Mom.com Features Color Me Happy and Color Me Grateful Among Best Coloring Books for Moms

I'm continuing to be amazed at where I find my books. Sometimes they are "new" finds for me, even though they've been online for a while. Here I found both "Color Me Grateful" and "Color Me Happy" on Mom.com's "Amazing and Beautiful Coloring Books for Moms." It's fun to discover, and I'm glad that people are still getting use from them! Thank you for featuring them!

https://mom.com/momlife/37353-amazing-beautiful-coloring-books-moms

The Huffington Post includes "Color Me Calm" and "Color Me Stress-Free" on Top 15 Coloring Book List

Both "Color Me Calm" and "Color Me Stress-Free" made Dr. Martinez's favorite 15 coloring books for the Huffington Post!

THE BLOG
My Top 15 Favorite Adult Coloring Books, and Why...
06/03/2016 11:28 am 11:28:13 | Updated Jun 03, 2016

Dr. Nikki Martinez, Psy.D., LCPC
Tele-health counselor for www.DrNikkiMartinez.com, Adjunct Professor, Consultant, and Writer

1. Mandalas to Color, Volume I, by colorit.com. Who does not love a Mandala? There is something about these intricate patterns that allows us to get lost in the beauty of them, and these are some of the best quality I have come across.

2. Outside the Lines, curated by Souris Hong-Porretta. If you are someone who is obsessed with the likes of Gary Baseman, Shepard Fairy, AIKO, Keith Haring, and more than 100 other artists, this is the book for you. Edgy and creative, the fun and complexity is attracting.

3. Dia De Los Muertos, Volume 1. 50 pages of Sugar Skulls. I am not sure about you, but I am in love with sugar skulls, the detail, the beauty, and the ability to make something dark, but beautiful. If you love them too, this is the book for you!

4. Color Me Calm, by Lacy Mucklow and Angela Porter. These two ladies truly came together to form a series of images that would calm even the most anxious person. They are lovely, original, and enjoyable for anyone who chooses to start with this.

5. Coloring for Grown-Ups, by Ryan Hunter and Taige Jensen are just plain fun. They are edgy, silly, and undeniably fun. A great gift for yourself or anyone with a great sense of humor. You will not only get lost in the coloring, you are bound to giggle as you do it.

6. Colorama Color Me Happy, Coloring Book, by Telebrands Press is a great book for anyone. They are clean, clear, and cheerful. A terrific book to get you started, and a gift that will be appreciated by anyone who receives them.

7. Colorful Flowers, Volume I, by colorit.com is a personal favorite. I will admit, I have a bias for varied and beautiful flowers, something I like to think I share with many. These books are not only beautiful, they are sturdy, high quality, and real remembrance that will hold up over time. While some books may be a few dollars cheaper, I think the quality more than makes up for it with these.

8. Breathe, Volume 3, by Angie Grace, These books are small, portable, and well done. The images are inventive engaging. A great book, at a wonderful price. A nice way to calm yourself for a small investment if you are starting out with adult coloring as a hobby.

9. The Tattoo Coloring Book, by Megamunden. If you are like me, and you love tattoos just as much as you love flowers, because aren’t we all eclectic? You will really enjoy this book. It has wonderful traditional tattoo designs for you to color the way you always want the professionals too when you watch them.

10. Outside the Lines, Too, Curated by Souris Hong. In the second installment of this series, you will not be let down with images created by the minds of another 100 imaginative minds. If you love the likes of Tim Biskup, Caroline Hwang, Jack Black, and many more, you will love every second you spend lost coloring this book.

11. Color Me Stress-Free, by Lacy Mucklow and Angela Porter. In another installment of this collaboration, the two come up with works that are bound to reduce stress, create relaxation, and foster creativity. I find the series to all be very well done.

12. Colorama, Flowers, Paisleys, Stained Glass and More, Coloring Book, by Bulbhead. Another simple, clean, and pretty book for the person who is looking to dip their toe in adult coloring. It also makes a wonderful stocking stuffer for any creative friend.

13. Calming Doodles, Volume I, by colorit.com. As mentioned before, a few of these, and a pack of colored pencils, make a really sharp gift. Not only are the pictures and books high quality, but they look like you have spent invested in this hobby for them. Fun, function, and flare, at its best!

14. Balance, Volume I, by Angie Grace. This is another book in her series, and carries the same portability, reduction of size, mixed with lovely images and centering coloring activities for the novice to the expert.

15. Calming Therapy, an Anti-Stress Coloring Book, by Hannah Davies, Richard Merritt, and Cindy Wilde. I saved one of my absolute favorites for last. This book helped me fill more hours than I can name during recovery from surgery. The book is sturdy and attractive, and the pictures are very engaging. You find yourself not wanting to walk away until you have finished a piece.

So there is my list of my 15 favorite books that I have come across, and that really help meet any interest, need, and function that they are intended for. Check them out online and see if any might be a good fit for you. Perhaps another book by one of these artists will be the right fit for you, or maybe a complete other book will be the one that touches a note with you. No matter what you choose, enjoy, relax, and regroup in a wonderful way.

Follow Dr. Nikki Martinez, Psy.D., LCPC on Twitter: www.twitter.com/DrNikkiMartinez

Bust out the Crayons: This New Adult Coloring Book Wants to Send You to Sleep

Here is an article I was interviewed for at VanWinkles.com about my latest coloring book, "Color Me to Sleep," since this magazine focuses on sleep-oriented information.

Bust out the Crayons: This New Adult Coloring Book Wants to Send You to Sleep

By Dan Katter • April 28, 2016 at 1:10pm

 

It happened suddenly, didn’t it? One day we were staring at a rather unextraordinary bestseller list and the next we were seeing adult coloring books amongst the James Pattersons and Jojo Moyes’ of the world. Now, the eyebrow-raising pastime that launched 1,000 thinkpieces, is a full-blown movement that shows no signs of slowing — as of this writing, two of the top five bestsellers on Amazon are adult coloring books. You can work your Crayolas to nubs coloring everything from bible verses and sea creatures to many, many books about swear words, all in the name of stress relief.

Today, Lacy Mucklow and Angela Porter, the prolific duo behind such bestsellers as “Color Me Calm” and “Color Me Happy” have released “Color Me to Sleep,” the first such adult coloring book designed to help readers wind down and achieve a good night’s rest. We spoke to Mucklow, an art therapist, about the coloring trend and why, exactly, scratching out a picture of an owl might make someone sleep better.

Why do you think adult coloring books are having such a moment right now?

Coloring books for adults have been around for years on a small scale, but I think the coloring books started becoming really popular about a year or two ago. Apparently, the trend really started to swell in France, and then started spreading around the global market My theory is that we’re more digitally minded than ever. A few years ago, owning a smartphone wasn’t an expected fact of life. Coloring books (along with board games and puzzles) are popular right now because it’s an interactive activity that doesn’t require a screen. At the same time, social media makes it easy to share your finished work.

Coloring helps tune out the chatter of the day by focusing the mind on a single activity.

On top of that, coloring gives each person the freedom to be creative and escape the stressors of the everyday. We see the joy and excitement that children have when they color a book with cartoon characters that they love, and we tend to get away from doing things like that when we’re adults. I also think that adults are interested in the books because it is an effective and innovative way to bond with people across generations. People have told me that coloring books have connected them with other adults, their children and their own, older parents. It’s nice to be able to put your phone away and enjoy down time with a shared experience.

Courtesy of Quarto Publishing

How is this book different than other coloring books for calmness? What makes it sleep-focused?

The templates of “Color Me to Sleep” center on the things that exemplify a good sleep: comfortable beds, cozy linens, warm beverages and fireplaces, starry skies, hot baths and whimsical fantasies. This helps colorers visualize positive sleep experiences for themselves. The patterns and shapes encourage people create a restful space, and the images infuse that space with a sleepy mentality.

What types of shapes and patterns promote a restful calm mind?

When it comes to relaxing, one of the most useful designs is the mandala. Cultures around the world use the mandala to guide meditation, and they were popularized in the west by Carl Jung after he included them in his theory of symbols and drew a mandala every day himself. Mandalas are highly symmetrical and emphasize circles, so they allow for creativity but also provide the guidance that people need to get going. Patterns found in nature make people feel comfortable, because they’re familiar. The Fibonacci sequence, for instance, appears on everything from seashells to pinecones and sunflowers. Fractals patterns, which you can see on snowflakes and ferns, can induce a meditative state through their repetition.

The Mandala featured in "Color Me to Sleep", Courtesy of Quarto Publishing

How do you think performing an activity like coloring prepare someone to go to sleep?

Coloring helps tune out the chatter of the day by focusing the mind on a single activity. The repetitive motion and detailed designs help induce a meditative state for most adults and allows them to tune the world out for a little while as they focus. Coloring engages the amygdala, the “fight- or-flight” part of the brain, and gives it permission to let its guard down.

The patterns and shapes encourage people create a restful space, and the images infuse that space with a sleepy mentality.

Are there any particular colors you recommend using for a good night's sleep?

A person’s color choice can even affect their mood, and every color has its own “energy” that can calm someone down or excite them. Though it varies by culture, cooler colors tend to reduce energy, while warmer colors tend to increase energy. Bright colors tend to bring more intense feelings, while pastel or darker colors communicate softer energy. So for winding down for a good night's sleep, cooler, darker, and pastel colors are likely to be the most effective. However, the most important thing when coloring is to figure out which colors you find pleasant and soothing and then incorporate them into your palate.

Courtesy of Quarto Publishing

Did you design the templates to be monotonous, in hopes of lulling colorers to sleep?

The repetitive designs of a mandala can be lulling to some people, but we also include many scenic and representational pictures that show a variety of different designs. The idea of the book isn’t to bore people to the point of passing out, but to help them put aside their stressors and encourage thoughts of restfulness and comfort.

Would it be wise for parents to incorporate coloring into their child's bedtime routine?

This is absolutely something that can be incorporated into a nighttime routine with children. Though "Color Me to Sleep" in particular may be more advanced for some children to use themselves, parents can use it to color with their children in their own coloring books as to wind down for the evening together. Many children actually prefer to color before bed rather than hear a bedtime story. It is definitely a method worth exploring its effectiveness for a better night's sleep.

Experts Warn Adult Coloring Books Are Not Art Therapy

As an art therapist and author of adult coloring books, I anticipated this subject being broached at some point, especially since some coloring books are titles with "Art Therapy" in their name.  Coloring most definitely has its benefits, in allowing people to de-stress and calm themselves in an easily accessible manner.  But as I have made clear in many interviews, coloring is good for everyday maintenance, but it is not clinical art therapy and is not a substitute for professional help when needed.

ART WORLD 

Experts Warn Adult Coloring Books Are Not Art Therapy 

 Sarah Cascone, Friday, August 7, 2015

An adult coloring book. 

Photo: Passion for Pencils, YouTube screenshot.

Experts are questioning the therapeutic benefits of adult coloring books, one of 2015's biggest and perhaps most-unexpected art trends, widely touted for its stress-relieving benefits.

According to Jo Kelly, president the Australian and New Zealand Arts Therapy Association, however, adult coloring books are no replacement for an in-the-flesh art therapist.

"An arts therapist is a qualified, trained individual who helps people and uses creative processes," insisted Kelly to ABC. She admits that by encouraging people to set time aside for their own enjoyment, adult coloring books have their benefits, "but to sort of suggest that it's a sort of creative art expression, you're actually using other people's designs—why not make your own?"

Color Me Stress Free. 

Photo: courtesy Race Point Publishing.

Publisher's Weekly traces the current popularity of coloring books for adults back to 2012, when Art-thérapie: 100 Coloriages anti-stress, by Hachette Pratique, was published in France. The first book to really hit the mainstream, however, was Johanna Basford's Secret Garden: An Inky Treasure Hunt & Coloring Book, currently Amazon's number one best-seller in self-help books.

The follow-up from the so-called "queen of coloring," Enchanted Forest, was released in February, and a third volume, Lost Ocean, is slated for an October release. Even fantasy author George R.R. Martin is getting in on the action, with plans to release a Game of Thrones coloring book.

"We've never seen a phenomenon like it in our thirty years of publishing. . . . Just can't keep them in print fast enough," Lesley O'Mara, the managing director Michael O'Mara Books, which has no less than 24 adult coloring book titles, told the New Yorker.

An illustration from Johanna Basford's Enchanted Forest. 

Photo: Johanna Basford.

The San Jose Mercury News recently counted coloring books as part of an "ever-growing list of kid things co-opted by adults (video games, mini golf, Legos, Pez dispensers)," but adult coloring books are often marketed based on their therapeutic value.

There is Color Therapy: An Anti-Stress Coloring Book, and Adult Coloring Book: Stress Relieving Patterns, Amazon's top seller in Graphic Design Color Use. The Zen Coloring Book series, which includes Color Me Happy and Color Me Calm, is actually authored by art therapist Lacy Mucklow, with art by Angela Porter.

"We imagined the books would appeal to adults looking to relax. But we never expected the responses we've received from people battling serious medical conditions," editorial director Jeannine Dillon told PW of the Zen series, which sold over 275,000 copies over just six months this year.

Susanne Fincher, art therapist and author of the Coloring Mandalas series, sees coloring books as a useful supplement to art therapy treatment. They "can empower a client to manage thoughts and feelings on their own with the positive activity of coloring, instead of, for example, overeating or abusing substances," she said to CNN.

Coloring a postcard by adult coloring book queen Johanna Basford. 

Photo: Susan Tripp Pollard, courtesy Bay Area News Group.

The PTSD Survivors of America, in particular, have embraced the trend, hosting a nationwide "Color Across America for PTSD Awareness" event on August 2, National Coloring Book Day.

Erin Maynard, the organization's president, credits coloring books with counteracting the hyperactivity of the region of the brain called the amygdala, which controls the fear response. "Coloring actually reduces the activity of the amygdala, so that's part of the reason that it helps calm you down," she told the Lancaster Bee.

"Adult coloring is absolutely a growing trend and consumers are really taking to the idea," Matthew Lore, of the Experiment publishing group, which released The Mindfulness Colouring Book in January, said to CNN. "Not only is it calming and good for your health, it's just fun!"

But how much can coloring books really do for your mental well-being?

"It's a nice technique really that some art therapists sometimes use as a way to get started with someone, but art therapy is a lot more involved than that," Jane O'Sullivan, who runs the masters in mental health program at the University of Queensland warned ABC. "I think if someone was to say coloring-in books are art therapy, [that] is not accurate."

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