Colouring books have become popular these days.
For a very long time I had no interest in them, despite buying them to try them out.
Until I became interested.
I have a number of those at home and recently decided to start using them mainly for wellbeing reasons (rest, relaxation, decreasing stress, etc).
THIS POST USES AFFILIATE LINKS. FIND OUT MORE ABOUT OUR AFFILIATE DISCLOSURE HERE
The one I’m working through at the moment is the below colouring book called Cottage Vibes and designed by Southern Lotus:
I picked it because of its theme. I love rustic aesthetic, so you bet if I see the word cottage, that will be my pick.
This is a sweet little colouring book whose format is such that it makes the experience of colouring easy and smooth.
The art inside looks excessively cute but it’s also suitable for adults. Some people use alcohol based markers to colour this, I use coloured pencils. I’ve had those pencils for quite some time and had never truly used them. But colouring this little book is seriously getting me now to develop an appreciation for them.
Initially I had bought several packs of coloured pencils, cheap ones and more pricy ones. But as I got into colouring more seriously recently, I binned the cheap ones because they just lack everything in my opinion. They may look nice to the eye but I didn’t find them useful for colouring. The sets I chose to keep and that I love are the Prismacolor pencils and the Faber Castell pencils. These two sets are a joy to work with because they have rich pigments. I bought them over the years, so I do have a few of them. But just so that you see what they look like, I picked 2 packs from Amazon for you below (these coloured pencils are fairly easy to recognize due to their look):
I have to say that when I think about colouring pencils, I often associate it with Emily Schofield, a British illustrator whose style and art has inspired me in the past. I particularly loved this video below where she uses coloured pencils to draw a little rustic scene that I absolutely love. She also does beautiful collage art that is quite unique.
So far I’ve managed the below pages:
I enjoy the fact that I do have creative freedom when colouring these pages. For instance, above I chose to give her a green gingham dress and I also made the napkin under the baked pie a gingham one. As you guessed, I love gingham patterns. It forces my brain to also figure combinations of colours that won’t look too off next to one another. I’m sure my mind must be learning something somehow even if I do not set out to learn anything here.
There’s a third page that I started recently, so the colouring adventures continue.
So far, I’m enjoying the colouring experience. It helps my mind switch off. Therefore, I shall continue.
Alex
