Sleeping Baby Angel

Click Photo to see & print a larger version
Betsy Ritz-Frith, 1999
Jsphsldy@aol.com

I am writing very general color instructions as I think this could be painted in many color combinations, for instance, a night sky with stars in the background would be affective too, and the "jammies" could be any color, as could the skin tones.

Prepare your surface according to what it is. I painted this on a paper mache box so I sealed it first and then basecoated with a light Aqua color.

Transfer the outline of the baby lightly, so you know where you want to place the clouds, you can lightly transfer some of the mail cloud forms in if you wish.

The method I use to paint clouds works well for me, but feel free to do them any way you like.

CLOUDS:

Sponge in the basic shape of your clouds with white, very light coverage, as we will build on this. Continue to layer white on ever smaller portions of each section of clouds. (I pick up very tiny amounts of other colors I use in the painting on my sponge and work them into the clouds also, in this case, light peach, light aqua, and a light yellow.) Remember to keep the clouds light and fluffy looking. After I have them sponged in I float a shadow between the sections, usually using a very thin storm blue. After the painting was complete, I highlighted the clouds with Delta Pearl on a sponge, only on the very highest portions of each cloud section.

BABY:

Now you can transfer the baby pattern with more detail, only as much as you need. I based the face and hand with light flesh (you can use any skin tones here) and used a darker color to do a little shading, under chin, around the hand, and in the eye area. The hair (if you chose to give the baby hair) can be any color, paint the eyebrows to match. I used some of the jammie color to color the cheek (peach).

Baby's jammies are a medium peach color shaded with darker peach, and highlighted with white. The bottom of the jammie feet are storm blue (a grey blue) highlighted with white. The wings are based in white and detail painted with the same blue as the feet, I notice I forgot to shade the wing in on the far side of the baby.

FINISHING THE DESIGN

After the baby is dry, I took my sponge and brought the clouds up around the legs, arm and face to make it look like she is cradled in the cloud. The sunbeams are painted with very thin white, pearl, and yellow with a small flat brush.
I painted freehand rose buds around the side of the box using the peach colors and the inside is painted light peach.
You could also use the area with the sunbeams to put a saying on the box, such as "Precious Memories" or any other appropriate thing. The pattern is easily adapted to any shape box by filling in more clouds.

When your painting is done and dry, you can spray or varnish as you would normally do.