Relieving Stress By Coloring

I never thought you could relieve stress when you color. I saw these post from others on coloring mandala designs and more. Well my daughter gave me a Christmas gift of crayons and 2 coloring books. Did not really pay attention to it. But one time during a whole day brown out, instead of getting frustrated I went to the balcony and bought the books and crayons. I started out with a simple flower. Got so engrossed that I did not know it was lunchtime already. I started out 8:30 am so in 3.5 hours I was occupied and not stressing.
So I slowly added to my books, bought more colored pencils and crayons. My younger brother sent me a box of 64 colors of crayola crayons! I remember this and it has it's own sharpener at the back. Brings back memories.

My daughter gave me the 12 colored pencils and the 24 colors crayola. I bought the 36 color peds and the 12 twistables colored pencils. My younger brother sent the 64 colors of crayola.

When you color, it is not the perfection you get but the satisfaction you feel when you made something colorful. I really need the high-end kind of colored pencils or crayons but I am happy with what I got.
I did a few colors. It is mostly during the brown outs we have that I can color. Since I can not use the computer, I can color outside,
There is also a color apps on the internet. I tried it. It was ok, got lots of colors and it comes out neat and in line. But I don't feel that much of a satisfaction I get when I color them myself, using physical effort.

These are my books. The first 2 are what my daughter gave me. more on flowers. So I bought the other 2 which has different designs. I started one on the mandala design but did not finish it yet.

So far I finished these three with the black background in the Midnight Garden book. It is not perfect nor the shading, but it is my work. Feels good to choose your color and rubbing it in. Relieves the stress. Kind of small but it makes you concentrate and you loose the track of time.

These are from the Full Bloom book. It has the name of the flower at the bottom so I can research and see what the color of the flower is supposed to be. Sometimes I follow and sometimes I make my own version or color.

See all the different colors and shades of the pencils and crayons. If I start the picture using crayons, I finish with crayons. I do not mix crayons and colored pencils. To me it won't match.

So now to make it easier, I place them all in a bag. Now I can just pick it up and go outside and color. It keeps everything in its place. I call it my "Anti-stress bag".

Maybe we should all have one so we don't stress often which is bad for the health. Since tomorrow we will have an 8am-4pm brown out or power failure, I will be outside coloring to my hearts content.

PICTURES ARE ALL MINE