A sweet and simple way to capture dandelions for all time is to create your very own watercolor painting, but with the actual flowers used in the making.
What you'll need is a few dandelions, some watercolor paints, a paintbrush, 5"x7" watercolor paper, parchment paper, and a rolling pin. To begin, place your watercolor paper on one side of your parchment paper:
Arrange dandelions where you'd like them to appear on your painting:
Bend the necks of the flowers so they're facing straight down on the watercolor paper:
Carefully keeping flowers in place, fold parchment paper over the top of the flowers and watercolor paper:
Roll the rolling pin very firmly up and down over the top of the flowers:
Pull back parchment paper:
Peel dandelions off the watercolor paper. (Your artwork doesn't look very pretty at this point, but don't worry, it will soon):
To paint the stem and flower petals, either use a watercolor paint color you like, or mix your own. I wanted brown and didn't have any on hand, so I mixed red and green together, along with some water:
Next, study a dandelion to see its unique petals so you can recreate your own artistic version. I see graduated layers of petals, so that's what I'll focus on:
Start at the center of the flower and lightly brush out, little sweeps of color to create the petals, graduating them in size as you go, to emulate the flower. Do the same with the stem, starting at the bottom and sweeping the brush upward until it connects with the flower. Repeat with each flower until you're done:
Lastly, paint any word you like on the painting. I love old specimens, so I kept it simple and painted the word dandelion as if it were a dandelion specimen for cataloging:
And now the dandelions are preserved for all time as a sweet little reminder of spring.
Notes:
I purchased all of my art supplies at Dick Blick. Watercolor paper here, watercolors here.
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