Last children’s coloring book review

Recently I received a third children’s coloring book from BBNC Publishers: Little Pony, for which I’d like to thank them. This is the last one and then I’ve completed the task of reviewing children’s books. In a recent blog I’ve explained that coloring in children’s books is not what makes me happy.

This Little Pony coloring book measures about 27,5 x 21 centimeter and it contains nearly 50 different drawings. The book has white paper and it’s double-sided printed.

On the internet I read the description of this book, and it said that it contains extra thick paper which makes it suitable to use a lot of materials for coloring. Therefore I started coloring for this review with high hopes.

Little Pony Tail

The first drawing that I started was a cute little pony. Such a pony as you’ll find in toy stores ever since the eighties. Made of soft plastic and with ‘real’ hair. For this drawing I’ve chosen to work with my sharpies, to color a sugar sweet pony.

It was kind of a ‘quickie’, since I didn’t spend a lot of time on this one. I fluttered a bit with the markers and pretty soon I felt it was enough. Unfortunately I had to sacrifice the sweet little baby pony on the backside of the page.

Paper test

I mentioned it earlier, that I was very curious about that specially announced ‘extra thick paper’. The bleeding through from the Sharpies wasn’t the paper’s fault. That’s just inherent to alcohol markers, you just know they always bleed through. Guaranteed. But what about normal water based felt tip pens, or working with a water brush?

To take the acid test I decided to use the Caran d’Ache Neocolor II crayons for the next drawing. These are water-soluble oil and wax based crayons. They’re rich pigmented, therefore you’ll get lovely deep colors when you dissolve them with a tiny bit of water. No need to soak it, adding minimal moisture with a small paintbrush or water brush is enough. So that’s what I’ve tried to do.

Extra thick paper, or secretly not?

I picked a nice drawing and started full of good cheer. Soon I saw that the minimum of water that I used created lumps in the paper. And I noticed that the paper did suck up more fluid than it should. That probably caused the lumps and made the green of the pony’s body blotchy. Like it was colored in with a bad felt tip pen.

I later corrected that by going over the green with a soft green Spectrum Noir Sparkle glitter brush marker. Oh by the way… those Sparkles are fun!

The so called ‘extra thick paper’ was in the end not very good for working with moisture. Although I haven’t tried felt tip pens, after the markers and water-soluble crayons I dare to conclude that the paper isn’t fit for felt tip pens either. Especially for children, of whom most are not that patient as (some of us) adults.

Children will put layer over layer with felt tip pens and this paper just can’t handle that. Feeling this paper, I guess it’s about 90 gsm, not much thicker than a sheet of printing paper, I do wonder with what they compared this paper to conclude that it’s ‘extra thick’? Blotting paper?

In that case they’re correct. But it’s definitely not thicker than e.g. the paper that Createspace uses for coloring books on Amazon.

It would be nice if children could be able to have coloring books on real thick paper as well. I’m sure that this would increase the fun in coloring for a lot of children. And by all means, they are the future of this wonderful hobby!

Bambi with pencil

To show the paper while working with colored pencil, I’ve picked a lovely drawing of a true Bambi. There are several other animals in the book that are not ‘little pony’. This deer has those beautiful enormously large Bambi eyes.

I’ve chosen to colorize this drawing with the Bruynzeel Expression Colour pencils. And they did a wonderful job! The pigment attached very well to the paper. And since I wanted to try out my newest ‘toy’, the Gansai Tambi glittery watercolor, I’ve added a finishing glitter touch here and there.

After all, Bambi is the king of the forest, so with a bit of gold and silver glitters he looks a bit more royal.

Conclusion

After having colored three drawings it was time to take stock about Little Pony. Let me first say that it’s a truly lovely children’s coloring book. The drawings are cheerful and fun and in some way they’re even touching.

But… I do think that one shouldn’t let children color in this book with felt tip pens nor watercolor. It’ll be a drama. I can already see the picture in my mind… Blotchy and lumpy drawings, crumpled into a ball and thrown into a corner by a frustrated child.

And on top of that the child is yelling that it never ever wants to color again, and cries out “coloring is stupid”. The paper, in my humble opinion, is not very suitable for coloring materials that contain fluids. Better is to let children use colored pencils, since Little Pony is ideal for that material.

When you give Little Pony to a child, you might want to consider adding a set of nice colored pencils to it.

Add 2019: unfortunately Little Pony has sold out and will not return.

All pictures from this review can be seen here in a larger size (or through the Photo gallery in the top menu).

Disclosure: This review contains products that I received from a publisher or company. This however does not reflect on my opinion in any way. Also note my Disclosure Promos page!