Pie – show the cherries
I left gaps between the lattice to reveal the cherry filling. Then in my mind, I said as the pie bakes certain parts will brown more. So I added darker shades here and there.
To make sure all knew it was a cherry pie, I added a few whole cherries around the pie. I knew a odd number of things are more pleasant in art.
A little bit of touch up here and little there. After stepping back and squinting some, it didn’t look half bad. So we let them dry. And finally, we mailed them to our cousin.
She was ecstatic with our painted hearts. It made her so happy! She said she wanted to cry. Wow! I’m blessed to have such a cousin who’s so appreciative of our humble hearts. It’s so true. There’s more happiness in giving than there is in receiving.
A Pie Idea Is Born
After this small painting project, I started to stir up a new pie idea. Can I paint on a real pie? A literal pie using colors that are edible. So stay tune while I flesh out painting on my pies. I think it’s going to be fun and adventurist, and so now I am researching paintings.
Bye, bye for now.
