IN-SCBWI Spring Conference

Just returned from McCormick's Creek State Park in Spencer, IN.  I was honored to speak as a panelist on "Tackling the Tough Stuff" related to my cancer and asthma books.  Also enjoyed critiquing manuscripts and meeting Minju Chang, an agent from my agency, BookStop Literary.  Find me in our faculty/planning committee photo, two heads left of the sombrero.

Introducing...TWO IS ENOUGH

With the help of my wonderful new agent, Kendra Marcus, I now have a new picture book on the way!  TWO IS ENOUGH has been acquired by Running Press Kids and is tentatively scheduled for release in fall 2015.  This story was inspired by a dear friend who adopted a baby boy, Carter, back in September of 2012.  When I wasn't able to find a gift book depicting a single parent bringing home an adopted child, I figured it was high time to create one.  TWO IS ENOUGH is not specifically about adoption, however, but rather celebrates love's way of making even the smallest of families--families of two--just right.  Can't wait to see how illustrations complete this story!

3rd Graders and Fables

I've just completed two school visits to the third graders at The Oaks Academy Fall Creek and The Oaks Academy Brookside, both in Indianapolis.  This is my fourth year of taking this particular show on the road, featuring the craft of fable-writing.  Using my story, "No Ducks for Dinner" (Spider magazine, March 2010), I took the kids on a brief journey through own writing life and then into their own curriculum focus of fable-writing.  These kids know their Aesop!  We sang, laughed at my hair in my 4th grade school photo, listened to a cassette of me telling a fable when I was 8 years old ("What's a cassette?!"), read a couple of my books and my fable, and talked about their own recent forays into writing about talking animals who pick up lessons along the way.  Lots of fun!