How to easily make a Shabby Style painting

Good evening to everyone, today I will show you how to make a small "Shabby Style" painting in just some simple steps.
Shabby style defines a type of interior design aimed at giving the impression that the house decorations are old and very used, even when they are actually fresh new.
In this modern age of cold and aseptic furniture, it's comforting to look at some old fashioned paintings.

To make the painting you'll need the following:

• Some paintbrushes (I used size 6 and size 12);
• A canvas (In this tutorial I used a 20x30cm one);
• Acrylic paint of whichever colors you like the most, but keep in mind that they need to have pastel tones and a matte texture (I added a hint of ivory to every color to achieve this effect).

Before starting, remember to always make a sketch of your painting on paper using a pencil, paper sheets are less expensive than canvases.

First thing, you need to paint the background on the canvas with your favorite color (I used ivory and umber) using a kind of large paintbrush. Be sure to make it as uniform as possible.

Next, paint and fill the outline of some flowers and petals using the color you thinks suits best (I used a mix of ivory and peach). Place them wherever you like, the art is in the artist's style.

Now, just as before, add the branches and the leaves of your flowers. I personally recommend to mix ivory and a dark grey to paint the leaves, while umber is used for the branches. Let the paint dry for some minutes.

By adding a bit of black paint to every color you used before, paint some shadows on your flowers in order to give depth to the painting.

Using ivory, paint the highlights in order to make the painting as realistic as possible. After this step let the paint dry.

As a final step, take a pencil and enhance the outlines of every element while also adding a couple of final details.

Now you can hang it in your living room and enjoy a cup of tea thinking about simpler times.