Definition

1. Adjective:
   • Having a color resembling a blush; rosy, pinkish: Describes something that is of a soft, warm pink or reddish hue, similar to the color of a human cheek when blushing.
   • Showing blushes; red-faced from emotions: Describes a person whose face has become reddened due to feelings of embarrassment, shame, shyness, agitation, or other emotional upset.

Usage Examples

• Adjective:
  • The sky at dawn was a blushful pink. (The sky had a soft, rosy color.)
  • She felt blushful when everyone turned to look at her. (Her face turned red from self-consciousness.)
  • The blushful mists hung over the valley. (The mists had a reddish-pink color.)

Advanced Usage

• Poetic/Literary Use: The word is often used in poetic or descriptive literary contexts to evoke a sense of delicate color or modest emotion.
  • He wrote a sonnet to her blushful cheek. (He wrote a poem about her rosy, perhaps shyly reddened, cheek.)

Variants and Related Words

• Blush (verb/noun): To become red in the face; the reddening itself.
  • She could feel a blush rising to her cheeks.
• Blushing (adjective): The more common adjective meaning "red-faced from emotion."
  • The blushing bride smiled.
• Blush (noun): Can also refer to a rosy color or a cosmetic.
  • She applied a pink blush to her cheeks.

Synonyms

• Rosy: Having a pink or reddish color.
• Flushed: Reddened, especially in the face.
• Red-faced: Having a red face, typically from emotion.
• Crimson: Of a deep red color; can also imply blushing deeply.

Antonyms

• Pale: Lacking color, especially in the face.
• Pallid: Unnaturally or unhealthily pale.
• Unabashed: Not embarrassed or disconcerted.

Related Idioms/Phrases

• To spare someone's blushes: To avoid causing someone embarrassment.
  • He changed the subject to spare her blushes.
• (As) red as a beetroot: Very red in the face from embarrassment (a more informal synonym for the state of being blushful).
  • When he realized his mistake, he went as red as a beetroot.

Adjective

1. of blush color
   • blushful mists
2. having a red face from embarrassment or shame or agitation or emotional upset
   • the blushing boy was brought before the Principal
   • her blushful beau
   • was red-faced with anger