Series “Une souris verte” · sheet 1 of 5
A mouse in the grass
A mouse in the grass: a free printable coloring page, from age 4. Sheet 1 of 5 in the “Une souris verte” series, in a meadow full of flowers.
- Recommended age
- Ages 4 and up · 20 to 40 minutes
- Themes
- Storybook scenes, Animals
- Series
- Une souris verte · one of the five in the series
- Season
- Spring
A meadow, and the mouse in plain sight
The mouse sits right at the bottom of the page, in the middle, between the girl and the boy who are holding hands. It is big: two ears round as saucers, a well-filled belly, a long tail curling to the right. Behind it, the unicorn has stars on its rump and a mane in waves. Two round trees frame the scene, with flowers set in the foliage. Above, four clouds have eyes and a smile, and a round moon lingers in the sky beside three stars.
The first sheet of the series
Sheet 1 of 5 in the “Une souris verte” series, the French rhyme children often know before they can sing it all the way through. The song tells of a mouse caught by the tail, shown to some gentlemen, then dipped in oil and in water — and nobody has ever known why. The drawings in the series follow it from place to place: the grass, the school, the park, the beach, home. Here it is still at home, in the meadow, and nothing has happened to it yet.
Four very large surfaces, and the rest in small
The large areas dominate: the meadow takes the bottom half, the sky the whole top half, and the two crowns of foliage are round masses in one piece. You fill them without thinking, in broad sweeps. Around them there is still plenty to do — the five-petalled flowers set in the foliage, the four clouds, the moon, the stars, the children’s clothes. The outline is thick and closed everywhere, including around the smallest shapes. The mouse’s belly, the unicorn’s body and the two dresses are already enough to make a complete page: the rest comes as an extra, while the appetite holds.
A green mouse, really
This is the sheet where the color is allowed to disobey: the song says “une souris verte” — a green mouse — so bring out the green and let it happen. Apple green on the belly, a darker green on the ears, and the animal no longer looks like anything known, which is exactly the point. For the sky, one shade is enough, laid flat around the clouds and the moon. A broad-tipped marker covers the meadow in a minute; keep the colored pencils for the flowers and the stars, which are smaller.
A word for the grown-up: before the pencils come out, ask your child to point to the mouse, then the moon, then the three stars. That small reconnaissance wakes up the attention, and the session starts far better than if the page is simply put down without a word.
The other sheets of “Une souris verte”
The sheets are drawn on the theme of the same song. Same characters, same line: you print them together.
Coloring pages that go with this one
More pages from the same theme, age or season — the ones you print right after.
