It’s true. I pinky swear. We had Tricia Lawrence from Erin Murphy Literary Agency on our faculty at a somewhat recent Western Pennsylvania regional SCBWI conference, and the two of us seemed to hit it off pretty well. But that was November of 2014, and it had been months since I had submitted a picture book dummy to her. And, honestly, I had assumed it …
Down in the Dumps
I have friends, I swear. Well, maybe I used to have friends, sort of, but little by little they seem to be slipping away. One has pretty bad arthritis in her back that has had a domino effect on the rest of her body. It’s difficult for her to get around, so we don’t see each other so much anymore. One …
Strokes and vending machines and death
I found out yesterday a friend had had a few strokes this summer and never told me. She was also diagnosed with lung disease and heart disease and, again, she never told me. Sometime in the last month she was on life support and almost didn’t make it. Again… I only know now because she’s in a nursing home and …
I write, therefore I am
Do you have any idea how hard it is to write? I’m sure some of you do. The ideas are playing out like a movie in my head. I can see them very well. They’re there, it’s just so hard to abstract them into words and sentences in the right order. So I write Christmas cards. I answer email. I …
Secretariat
Every other Sunday evening I trek off to visit my dad. We have a routine once I’m there: I let myself in the front door; I sit down; he starts up our latest Netflix DVD; he makes popcorn; we watch the movie; we watch cartoons; I leave. That’s the way we’ve always done it, and that’s the way we’ll probably always do …
Blogging combo
I’ve been trying to keep way, way too many blogs in the air at the same time, and for all the right reasons I’m in the process of combining as many as I can. So my graphic design/editorial illustration/fine art blog posts from a different blog are now integrated into and between the posts in this blog. And you probably …
#WPaSCBWI 2010 Fall Conference
One week from today—save the date. The Western Pennsylvania chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators will be hosting their annual conference at the Greentree Radisson in Pittsburgh next weekend, and I’ll be speaking about social networking. First, the info: Practical Solutions for Tough Times Friday, November 12 Pre-Conference Event (You must also attend the conference) 7pm–10pm …
TTFN
If you’ve read my last entry, you already know about the frustration yada yada. After some soul searching and decision-making, I’ve decided to allow the kid’s illustration part of my life to take a back burner. I’m finding it difficult to justify pouring money and time into a part of my career that has no intentions of going anywhere anytime …
My illustrations on somebody else’s blog!
Isn’t it the coolest thing when you run across your work on the Internet in a place where you didn’t put it? I was doing some site submissions to Google when I ran across a blog from last September that shared some of my work, and the blog wasn’t mine. It belongs to Jennifer Daniels, a Brooklyn-based graphic designer and …