Join the Forest!
Author Archives: admin
Gardening with chickens & ingenious bookstore event
A bunch of you have written asking for chicken update pictures. Earlier this week, BH and I took a couple of the girls out to help us weed the flower beds. They are bug-eating machines. A man and his chicks.Along with the garden (we’ve been eating the first peas this week) and the chickens, we’ve been [...]
Writing about race for kids
Back in January, bookseller Elizabeth Bluemle and I had a conversation about white privelege and issues of race in children’s publishing and children’s literature, two topics that had been much on our minds.Elizabeth kept pondering and talking to people in the industry and has now published a post called "The Elephant in the Room," complete [...]
And more Abigail
This round of historical detection is ending. This is the house that Abigail and John Adams lived in after they returned from Europe. They called it Peacefield.I found much material to make me ponder and start planning a different research trip to some obscure archives. I adore primary sources, don’t you?
Abigail
Yes, this is the house where Abigail Smith Adams was born and where she lived until she married John Adams. I had goosebumps all day yesterday as I walked around the house, her parents’ gravesites, and was able to touch her father’s Bible.(This is all for a picture book I’m writing about Abigail. I don’t know when it [...]
Chicken Update & suitcase
The chickens continue their nuclear growth. Now they have tail feathers that look like a Victorian lady’s bustle. Here’s a quick clip filmed by Queen Louise of me in the temporary play yard with them.I’m off on a research trip for my Abigail Adams picture book. Not sure if I’ll be blogging or vlogging from [...]
Batting Monday Clean-up
You know the sound a car engine makes at the RPMs are climbing and you are preparing to shift into the next gear?Make that sound in your mind right now.I’m getting ready to shift gears and go full throttle on a number of projects.Before I can do that, though, I have to clean off a couple [...]
My book signing today
I am signing today at the Clay, NY, Barnes & Noble at 1pm.This is a fundraiser for Paige’s Butterfly Run, a charity that raises money to support he families of kids with cancer and contribute to research.I beg you. Print out the voucher before you come, so that a portion of the sale will go to [...]
Roadtrip to hang out with me!!
My friends Ellen Yeomans and her husband Chris Arnold lost their daughter Paige to leukemia in 1994, just before she was due to start third grade. Frankly, I don’t know how they found the strength to go on after that. But they are amazing people. They did not simply find a way to live. They found [...]
Mockingjays and chickens love booksellers
I seem to be on a video roll this week. Can’t figure out what’s come over me! But before we go to the tape, I have to share one photo. At the Scholastic MOCKINGJAY party. Suzanne Collins gave us a surprise reading of the opening pages and all I have to say is this: order your copy NOW! [...]
Newsletter
Taking advantage of the longest days & WFMAD anyone?