Upper Dublin Day

Wow! I’ve been sitting here, kinda stunned, on my couch for the past hour. It was a great day, but I’m beat.

First off, many, many thanks to Upper Dublin librarians Susan Mowery (high school) and Michelle Stone (Sandy Run Middle School) for putting everything together. I did two large-group presentations at the high school, signed books and hung out with the book club (hello everybody – thanks for all your kindness, energy, and the chocolate-covered pretzels!), had lunch with a roomful of teachers and librarians, drove to the middle school, gave two more large-group presentations, signed more books, packed up my stuff and my beautiful flowers, and was suddenly in the car driving home.

The students were very, very nice and we took a lot of pictures. I felt bad for the 8th graders because after I talked for an hour, they had to listen to another presentation, this one from the high school staff about planning for 9th grade. Interesting, I’m sure, but those auditorium seats looked mighty hard to me. They seemed to handle it OK, though.

A couple teens promised to e-mail me questions about the publishing process which I’ll answer here in the LJ. And two 8th graders, Liz DeLise and Lina Breslav, showed me a great project they did for extra credit. They turned Fever 1793 into a board game like Life. I’ve never seen that before. When I asked how long it took, they said “Three sleepovers and a lot of candy.” What a great way to measure time!

Now I have to make dinner, find some focus, and write. I have a bad feeling my focus is nestled in the dust bunnies under the couch. Ick.

Time to put the coffee on.

Oh, I forgot something this morning. A big shout-out to my awesome nephew Private First Class Ryan Stevens, stationed in South Korea. We miss you, sweetie. (Just what every soldier wants, eh – his aunt calling him “sweetie” on a public forum. Heh-heh-heh…)