Three cheers and crossed fingers! November 17, 2009

Thanks again for making this such a special week. I really appreciate all of your emails and kind words!

There are a lot of well deserved awards that seem to be floating around in the children's book world this week, and I want to share some of the love.

Congratulations to Brian Floca! His fantastico book, Moonshot was one of ten books that recently appeared on the NY Times Best Illustrated Children's Books of 2009! I was so thrilled to see this great news. I took a really fabulous children's book writing and illustrating class with Brian at SVA, many years ago. He is such a talented, hard working author and illustrator, and Moonshot is one heck of a book! Go! Purchase!

Also, Portland friends Jim Di Bortolo and Laini Taylor's new book, Lips Touch Three Times, is a National Book Award finalist! This is such a stunning book all around. Both the writing and the illustrations, are amazing. There was a recent article about Jim and Laini in the Oregonian, that you can read right here.  Jim and Laini and baby Clementine are off eating pizza and cupcakes in New York at the moment (and doing lots of National Book Award events too, and important work related things, I'd imagine..)  All of my fingers and toes are crossed for the NBA announcement tomorrow night.

And lastly, you might be wondering what the heck these pictures (posted above ) are all about. A former teacher of mine, kindly sent these to me the other day, after watching the OPB broadcast. I think I was in, 4th grade? This particular class only met once a week, and it was so special to me.  But I'm not totally sure why I have my shoe on my desk, and seem to be writing with extreme fervor in one of the photos. Also, if you lean in close, you can check out the awesome bowl hairdo and ginormous 80's glasses that I'm sporting!  And the Cosby sweater. Boy did I love those Cosby sweaters back then. Still do, come to think of it...

Congratulations again, children's book peeps!