Mission Impossible

 So my mission on this VERY HOT day, if I should choose to accept it, is to come up with a prototype of this year's Christmas ornament. I found a photo of a painted angel ornament that I liked although the photo was not in a tutorial so I was left to my own devices to figure out how it was done as her wings had some texture. I had a few ideas so I gathered my supplies and set out on my mission.

Since this was going to be an experiment with probably a few hits and misses, I decided not to use the rounds that I bought but instead to practice on some ornament shapes that I had in my stash. That wasn't the best idea since it isn't the correct shape that I will actually be painting on but for now, I was just going for some basics.

I sketched a bit of a shape and began painting. To get the texture on her wings I used light weight spackle. It goes on pink but dries to white. I bought both a burgundy red and a green paint to try out. I know I could have gone to white, gold, silver, etc. but we all know that I am a traditional red/green gal for Christmas and, oddly enough, both of my inspirational photos used those colors.

At this point it became very obvious to me that when I go to paint these on the "real" rounds, I will probably create some kind of an outline stencil. I know they are supposed to look hand painted-and they will be-but, I would like them all to be close to the same size and shape and as you can see here, the harder I tried to do that, the worse it got. Lol

The other hard part of this project is that the design is semi-outlined with a thin black line and it is meant to be kind of freehand and "sloppy". I find that really hard to do because if it isn't done correctly, it looks like the artist just did a really bad job. LOL

I tried to use my NEW white paint pen for her halo but it still wouldn't co-operate on the wood so I had to resort to a very small brush and just painting it on.

Once the spackle dried, I felt like it needed a zhuzh of some kind. I was going to use glitter but it seemed too large so I happened upon this stuff in my stash. I have NO recollection of ever buying it or what I may have used it for but I think it worked. It is just a much finer grind than glitter and gives the wings the little pop that they needed. And, I also decided to try stamping on the word "joy" and I like it so that will probably make the cut as well. And perhaps the biggest surprise of all is that I am going to go with the red over the green. That is a huge surprise even to me but I just like the way it pops better. Of course, I will have to wait to see how all of this plays out on the distressed rounds that I bought. I might distress the edges of the ornament or perhaps glitter it. And, I am thinking of maybe topping it off with a small sprig of holly to get the obligatory pop of green.

Of course, now we are at the point of accepting my mission...or not. I think I will! I don't think I've made an angel ornament over the many years I have been doing this. If I have, it was probably a decoupaged image and not hand painted. Of course, this is also the part where I have the most trouble getting motivated. I LOVE to do one of something and I'm OK with two because I can make my modifications. But, once it goes beyond that, I get crazy bored. I have 12 of these to do at the very least so we shall see how it goes. Lol At least I am not outside in our predicted possible extreme heat index of up to 114 degrees! 

I'll let you know how I end up doing on these and maybe I'll even show you the end result-after I post a spoiler alert for those of you who might be on my gift list because these will probably end up being package tie-ons for your presents! Stay safe and stay tuned.