Squishmallow Coloring Pages

A Squishmallow is recognizable from across a room: a round, squashy shape, two dot eyes, a small smile and an oval patch on the belly. These Squishmallow coloring pages draw that shape as dozens of plush friends, each one somewhere cozy.

The animals come first. A plush axolotl leans on cushions on a window seat, a cat sleeps under a patchwork quilt, a unicorn sits in an open toy chest, a dragon perches on a shelf of succulents, a penguin stands on a bath mat beside a rubber duck, and a frog floats in a swim ring. Two bears share a tea party, an owl naps in a hammock between houseplants, a sloth hangs from a bunk bed in a string of lights, a narwhal balances on wave-printed pillows, a fox curls in a knitted basket, an octopus spreads out on a beach towel and a cow waits at the barn door. There are more: a koala on a potted eucalyptus, a turtle by a pond, a dinosaur in the laundry basket, a panda in a paper boat, a lamb in a nest of scarves, a shark on a skateboard, a chick hatching from its egg, a llama carrying flower pots and a raccoon sorting buttons.

The food plushies get their own pages: a strawberry in a picnic basket, a pineapple on the kitchen counter, an ice cream cone on a picnic blanket, an avocado in a hammock and a cupcake on a cake stand. The seasons each have one: a bee on a sunflower, a hedgehog in autumn leaves, a ghost over a bowl of candy, a reindeer under the Christmas tree, a mushroom among ferns and a bunny in a cardboard rocket. For something to decorate, there is a stack of egg-shaped plushies on a beanbag, a mandala of plush faces and hearts, and a border of little plushies, stars and clouds around an open page.

The belly patch is the whole character

What makes a Squishmallow a Squishmallow is not the animal, it is the shape. Every one is built on the same rounded body, and what tells them apart is color and one detail: the belly patch. On a real plush it is a soft oval of a lighter or contrasting color, sometimes with spots, stripes or a pattern.

So color the body first in one even color, then treat the belly as its own small design. A pink axolotl with a cream belly, a green frog with a yellow one, a lavender cow with white spots on its tummy. The stack of egg plushies on the beanbag has three blank bellies with patterns already drawn in, zigzags, dots and flowers, which makes a good first page for trying three combinations side by side.

Finish with the cheeks, two small pink ovals under the eyes, colored in little circles so the edges stay round.

Pastel or bold

Real Squishmallows come in soft pastels as often as in bright colors, so either works. A simple rule keeps a page from getting muddy: one color for the body, one for the belly, one for the details (the axolotl's gills, the unicorn's horn, the strawberry's leaves), and nothing else on the plush itself. Use as many colors as you like on the room around it.

For a softer look, color the body with very light pressure and go over it a second time, rather than pressing hard once. Plush looks soft on paper when you can still see a little white of the page through the color.

Pages for small hands and plush fans

A round plush on a plain floor is about as friendly as a coloring page gets, and a good share of these are exactly that, one big shape with a belly and a smile. They suit a child of three or four. Quick to color, above the grid, starts with:

• Stack of egg plushies on a beanbag
• Plush cat tucked under a quilt
• Plush frog in a swim ring

The rest put the plush somewhere: a bath mat, a barn, a beach towel. The densest are the ones with knitting, wicker and patterned cloth around them, where every stitch and weave is its own shape. Lots of detail opens on:

• Plush strawberry in a picnic basket
• Plush ice cream on a picnic blanket
• Plush fox in a knitted basket

Make your own plush, with a name and a card

Every real Squishmallow comes with a name and a short line about who it is, printed on its tag. The border page, with its ring of little plushies around an empty middle, is the place to invent one. Ask the child to draw their own plush in the center: pick an animal, a food or anything at all, give it the round body and a belly patch, then write its name and one line about it underneath. "Loves naps and strawberry milk" is exactly the kind of thing the real tags say.

The finished plushies make good collector cards. Color one, cut it out, glue it onto a piece of card, and write the name and a favorite thing on the back. A child who collects the real ones can make a card for each, and a child who does not can make a whole collection on paper.

Printing a shelf of plushies

These are free PDFs laid out on A4 at 300 dpi. On A4, print at full size; on a US Letter printer, "fit to page" shrinks each plush by about six percent. Where to find that option is in the printing guide. Add pages to a pack with Add to pack and print them together. The kawaii coloring pages have more round faces with blush on their cheeks, the axolotl coloring pages show the real animal behind the plush, and the cozy coloring pages are full of the same soft rooms.