Christmas Coloring Book

This book was one I'd gotten several years ago as gifts for family, but ended up with an extra.

Vive Le Color! has some wonderful books, I think I've only got 2 myself, but think I've gotten a lot of different ones for family as gifts.  They're compact, the pages pull right out, and they are one sided on nice, thick paper.  Perfect for any kind of color medium.  The pages I'll share today I colored with different marker and gel pen sets.  I also took a picture of the cover with my hand so you can see just how small and easily portable it is, it'd fit into practically any handbag, carry on etc, so easily taken with you to appointments, on trips etc.  I will say this, since it is small, the small effects you do see can be VERY small indeed.  I used a magnifying glass on the one with the deer and snowflakes, just to try and be as precise as I could, but I also used gel pens which can at times come out faster than you expect so forgive yourself if you go out of lines.  Also, don't look at the pictures with a magnifying glass and maybe you won't see where I did hahahaha!  I'll post that one first since I already said what type medium was used.  I absolutely LOVE gel pens because they are so vivid and you can use the glitter and metallic colors for a deeper effect, but they do take a while to color because they take a little bit to dry.  I think you can just see behind the deer on the right what happens if you get it on your hand and lay it down on the page before it drys LOL there are little blue speckles behind her tail.

The ACTUAL first picture was Santa.  Since markers aren't usually my go to, I'm still learning with them.  The greys in his beard were a bit darkish, so he will simply be a younger version of himself LOL.  This marker set didn't have "fine" points but they did come to a sharper end, so you could still be mostly precise with them.

The next picture in the book was this lovely christmas tree, colored with two sided markers with a fine point side for more precision which was useful on the super small bits of this one.  I did misjudge some of the greens, so some decorations on the tree disappeared once the tree was colored in but that's ok, it's still a pretty tree. ;P

And lastly, the picture that shows just how portable the books are.  If you're hunting for one that would be easy to take with you everywhere, I'd encourage looking into these, there's probably a style for anyone.  Some I recall giving as gifts were flowers, and butterflies, as well as some that are stylized into iconic pictures depicting certain corners of the world.

As always, I hope you enjoyed what I've shared, now back to my coloring!!! Ciao!

Insomnia

Insomnia is a giant pain in the butt.

It's exhausting laying in bed for hours and hours trying to fall asleep with your eyes closed.  It's even MORE exhausting and emotionally draining as well as completely frustrating to chase your butt around the clock trying to get and maintain some semblance of normalcy.  It's lovely when I have a schedule where I wake even if it's early am, to have the majority of my waking hours be those of "normal" sleep.  That means making appointments, with agencies, doctors or even family is much easier, and then I feel great because I'm not letting others or myself down by not making my engagements.

When my sleep becomes erratic or even non existent, that's when I get angry, frustrated, anxious and even sad because I feel I'm letting other's down, and that's a horrible feeling.  Family, and loved ones are important to me, and naturally, it makes me feel like by letting them down, they might feel less than cherished by me, and nothing could be further from the truth.  I absolutely adore my family, and I feel blessed each and every day to have them in my life.

I do my best, even when my sleep is horrible, to try and still make my appointments, ESPECIALLY with family.  Sometimes, my body just says no, you can't do that right now, snoooooore.  While crashing for sometimes a day or so at a time can finally make you feel "rested" even that's exhausting since when you wake from such a state, you're dehydrated and groggy for much of the day afterward.  On the one hand it's like you're saying, yay I had sleep, but on the other it's like saying, geez I slept for THAT long?  How can I waste that much time sleeping all at once?  You lose days, and that's never something that's pleasant.

Some of my family has also has issues with this, but I pray every day that theirs improves and that it never gets as bad as what mine has developed into.

Hooray for Coloring!

I know it's been a little while since I've shared some coloring.

This time I'll be sharing some from an older book I've shared before, and also some pictures from a book I haven't shared yet but has been laying around for a while.  I have a few other books that are also laying around but I'll eventually get to them.  I've been occupying my time with several things so coloring has been slow and some projects that have taken time, so it's a good opportunity to illustrate that you don't have to color things all in one sitting.

The book that's been lying around for a while is by Kerby Rosanes.  This artist has a few, the one I had is the Mythomorphia one.  Basically it's full of mythical creatures, but also they have some morphology into other things in some pictures.  The other book is the one that came in a set of 3 from creatively calm studios.

Think I might do some holiday pictures since Tis the Season!!!  Enjoy, and as always feel free to share your art with me!