Are we inexorably drawn to the things we knew deeply and warmly when we were little? In Maji, Ethiopia, my backyard wasn’t neat or cozy. It was full of frogs and bugs and plants that we pulled apart and stitched together in our games. It stretched outward to that path that led to a waterfall,
Long plane trips between continents…learning how to manage life in Addis Ababa and then in the countryside where (at first) water arrived at our house on the backs of donkeys and cooking was done on and in a wood-burning stove…landing on the hot savannah and standing under the wing of an airplane for shade…creeping up the
Home from travels and thinking, again, about weeds. Ah…weeds. One of my stops was in Kansas, a visit organized by LeAnn Clark–astounding volunteer for Ethiopia Reads who has gathered and sorted and figured out how to ship about 300,000 gently used children’s books to Ethiopia. She was impressed with how much more I know about plants
On Saturday, I was honored to speak at a young author’s conference in southern Washington, and was it ever special. These days, it takes almost heroic effort to pull off such things–teachers, parents, kids all choosing to be part of a reading and writing event instead of all the other things tugging at them. On
Isn’t it fascinating how books and life weave together sometimes? Over spring break, I visited a museum that had an exhibit about things recovered from an old, old shipwreck. Including…a rat skeleton! What a perfect introduction to the next spring break stop, which included reading Adventures of a South Pole Pig to the two most
Thanks for being such a reader and thinker and great model for someone always interested in people, ideas, and the truth.
My smart, wonderful writer of a daughter is in a PhD program in the English department at Purdue University, and she reported the irritation literature scholars and others felt when Purdue tagged itself as “makers all,” in honor of its strong hands-on programs in engineering and the like. I did have the phrase ringing in
Our family moved to North Dakota in January, not the month when you really want to move to North Dakota. By the time the front and back doors had stood open for an entire day–so the movers could lug our furniture and books and other things inside–the poor furnace couldn’t possibly keep up and the
Many of my friends love to be home…but I have a strange, fluttery passion for not being home. I like the energy fields of airports and the rituals of getting on a plane–most of the rituals, anyway. One of the first pieces of literature I claimed to read (before I actually could decode words) was the emergency
Lots and lots and lots of people over the years have approached me with a question something like this: “I have a great idea for/have written/have written and re-written and re-written a children’s book. What now?” I always recommend the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. It was at SCBWI conferences that I first
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