Baby Squirrel Holding an Acorn Coloring Page

A squirrel sits upright on its back legs holding an acorn in both front paws, turned to the right, nibbling. Behind it the tail sweeps up off the ground, curves over and arches above its head.

That tail is the drawing. It is as wide as the whole body and it takes up more of the sheet than the animal does, drawn with long soft strokes running along its length and a feathered edge all the way round. It is the reason to pick this page rather than any other squirrel page: the pose is built around the one feature that makes a squirrel a squirrel.

The acorn is small and held close to the chest, with a cap drawn on top of it, and the face above is simple. One large eye, a small nose, whiskers and two upright ears.

The tail rewards layered coloring more than flat color. Work along the direction of the strokes, keep the outer edge paler than the middle, and it reads as fur rather than as a shape. Do the body a little deeper than the tail.

The acorn is the one small object on the page and it looks best in a brown quite different from the squirrel, so it does not vanish into the paws holding it.