Pumpkin Painting - Floral Full Moon

If you're anything like me then you probably love Halloween and the autumn aesthetic. You probably enjoy a crisp afternoon at the pumpkin patch and buy more mini pumpkins than you know what to do with. While you enjoy the lattes, movies, and activities, you might not be too keen on the mess of carving a pumpkin.

While I love decorating with them, I've never been a skilled carver and I hate dealing with the mess after. I'll be the first to admit that I can be a little prissy so if you know me, this makes perfect sense.

Still, I like to get creative with them so I've recently started painting them and adding in different elements to make them stand out a bit. For this post, I want to talk about how to make a full moon pumpkin that involves very minimal carving, but still results in a unique creation!

For this project you'll need the following:

• Black and white acrylic paint

• Fake flowers with stems (try to get a variety of sizes and shapes)

• A thin knife, drill, or any tool that will let you poke small holes into the pumpkin

• A pumpkin of your choosing

• Some newspaper or old towels to set the pumpkin on

• Large paintbrush or sponge brush

Instructions

1. First, paint the stem of the pumpkin white

2. Cover the rest in black paint. This might take a few sessions. I had to do at least 3 coats to completely cover the orange. I used a sponge brush for this to make it a little easier.

3. Once it's dry, drill or poke holes into the pumpkin in the shape of a moon. You want to make sure that there are more holes near the middle and very few near the ends. I started out making a basic moon shape and adding more holes where I saw fit to give it the shape I wanted.

4. Next, I took the fake flowers and cut the stems to make them shorter.

5. Carefully place the cut flowers into the holes. I used the bigger flowers for the middle and the small ones for fillers and for the tips of the moon. Note that you can definitely create more holes if you feel like you're loosing the shape or want to expand it.

6. Play with the flower arrangement a bit until the shape and look is what you want and done!

It's also fun to paint the mini pumpkins to match the theme of your larger one. You could make them look like flowers, stones, or bugs to look like a garden or anything you'd like! I've done galaxy, Pokémon, and even Rick and Morty pumpkins just for fun! Just experiment and get creative!