Book of Colors

When I was a young mother trying to teach my first-born son calculus at the ripe old age of 6 months, just kidding...sort of...

Actually, I was teaching him his colors...

...I got frustrated that every baby book I could find that teaches color presented the color in the context of an object, or at the very least, a shape, as in "red suitcase", "blue shirt", "orange triangle", etc .

I wanted him to learn these concepts one at a time, or at least have a place where he could focus on just the color concept without having to separate out Mickey Mouse's face or the Little People's trucks, so I set out to create a book about color which would stimulate his senses without putting them on overload.

Here is the result:

I kept it very simple. No pictures. Just pattern and color.

The pages are simple, cotton canvas.

I wanted something that he would want to touch,

so I used puffy paints to write the name of each color.

They have all loved to run their fingers over the patterns and letters.

And what does every kid love? FLAPS!

I sewed the flaps on AND glued them because I knew they would have to be durable.

The colors are simply squares of soft, touchable felt.

Each color has it's own simple, tactile pattern on the flap.

and just on the edge of the flaps,

because I wanted the book to be about the colors, not the patterns.

I included Black and White, but none of that Indigo, Violet business.

;)

My Superman helped me put grommets into the pages.

Then I bound them with rainbow ribbons.

I didn't decorate a cover for this book. Maybe I should have, but at the time, I guess it didn't occur to me. My goal was to keep it simple and baby-friendly. I am really glad I didn't put my first child's name on it because every one of my kids has played with it.

What would you have put on the cover? A Rainbow?

PS. It also serves as a nice little teaching tool for beginning readers, but I didn't make him start reading till 9 months. Just Kidding!

;)