This Grandma keeps a large box of art supplies in the house. I include crayons, markers, colored pencils, water paints and blanks sheets of paper as well as a variety of coloring books. The grandchildren play a while on this old fashioned method of creativity, but invariably go to the myriad of apps on their I pads to color. The youngest loves the app, Wheels on the Bus, which allows coloring of the bus. You can explore on line with the preschooler grandchild, but note that some of the child coloring apps use a lot of memory.
It seems, however, that coloring books for adults are the new craze. On Amazon’s best seller list, seven of the books in the top twenty are coloring books, according to a Entertainment Weekly summer issue article by Isabella Bienhenharn, “Dust off Those Crayons and Felt-Tip Markers.”
The article made me smile. We are regressing as adults. Not only regressing to be creative and back to childhood, but as “a reaction to a screen-weary culture, hungry for a tactile experience.” It seems computers have taken over our lives, at work and at home, and we want an outlet away from computers. This Grandma wonders how long it will take for the grandchildren to regress back to using real crayons and markers as preferable to using their fingers on a screen!
Should we do this? Why not try. The new coloring books are made mostly for adults, not children. They enable us to complete our own drawings. Interesting enough, the top sellers advertise the adult coloring books as stress relievers. Here is the best of the best according to Amazon:
The number one best seller is “Adult Coloring Book: Stress Relieving Patterns Paperback.”
For just a small investment, a lot less than an hour with a therapist, the book advertises fantastic flowing artwork.
The number two best seller contains animals to color, so it seems that the books are gender neutral, although it seems more women than men are reaching for the colored pencils. The lion on the cover of “Adult Coloring Book: Stress Relieving Animal Designs” is magnificent. You can find adult coloring books for cats, and other specific animals of interest. If you want to experiment first, websites have printable adult coloring pages. Try these zen stress reliever ones first, of course.
But this blog and this post is really about grandparents and grandchildren doing things together. Grandma can buy the same coloring book for herself and a grandchild over age eight with “Secret Garden: An Inky Treasure Hunt and Coloring Book Paperback,” by Johanna Basford.
This book has everything to keep you and a grandchild interested–animals hidden in the pictures to find and pictures left to be completed by the artist.
What supplies do you need in addition to the coloring book? One of the reviewers of Secret Garden had the best advice:
“This is the list of items I use for coloring all the beautiful intricate details of this amazing coloring book. I keep my colored pencils sharpened and pointy to be able to color tiny areas of the designs.”
* Prismacolor Premier Soft Core Colored Pencils. * Prismacolor Premier Verithin Colored Pencils. * Pilot G2 07 Fine Point Retractable Gel Ink Pens-Multiple Color 20 pen pack. * Small Aluminum handheld pencil sharpener * Sanford Peel-off Magic Rub #1960 Eraser. What does this really do for us all? “When you’re completing something in a structured way, you feel gratified, and that raises your serotonin levels,” according to art therapist Linda Turner. Boosting serotonin levels is advertised as a way to lose weight, decrease anxiety and depression, increase energy levels or just generally look and feel healthier.
This new wave of coloring is a great activity for grandma and grandchild and another way for us to connect and share the
Joy,
Mema
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