Twelve Days of Christmas Day 5…hand painted Christmas pillows.
I’ve made lots and lots of Christmas pillows. For years I’ve intended to make Christmas pillows to sell online, but I get so busy with client work leading up to Christmas, that I never get around to it. I guess I need to start Christmas pillows right after the new year.
I made the hand painted tree pillow and the Knock-off Channels fabric pillow this year. The other three pillows I made in years past. 
I used gesso to prime the white canvas fabric I bought from Big Duck Canvas. The fabric must be primed prior to painting or the paint will just soak into the fabric and spread out. I’ve also used regular latex house paint to prime some pillows previously and it works exactly the same as gesso.
The primer does make the fabric a bit crunchy, which I don’t like, but since the pillows are only seasonal it’s fine. I use the hand-painted pillows on chairs we use less often.
I used a contrasting red linen for the back of the pillow, after first trying to use the same white fabric for the back, but it didn’t match the primed front, so I used red and it looks way better anyway. 
Next time I’ll make the trees a little smaller so they don’t bend around the top of the pillow and look like a grinch tree with a star that’s too heavy.
I use acrylic paint from the craft store, in two or three shades of green and one brown. Nothing special or expensive. I use a lot of water to give it the look of watercolor paint. The trick is to layer on the paint in thin layers to get the watercolor effect with acrylic paint. I could go on and on with the layers, but I just wanted to keep the trees simple and fast.
A time lapse video of the painting process…
check out day 1, 2, 3, 4, here of my Twelve days of Christmas Crafts.
[…] Twelve Days of Christmas Crafts, Day 5-hand painted Christmas pillows […]