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How to make faux oranges

You might be thinking to yourself, why would anyone want to make, or have the need to make faux oranges? Well, I  have  project coming up later this month that is going to answer that question for you! I know, this seems like one of those super-weird, has she lost it, projects, kind of like when I made this.

It’s much easier that you think, and it was kind of fun to see how close to the real thing I could get. I used a real tangerine I had on hand to pick out the paint colors.

I am going to throw out a disclaimer for this post… these are fake oranges. As delicious as they look, don’t eat them. Keep them out of reach of children, who just might take a bite. I mean, my kids still put stuff in their mouth that they aren’t supposed to, and they are teenagers. If I have to yell at one more person to get a gross earphone cord out of their mouth I’m am gonna lose it.

Use a hard foam craft ball to use as abse for a faux orange

I bought hard foam balls at the craft store in the floral supply section. These are about a 3 inch ball. You could do real life sizes citrus-size foam balls, for the project I want to use these for, this was a better size.

Cover your foam ball in Paper clay, pressing the clay into the grooves. I really smooshed it in and smoothed it out a bit. You don’t want to cover them 100% so they’re smooth, and it’s ok to leave a little bit of the original foam showing.

Let you paper clay foam balls to harden and dry

Let the clay dry all of the way. I let mine dry over night  to make sure all of the moisture was out.

Paint a dark orange paint onto faux oranges

I first painted mine with a dark reddish-orange paint as a first layer.

Paint a medium orange paint

Then I added a brighter orange paint over the top.

LIghtly paint over faux orange with a green paint

Finally, to give then that touch of  “real” citrus flair, I dry-brushed on some green paint to complete my faux oranges.

green paint to make faux oranges

I used a real tangerine for reference. I think it turned out to look fairly realistic! I had a few spots where the paint lifted where my fingers were holding the not yet dry fruit. I’ll go back and touch up once they dry. Sometimes if you put wet on wet paint, it just keeps lifting it and it gets a bit on the frustrating side.

I can’t wait to share what I am going to use these for. It’s something that is a little different for me, and outside of the box!

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