how to make a cute painted christmas tree on canvas

I have found it harder and harder to find little Christmas signs that truly fit my Christmas vibe these days! Everything seems to fit into a very traditional look, and that’s just not what my style is.

I knew I wanted a little “something”‘for my guest bathroom, and it needed to be small, yet impactful for my fun space…so it only made sense to take my vision and create it myself!

I found this velvet ribbon in my craft stash, and it became the basis of my creation!

I decided to make a fun and whimsical Christmas tree on a longer canvas that I had on hand from a previous class, and my ribbon would be the bow topper!

To start, I covered the canvas with white paint (yes, even though the canvas was already white). You may be wondering why I would paint white on white, but there is a good reason! You see, the paint just helps all the other colors adhere and glide that much better, giving the canvas more of a base to work with and a more finished look in the end.

White the canvas was still wet, I went over it with my light pink, making horizontal stripes. These are not perfect, and I didn’t want them to be. I don’t love that perfect look, but if you do…use painters tape and you can get those clean, crisp lines!

Next, I made horizontal stripes!

I went over both vertical and horizontal stripes again, just to reiterate the colors.

To get the true gingham/buffalo check look…I simply took the overlapping squares and painted them with a LITTLE bit darker shade of pink, to make them stand out more.

And then….I added GLITTER!!!!! (The very FINE glitter! That is the only kind that will give you this exact same look!)

You can’t tell me this didn’t take it up a whole new notch! SO pretty!

Now it’s time to start my colorful tree! This is very very easy, so don’t overthink it.

I simply made 2 vivid brush strokes going downward like the top of a tree…

and then I continued that down until I got to what I wanted my “bottom” to be. I alternated bright colors of my choice…

and then I began adding a little white to my brush to give them some highlights and variance!

I love how much variance they have now. It is really starting to come together!

At this point, I could have been finished…but I wasn’t! (And I personally LOVE the long skinny trunk….in green and not brown)

I decided to take some white tulip paint and add some 3-D fun to my tree! At first I felt like, “oh no! I have messed this up!!”…but once it dried and I put my bow on, I couldn’t imagine it any other way!