C oloring O utside the L ines Abby and Mimi and Their Coloring Adventure

ColoringOutside the

LinesAbby and Mimi and Their

Coloring Adventure

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Abby who traveled a long, long

way to visit her Mimi and Grandad.

(She also went to visit her Nana, cousins, aunts and uncles, but they are not in this

story.)

This is Mimi and Abby (center) with cousins Bella and Sydney.

One evening, as Abby and Mimi decided

how they would spend time together,

this is what happened...

Mimi, you want to color a picture? Oh, Abby, I'm really not good at coloring said Mimi. I have not colored in a hundred years! Abby rolled her eyes up at Mimi with a smirkish grin.

(That’s Gracie in the back.)

But I am sure you can do it Mimi. Just try.

We can both color a page in my new

coloring book I got for the trip.

So together they carefully selected a page

in the book with a picture that Abby liked

on the left page and one that Abby liked for

Mimi on the right, and they sat together in

the big chair and colored their unicorn and

puppy pictures.

"You are doing a very good job, Mimi " Abby complimented in her best teacher voice. Just be careful not to color outside the lines.  Mimi smiled. It's ok to color outside the lines, Abby.  Look!  And with that, Mimi colored a stroke right outside the lines! 

Whoosh!

OMG!

Abby looked at her aghast!  

That's ok Mimi, Abby said tenuously.

 Just be more careful to stay in the lines from now on. 

They colored along and made beautiful creations of Abby's magical purple unicorn and and Mimi's rainbow puppy with a stray hair gone afly.  

All of a sudden, Mimi took a stroke right out of the lines again!  

(Oh my goodness! Has she no control?)

Whoosh! Whoosh!

Whoosh!

Mimi!  You did it again!

Mimi was defying the perfection that Abby sought. 

Mimi laughed!  Abby, it is really perfectly fine to color outside the lines.  As a matter of fact, sometimes you have to go outside the lines to be creative and unique. Some artists, like Picasso went outside the lines to become famous. Going outside the lines can really be a good thing.

Sometimes, you can even take what looks like a mistake and make your own masterpiece!

Abby looked up at Mimi, grinned, and colored outside the lines on her picture for the very first time.  

It wasn’t much, but it was a start!

Whoosh

Then, they both laughed and hugged and finished coloring their masterpieces. 

Our Masterpiece!

And on the long, long ride home…

... she slept happily ever after.

This is a totally true story. It is nonfiction. It really happened.

The names have not even been changed to protect the innocent.

Mimi was so excited about Abby “letting go” that she and Abby decided to write the book.

The coloring pages are authentic, but some of the pictures had to be recreated for this publication. :-)