Adult Coloring…Who’s In?

I’m sure by now you’ve heard the latest trend.

It’s turned the chunky crayons and simple pages into something more sophisticated.

Oh yes, I’m talking about adult coloring books.

Usually when I tell people I have adult coloring books, I get one of two reactions:

“Me, too!!!”

or

“What? Is that like porn??”

For those that haven’t heard of it, once I explain, they typically want to try it. That’s how it happened for me.

I consider myself a “realistic” color-er, as in, leaves are green and bark is brown. The first piece I colored was what I thought was a yak. I don’t know if it actually is, but I was inspired by the pre-existing background shade.

I’ve been working on this Owl and Tree piece for months, learning to be more creative with my shading:

But recently I started finding images online of some coloring pages that were colored in a more interesting way, so I started experimenting.

Like this one I’m still working on, done in only shades of green and blue:

And this one, which I dubbed “Taste the Rainbow”:

I really love it when a hobby evolves and takes you outside of your comfort zone. It seems silly, but coloring things “unnatural” colors was kind of freeing. I’m like a total rebel. Don’t mess with me and my pencils.

Are any of you into coloring? What do you use to color? Pens? Pencils? Do you have a favorite brand? What books do you have?

I have Secret Garden and Enchanted Forest (just acquired) by Johanna Basford as well as the Art Therapy book from Posh. I think it will be years before I make a dent in these. Apparently I’m a fan of complete time suck hobbies like knitting and coloring. Basically I’ll do anything that lets me binge watch TV for hours on end. #truth