Colouring books for grown-ups

Dear friends, 

I am SO excited!

As a girl I loved to colour in, spent hours doing it. 

Then I grew up and that was the end of colouring. 

However I have discovered that you can now buy colouring books designed particularly for adults and once again I can colour-in, in fact encouraged to colour in!!

JOY.

And here is my first attempt after all these years. No bad!

There are lots available with both Amazon and the Book Depository selling a large range and to my pleasure, so does my local independent bookstore. The Secret Garden by Johanna Bamford is one worth looking at (and the one I bought). If you visit Pinterest and type in her name and book you will see lots of examples of her drawings, such as the picture below.  Many are bought by embroider who convert these beautiful ink drawings into masterpieces. 

According to a recent article by The Guardian, those who colour in, find it calming, soothing and it has therapeutic qualities. In France, these colouring books are outselling cookbooks!! So if you loved colouring as a child and still have a secret desire to colour-in as an adult, do have a look for them. 

Its fun, its good for the brain, its relaxing (listen to music as you colour makes it even more enjoyable), it creative, its good for your health and its harmless - what more could you ask for!! And its not overly expensive - all you need is some coloured pencils, a sharpener and pictures to colour (and they can be printed freely from the net if you want to).

This is one I started whilst I was on hold for 30 mins on the phone waiting to speak to an operator. It passed the time and I didn't mind waiting quite so badly!!

My 22 year old son asked for colouring book - he loves it. Only the other night he spent an 1 1/5 colouring in and didn't even realise the time had past. He is finding it very calming which really helps his anxiety and fears and sleeps better at night. I gave one to my daughter-in-law for Christmas. She was excited about starting.

Its one of those simple pleasures we should get back to. As the lady in my local bookstore told me, it isn't the finished product that is important, its the process and I think that is true. 

If you don't want to buy the books, Pinterest has many great colouring-in pictures that print well and brings hours of enjoyment. 

I really like these ones and if printing them off, would use textas instead of pencils. 

*****