Apple Picking Coloring Page

Harvest day is here on this apple picking coloring page. A girl in pigtails has climbed a wooden ladder and is reaching for a shiny apple high in the tree. Below her, a boy in a ball cap holds a basket piled with fruit. A wooden crate and a second basket are already full on the grass, and a few windfalls have rolled away.

It suits kids of about 4 to 10. The tree crown is one giant shape with apples all over it, so young kids can get started quickly. Faces and baskets take more care. Most children finish in 25 to 35 minutes.

What to look for in this orchard

Start at the top and count the apples on the tree. There are 15 hanging up there, plus the one by the girl's hand. Little leaves are tucked in between them, and each one can take a different shade of green.

The ladder leans at an angle against the branches. Its rungs make a nice row of small boxes to fill. The two baskets share a woven pattern of little blocks, a fun thing to color in two tones. The crate has plain slats, which gives the eye a rest.

Apple picking coloring page color ideas

The apple colors are yours to decide. A tree of all red apples looks like a storybook. Mix in green and yellow and it looks more like a real farm stand. Try giving the crate one type and each basket another, as if the kids sorted them.

For the tree top, use two greens. Fill the whole shape with a light green, then add some darker patches near the bottom edge, where the shade falls. Late in the season, a few touches of yellow make the tree feel like fall.

• Girl's sweater: orange stripes with blue overalls
• Boy's shirt: green with a blue cap
• Trunk: warm brown with darker lines
• Grass: gold, for a dry autumn field

Coloring tips from our table

Do the apples before the green around them. Red crayon can smear, and green over red turns muddy fast. When the apples are done, carefully color around each one.

Want round, shiny fruit? Leave a small white spot on the upper left side of each apple. Add a darker red along the lower right. Even young kids can manage this trick, and it makes the fruit look round.

With markers, work on one section at a time and let it dry before coloring next to it. Colors like red and green can bleed into each other when both are wet.

Apple facts for curious kids

There are more than 7,500 named kinds of apples. Their wild ancestor came from Central Asia, and it still grows there today.

Here is a surprise. Plant a seed from your favorite apple and the tree will not give you the same fruit. Apples grown from seed turn out very different from their parents. That is why growers graft cuttings from a good tree onto young roots, so every new tree copies the old one.

A taste test and a crate sorting game

Try a taste test. Slice three kinds of apples and have your child pick a favorite. Then color the apples on the page to match the winner.

Teachers can use the crate and baskets for a sorting game. Kids decide how many apples go in each one, then write a simple number sentence. You can also ask, what will these two do with all that fruit? Pie, sauce and cider are all good answers.

More orchard pages

Stay in the orchard with the apple tree coloring page, which is a good fit for younger kids. For a stop at the end of a farm day, try the hay ride coloring page.

Questions