Do you love to color? Have you discovered how relaxing it can be? When I started drawing coloring pages and books, it was a way for me to share my art with more people than just the fam. But once I got into it, I realized what a great stress reliever it was! I just relaxed every time I took up my pencil and started to draw—at home and in restaurants, back in the day when you could go into restaurants.
(I miss restaurants)
Side note: Eating out has always been one of my husband’s and my “things.” Sometimes we played Words with Friends with each other on our phones (hey, it’s no different from game night at home 😏) and sometimes I drew while we talked. Covid put a crimp in our style, but I keep telling myself it won’t be long till we can eat out (inside) again! Sometimes I listen to myself when I tell myself things like this, and sometimes I don’t. 🤷🏼♀️ Meanwhile, we will continue eating in our car at the park and watching the ducks. Or outdoors at the restaurant.
In addition to being relaxing, drawing inspires me. When I transitioned to drawing on my iPad instead of inking my pencil drawings, I found a more productive way to draw. It’s still my creativity and inspiration, and it still has the same de-stressing effect. But the great thing is that the whole process of drawing printable coloring pages takes less time because each picture is printer-ready as a digital file when I finish it. I sell mostly pictures to download and print yourself on Etsy, but I have a couple of things on Amazon, too. I have copied a few of the reviews I’ve gotten on Etsy below this post so you can see what colorists are saying about my art.
Related post: Q and A with a Coloring a book artist—me!
Teamwork!
I love the collaboration between artist and colorists. I love providing the inspiration for color artists. Coloring is not my gift (do I really have to stay in the lines?), but I love being in partnership with the colorists to create the finished product from my art. I’ve had my pictures colored with colored pencils, markers, glitter markers, and digitally. Each colorist interprets the pictures with their own unique creativity, and I love it! The colored pics I’m showing in this post were done by my colorist friends.
Spring Mill Art Designs
This is part of my bio for my Etsy shop, which will give you a little more insight into my art.
I think I have the soul of an artist.
Creativity is part of my makeup. Ideas for using my creativity are constantly flying around in my brain! It gets quite busy in there. One of the creative things I’ve always enjoyed is drawing and painting, and I’ve even done some terra cotta sculpting. I painted mostly for myself and my family, and my style seems to have a little “Grandma Moses” in it, according to those who have seen it. But I don’t actually like to stick with just one style–I love to try different ways to create with art.
My favorite things to draw
You’ll find some common themes running through my pictures, reflecting some particular interests of mine. First and foremost is illustrations of scriptures and words of faith. I also enjoy drawing pictures which include the “I love you” asl sign, because I am an interpreter for the deaf and want them to be represented in my work. As a cancer survivor, I like to include awareness ribbons and encouragement for those who are fighting, for the survivors, and for those who love them. And lastly, a fleur de lis is part of our family coat of arms and is a fun personal symbol I like to include in some of my pictures.
You + Me
I think that line artists and colorists are the perfect team. I am fascinated with the many different ways a picture can be interpreted by the colors chosen and the style used. I am in total awe of the talent, patience, and hard work shown by colorists–all those layers! I would love to see every one of my pictures come to life with color!
I hope you enjoy my pictures. Please post your completed art on my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/SpringMillArtDesigns, so I can admire and share your work!
From my artist soul to your artist soul, here’s to our teamwork!
Coloring is good for you!
Coloring (or drawing coloring pages in my case) can be therapeutic. Some therapists even recommend it or prescribe it for their patients. Friends in the coloring groups I belong to report that coloring not only helps with stress relief, but also with pain management, anxiety and depression, eye-hand-coordination after a stroke, and distraction from their problems, to name a few benefits. This has become an overarching inspiration for me as I draw coloring pages. If my art can help someone cope with their stress or forget their pain while they color, that makes me very happy.
According to Beaumont Health,
“Coloring has the ability to relax the fear center of your brain, the amygdala. It induces the same state as meditating by reducing the thoughts of a restless mind. This generates mindfulness and quietness, which allows your mind to get some rest after a long day at work.” The two hemispheres of the brain have to work together—the logic part to help color in the lines (Or not! Your choice!) and the creative part to choose the colors.
“Coloring requires you to focus, but not so much that it’s stressful. It opens up your frontal lobe, which controls organizing and problem solving, and allows you to put everything else aside and live in the moment, generating focus.”
You…are…getting…sleepy…
It’s also a good way (along with reading) to relax your mind before sleep without having the negative impact of electronics on your melatonin. Translation: it can help you sleep! All the current wisdom says if you’re having trouble sleeping you should turn off all electronics at least an hour before you want to go to sleep. So…enter coloring. You haven’t lived until you’ve fallen asleep in the middle of coloring a picture. Fair warning—it usually takes your coloring outside of the lines! But you can rest assured that you’ve been creative even in your sleep.
In focus
Mindfulness in coloring means that the focus on something that’s in your control can take your mind off the things in your life that are not in your control. You have control over the medium, the colors, the tools, and the techniques you use. If you haven’t tried it, you might want to give it a shot. Worst case scenario is you color outside the lines, which is another way to say you march to the beat of a different drummer, you’re your own person! Good stuff! And best case scenario, you have created peace for yourself. And art that you brought to life to hang on your wall!
If you color, I’d love for you to share your art in the comments or on my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/SpringMillArtDesigns. If you don’t color YET, I’d love to see your art when you start—you know you want to. 😉 Color for inspiration. For therapy. For stress relief. To complete the picture. Color for fun! Color because the world needs more color! Just color!
Here’s to coloring our world,
Disclaimer: my individual pages have gone up from $1.50 to $2.00 as you can see in the reviews below. But I’ve created a coupon code SAVE15 especially for you to receive a 15% discount on your purchases in my Etsy shop, SpringMillArtDesigns.Etsy.com.
