Take a color walk with your child! Yes, it is still winter in Oregon and more gray and rainy days are to be expected. But that doesn't mean you can't find color on a walk through your neighborhood or downtown. Point out the different colors on signs, houses, cars, as well as in nature. Create "color cards" at home before you journey outside on your color walk. To make a color card, use crayons to color note cards or glue different colored yarn or scraps of paper to a note card. Or you might find colorful pictures from magazines and glue them to card stock to take along as your color guide. 
Try to see if you can find any of the colors in your "color cards" in the environment as you take your walk. Brighten up your day, keep boredom at bay, encourage your child's curiosity, and build vocabulary!Then share a colorful book with your child at home. Two of my favorites are:
Duckie's Rainbow by Frances Barry (Candlewick Press, 2004)
Follow Duckie home through colorful fields, forests, and pond. The end result of Duckie's colorful walk is a beautiful rainbow! I've used this book for color-themed storytimes with toddlers and young preschoolers.
Another colorful favorite of mine is Colors Everywhere by Tana Hoban (Greenwillow Books, 1995).Tana Hoban has created a photographic journey of the colors around us. Looking through her books will open you and your child's eyes to the wonderful variety of colors, shapes and patterns one can find in our surroundings.
*Photo credit: Balloon and child photo from Flickr's Creative Commons.
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