December Days

A cat asleep on the rug, a coin hidden in the pudding, and a question you already know the answer to. December Days is twenty-four large print Christmas coloring pages, and facing every single one is a memory prompt — not a caption, a question. Who came knocking at Christmas, and did they come in? Who did the baking, and were you allowed to help or just to watch? There was a coin hidden in the pudding — did you ever get it? The designs are drawn the way all our books are drawn: thick outlines, wide open shapes, nothing fiddly, nothing that needs sharp eyes or a steady hand. Twenty-four of them, one to a page, printed single-sided on 8.5 by 11 inch paper so markers stay where you put them. What makes this one different is what sits opposite. Coloring alone is quiet. Coloring next to somebody who is asking you about the Christmases you remember is something else entirely. It was made for care homes, day centers, and kitchen tables where two people have sat down together — and at the back, all twenty-four questions are collected onto two pages, so anybody can pick it up and have somewhere to start.