How To Instructions For A Dala Horse Painting

SUPPLIES NEEDED:

1, 8x10 inch canvas panel

paint brushes

water to rinse off paintbrushes

rags 

cotton swabs (to clean up mistakes)

pencil

ruler

Acrylic Paints:

red

white

yellow 

blue 

green

1, 8x10 inch frame

STEP 1. Base coat canvas panel in a very light yellow. Mix in white if your yellow is too dark or bright.

STEP 2. draw or trace the horse shapes that you want to use. I've used 4 here but the number and type of horses you want is up to you.

STEP 3. Paint the horses red.

STEP 4. Draw very light vertical pencil lines. I used one inch, two inches and then one all of the way across.

STEP 5. Paint a blue stripe over the lines.

STEP 6. Use a round brush to add red dots about 1/4 inch over the blue lines.

 STEP 7. Add yellow to horses as shown. It may take up to 3 coats to cover the red.

STEP 7. Add blue dots as shown to belly and chest straps.

ADD OTHER DETAILS AS SHOWN:

STEP 8. yellow dots in the center of the red ones on background.

STEP 9: green comma strokes to frame red dots on background.

STEP 10. yellow dots inside the blue ones on the horses.

STEP 11. Long comma strokes in red and blue on the yellow mane

STEP 12. white comma stokes on each side of blue dots

STEP 13. Paint saddle area as shown. Kurbits in Blue and Green accented by comma strokes in red, yellow, blue and white.

STEP 14. Bridal and reins in white.

I was really pleased with the way this one worked out and best of all the stripes line up perfectly when used as a repeat pattern while designing fabric and other products with it.

Many of my results are for sale at zazzle on hundreds of different products that you may enjoy.

Dala Horses for Christmas

I really enjoy my Dala Horses at Christmas. I give some for gifts, put any of the ornaments that didn't sell on my Christmas tree and use the few horses that I still own as part of my Holiday Decor.

What's your favorite thing to do with your horses this time of year?

I think they really add to the mood and the charm of the season, don't you?

 We decided to use an old fiber optic tree this year because there just isn't room for a real tree in a tiny house.

I try never to do any 2 horses the same. Mixing designs and pattern keeps things more interesting, don't you think so?

Most of my other decorations are just bits of paper and old photos. Not only is it inexpensive. They don't take any storage place as I just toss anything that didn't last well and put other ones up as I sort through my photos each year.

It gives me a chance to scan a lot of the older ones and use up any that I don't plan to keep.

Rocking the Dala Horse

One of my sisters rescued this little rocking horse from a thrift store and the old wood finish just wasn't nice enough to keep.

As long as it needed painting I couldn't resist turning it into a dala Horse.

I was so excited to see how it would turn out that I totally forgot to take "before" pictures.

This will be a fun addition to anyone's collection, don't you think so?

Design for a red horse step by step

STEP # 1. Basecoat your project red.

STEP # 2. Add pale green dots.

STEP # 3. Begin adding white strokes and dots.

At This point on a horse I add another color dot to the center of the light green dot.

When using this design for other projects I add more dots and details.

I start with the blue dots and brushstrokes.

And finish with the yellow dots.

Feel free to play with the colors and change this design up in any way that you want to. The possibilities are endless.

Julia's Newest, Latest Dala Horse Designs

This season has a lot of classic design elements but the focus is on a playful placement of coma stokes in both the mane and around the saddle area. These shoot off in all directions to infuse the designs with an energy that they didn't have before.

On this ornament in addition to the coma strokes I painted a few daisies to lighten and brighten up the design.

For the next one I used a darker red and a few other brushstrokes to change things up a bit.

I felt that this design got a bit too busy so I made the next red horse quite a bit more simple.

I also came up with a couple of designs on white horses to keep things interesting.

This blue horse design was simply painted in my sketchbook and hasn't been carved into wood yet.

I'm hoping that this mixed media design will look great on products like greeting cards, wrapping paper and fabric. Depending on how those work out I may try it on other products too.

I added a border when I put it on a card and I liked it even better.

Here is how the new horses look with the rest of my collection.

I had just a few horses left and couldn't resist painting them up too.

This last picture is actually the green and yellow horses together shot with a different filter. somehow it turned them all the same shade of orange which offers even more possibilities. 

Ideas for Dala Horses from Painted Deck Posts

I never get tired of finding different variations for the designs that I use.

Whenever I'm stuck for ideas on color combinations or patterns to use on Dala horses I just go up and down the ramp and look things over until the ideas begin to pop.

It's a great source of reference material because each of the designs that I've tried has been done in an assortment of colors of different backgrounds so I can just see what works best together.

Both of these photos were taken on the same day. We woke up to snow but by 2:00 in the afternoon it had gone again.

The green post was designed and painted by my sister and fellow artist Becca.

Here there are posts painted by a couple of my sisters along with the ones that I have painted.

Can you see the thread that ties these projects together?