I began this project on Mother's Day. Well, the idea for the project began then. I had been busy drawing rough drafts for a series of drawings of Timberline I have wanted to do for a while. My grandson was looking at some of them and asked if he could help me color them in. In their rough draft form they resemble a pages from a coloring book so I decided to make a set for him to color in. That way he could enjoy some of the fun I was having and feel like he was part of the project. As I was working on them I showed some artist friends the collection I was developing. They suggested I publish a coloring book. I admit at first I was polite and replied sure, sounds like a good idea (all the while thinking it was a silly notion - I mean who makes coloring books, really?). I did a bit of research and to my surprise found coloring books are in Amazon's top ten selling categories. Apparently adult coloring book took off in popularity in recent years and reportedly publishers are having a hard time keeping up with demand. Of course that doesn't guarantee instant success but a coloring book could very well be a viable project. The only way I will know is to complete a set of drawings and see where it goes.
It's been a LOT of work but I've enjoyed every minute of it. I've gone back up to Timberline to check some of the details I didn't take pictures of the previous trip so I could make corrections before beginning to ink my drawings. I'm not trying to make them exact or precise but I don't want glaring errors because once this is published, it's permanent. I was concerned my preference for detail might not work for a coloring book but after doing some research, detail works in the adult coloring book range. I am hoping to have the inked version finished by the end of August and soon after the printed version will be done - just in time for the holidays. What I do know for sure is there isn't anything like this on the market. Could be a good thing, could be a bad thing. We'll see.
