Easy Painted Pumpkins

By The editors of MidwestLiving.com
Updated September 03, 2020

Create easy painted pumpkins using stencils, doilies, printed patterns or just your own imagination!

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Lace works

Doilies used as stencils give a lacy look to orange pumpkins in the entry.

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Patterned pumpkins

Credit: Jay Wilde

Painted geometric patterns and a gold stem create eye-catching pumpkins.

Start with a white faux pumpkin or by painting your pumpkin white. Then, apply stripes of acrylic paint in black, tangerine, blue, lime, purple and orange. Gold metallic fabric paint with a painting tip can be used to outline bands and add fine lines and dots. One-step liquid gold-leaf paint turns the stem into a sparkling crown.

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Inspired design

A pretty set of pottery inspired the painted color and simple designs on these pumpkins.

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Painted squirrel

Use our pattern to trace the outline of this bushy-tailed woodland creature, then fill in the shape with black acrylic paint. Download free pattern PDF. 

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Painted leaf art

Painted designs put the spotlight on your unusual squash or pumpkin cultivars, like this striking blue-green Jarrahdale pumpkin. Start with one that is clean and dry. Lightly sand the surface and apply paint sealer to prevent flaking. Create a design with stencils and acrylic paint, such as the leaf stencil and orange and white paints used here, then finish with a top-coat sealer.

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Dotted pumpkin

Decorate a natural or artificial pumpkin with painted-on dots for a playful look. To create dots, use the eraser end of a pencil or the rounded end of a paint brush.

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Go batty

Painted bats (or bats cut from black construction paper) look spooky on your doorstep or inside.

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Plaid pumpkin

A pretty painted plaid design gives this pumpkin a rustic look.

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Candy corn pumpkins

Create these cute, almost-good-enough-to-eat pumpkins with spray paint.

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Black magic

Create black-and-orange etched designs on three or four pumpkins for a bewitching display. Carve out one to hold a vase full of flowers.

To start, spray-paint the pumpkins a matte black finish. (Protect the stems with tape.) When the pumpkins are dry, use a paring knife to scrape away the painted surface in vertical or horizontal lines. Or etch a simple shape or pattern, such as the sunflower or a zigzag.

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Simple stencil

A simple but elegant painted stencil decorates this pumpkin.

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Birdbath buddy

A painted crow makes an appropriate Halloween appearance in a birdbath lined with twigs or a grapevine wreath in this easy DIY fall decoration.

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Light touch

Just a bit of pattern enhances this white 'Lumina' pumpkin; simple black accents look great on orange pumpkins, too.

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Painted mice

Black- or orange-painted mice skitter across pumpkins.

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Welcome pumpkin

Put together a Halloween outdoor display like this one—featured on a Midwest Living® cover—using a weathered wheelbarrow as a base.Stuff the bottom of the wheelbarrow with newspaper. Add a mix of pumpkins, gourds, fall leaf branches and bittersweet vines. Paint a friendly message on your pumpkins, if you like.

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Cool cat

A painted black cat chases three mice on pumpkins lined up atop an outdoor wall. Get shapes from clipartguide.com or another website. Print, cut out, and tape to pumpkin. Trace around shape, remove paper, then paint inside your lines.

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Caterpillar pumpkins

A curving line of green-painted pumpkins forms a fun caterpillar. Decorate painted pumpkins with adhesive-felt dots, and add googly eyes and pipe cleaner antennae to the head.

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By The editors of MidwestLiving.com