More Signings for Merry Christmas, Cheeps!

I have two more signings coming up for Merry Christmas, Cheeps. The first is tomorrow, Saturday, December 8th at the Barnes & Noble at the Waterfront in Pittsburgh, PA from 11 to noon. I'll be doing a story time with Judy Press, a good buddy and fellow local children's book author. She's promoting

Big Fun Christmas Crafts and Activities (Williamson) which features literally hundreds of easy, attractive holiday projects to do with your kids. We'll read the Cheeps book (with props and maybe a little singing) and Judy has a paper bag snowman project for kids to do. There will also be treats in the children's area. I think the store also has copies of other titles by me and Judy, and we'd be happy to sign those too.

Then next weekend (December 15th), I'll be joining Judy and lots of other Pittsburgh authors and illustrators at Joseph-Beth, Southside, for a benefit for one of my favorite nonprofits, Beginning with Books, whose mission is to help all children become capable and enthusiastic lifelong readers. There will be authors there signing, reading, and even wrapping the gifts you choose from noon to six. My shift is from 2 to 4, but I'm going to try to hang around later as a wrapper. A portion of the sales will go to Beginning with Books, and I think you can also purchase books for them to donate to needy kids.

Thanks to my Cheeps author, Julie Stiegemeyer, and her experience at a signing in Fort Wayne, IN last night, I now know one more thing to be prepared for at the upcoming signings: gorillas in Santa hats who scare little tykes. You can read about her author adventure on her blog.

You're invited!

Grab some buddies and shuffle on over!

Who: You, of course, and Julie Stiegemeyer, author, and me, Carol Baicker-McKee, illustrator
What: A book signing/holiday book fair for Merry Christmas, Cheeps!
When: From 11 to noon on Saturday, November 17, 2007. (I'll actually be there a bit earlier, around 10:30).
Where: The Barnes & Noble at South Hills Village Mall, Pittsburgh PA
Why: Because it will be fun! Plus it's a good chance to acquire a special book for a gift or for your own holiday collection.

Please join us!

cheeps-in-progress

When Cheep! Cheep! came out, a number of reviewers thought the illustrations were digitally assembled, and even some friends and relatives thought I made a handful of little chicks and then "reused" them for the different spreads -- but every chick (and egg, etc.) is handmade in a ridiculously time-consuming method. These photos (which aren't great quality -- sorry) are from the first book (somehow I didn't photograph the Christmas Cheeps in progress), but it gives you a sense of all the little pieces and my factory-assembly-line approach.

I recently finished up the first book that I wrote and illustrated, called Mimi. It's about a little pig, who has a stuffed bunny named Bunny, and a pet roly-poly bug named Frank -- who's missing! It will be out from Bloomsbury in Fall, 2008, and took me a good nine months (well, more really) to illustrate. That equalled many, many months that my family couldn't use the kitchen table because it was buried deep in pig, bunny, and bug parts. I do have a small studio upstairs in my house, but somehow I always gravitate to the kitchen. Well, partly that's because the kitchen is usually brighter and a more comfortable temperature, partly because it's nearer the stove which I use for baking my polymer clay parts (and the refrigerator which I use for motivation/consolation), partly just because I have liked to work at the kitchen table since I was a small child. When I redo my studio next year, I'm going to advocate buying a new table for the kitchen, and letting me have our old one (it's already covered with paint accidents and xacto blade boo-boos) for my workspace. But then I'll probably just end up messing up the new table too. Sigh.

I'm scrambling now to finish the art for a book called An Apple Pie for Granny by Susan vanHecke. I think it's supposed to be out next year too. I'm trying mightily to resist the temptation to work in the kitchen, but it's just very, very hard.

Merry Christmas Cheeps!

The cheeps are back! And ready to celebrate the season, from catching snowflakes in their little beaks to trimming the tree and hanging stockings. Julie Stiegemeyer has written another charming text about this family of flightless poultry that's perfect for the littlest guys. This time she used more than seven words, but Julie's style is nonetheless clearly the Prius of children's writing -- she gets an amazing amount of mileage out of very few words. The rhyming couplets not only give babies and toddlers a sneak preview of the joys they'll encounter at the holidays, they're full of the rhythm, repetition and fun-to-say words that compel toddlers to join in. And here's a cool thing I just noticed -- you can even sing the lines to the tune of "Old MacDonald." (Well, if you're completely tone deaf like me, it might not sound exactly like "Old MacDonald...).

I'm proud of my artwork for the book too, and learned a ton in the process of making it, as the backgrounds and props were more complicated than in Cheep! Cheep! I'm also very, very pleased with the outstanding job the folks at Bloomsbury did with the photography and design of the book -- everything really pops off the page and it seems like you should be able to feel the textures. And I'm grateful all over again to my family who let me take over every flat surface in our house while I finished it up, and to my sister-in-law and fellow children's book author Karen Baicker, who kindly put up with me and my mess while I put the, uh, "finishing touches" on everything at her house when I drove East to deliver the art. (Oh yeah, and then Karen was also nice enough to drive me into the city from her house, as I am terrified of driving in Manhattan and even more frightened at the thought of parallel parking there.) Making books, like raising kids, works best as a group project.

The book was officially released this week, and I've heard from people who've spotted it in Borders. I'm buried too deep in a couple work projects to make it over to any of the bookstores (man, do I miss the children's bookstore that used to be at the top of the hill), but it's exciting to know it's out there! And it already has a ranking on amazon. I'm amazed at all those people who are obviously out shopping for the holidays already. I bet December's a lot more fun when you don't have a to-do list that's longer than Santa's good kid list....

I'm sorry that it's once again been ages since I posted anything. I actually like blogging, but it does feel like a guilty pleasure when I'm swamped with work, family, laundry, etc. And for some reason, when I'm thinking about giving into a vice, chocolate nearly always wins.

And naturally, since it's been so long I have scads I'd like to say, but I'm going to take a deep breath and say ta-ta for now.