Sunday, May 20, 2007

catching up...

Well... I'm as bad at posting as I'd anticipated. When it comes down to it, deadlines come first, and I've been just keeping up of late.

I have had some fun illustration events. I spoke to 2nd and 3rd graders at Peninsula Heritage Elementary School through a conference run by YOUNG WRITER'S CONFERENCE ( www.youngwritersconference.org) It was great fun! I love talking to kids. In the past I spoke with older grades. So I was actually surprised by just how interested and involved the younger children were. I spoke about the inspiration for Hula Lullaby. How I tried to capture the connection the Hawaiian culture has to the rhythm of nature. It was a section I thought they'd be bored with, but it was actually the one they paid most attention to. It just confirms that kids are brilliant and intuitively understand that which many adults need to have explained.

Last weekend I went to the scbwi event "Artworks" It was good to see so many familiar faces. Mary Peterson http://www.marypeterson.com/ and Ken W. Min http://www.kenminart.com/ both won prizes for best portfolio. Yay! The speakers were Marijka Kostiw, AD from Scholastic Press, Orchard, & A. Levine Books... OK... design genius. I love, love, love her work. I've never heard her speak, and took so much away from what she said. Val Adams from Mosaic Licensing also spoke. She had many valuable snippets on licensing. It's a direction I'd love to go... one of these days I might have time to work up an appropriate portfolio.. ahh sigh.

I've also officially joined the committee to help plan illustrator's day. We met Monday night in Santa Monica. I think we're on to some great ideas!

So with that... I'd better get back to my drawing board..

Tuesday, May 8, 2007

I received my proofs yesterday for THE TWELVE DAYS OF WISCONSIN CHRISTMAS from Meredith at Sterling. The colors look great, and I'm really happy with how it's turned out! (Thanks to Scott the new AD!) I'm looking forward to seeing the book. In the meantime I'm thinking I should dig out my snow boots and plan a bit of pre-Christmas promoting.