Roses are Red. Are Violets Blue??

Roses are Red.  Are Violets Blue??

By Alice and Martin Provensen

Pippi first learned about color mixing by mixing up play dough, much to my consternation.  The yellow dough never stayed yellow for long.  It became green and orange in varying values before becoming a mottled purplish gray.  Actually all the colors ended up that same purplish gray, not what I would have expected from reading this book, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Although we learn primarily by doing around here - mixing paint and play dough to learn color mixing, as well as jumping down the last four steps to discover that's not so easy on the ankles - I do like a good book to reinforce what one has already learned.

And when it comes to color mixing books, you just don't get much better than this.

I was describing this book to Pippi's art teacher a few days ago, and the best word I could find was quirky.  And quirky this book is, from the rose-colored glasses,

to the purple cow,

to the green-eyed cat.

But where the book really gets good, is when it veers away from simply quirky and swerves wildly into bizarre.  This recipe for traffic jam sure tickled our funny bones.

Take a red car.

Take a blue car.

Take a yellow car.

Take a big purple car.

Take a little black car.

Add a green bug.

Mix well.

Beat the yellow light, then . . .

OOPS!

Instant BROWN GRAVY!

(Remember that purplish gray play dough?  It works for paint to.  Pippi wanted to make brown paint so she mixed all the primaries and secondaries together and what was produced definitely looked more gray than brown.  Maybe if she had just left out green.  After all, that green bug escapes the pile-up.)

Oh, and the question that is posed by the book's title?

The answer is violet.