Of course the year that winter has taken its sweet time arriving...



So being mostly home,  I have fallen into a bit of a routine, writing and book things in the morning and art in the afternoon and weekends. I have done it enough to find that I definitely need the stitching to stay sane. I decided to tackle a fabric collage idea I have had for a long time, more for my own walls or a gallery show than for a illustration portfolio piece,..

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I graduated from Art School the year Photoshop came on the market....hum, talk about bad timing. When I was in college the new technology was not in the Art Department, it was in the computer labs with the word processors and printers, only a few odd ducks had desk top computers of their own and
I do remember the cold lonely, food and drink free labs late a night when a paper was due the next day.
In the Art Department, we were still being taught layout with graph paper, rulers, T squares and those rub off letters. In the dark rooms? Well, I still have a really cool black and white photo of my roommate standing in a cereal box, a masking matte cut out of card stock to block the light. It all took a little luck, or a lot of paper to get it right.
Back then the debate of computer generated art was much of a discussion, or the evilness of it and the cheating of it. How wrong we got that should be a reminder not to predict the future because most of us are really bad at it. I do think paper and pencil, figure drawing and learning observation are still the foundation of any art program, digital or not...


I graduated in 1990 with a BA in Art and an emphasis in Child Development, going into college intent on getting an Art Therapy degree and then meandering to Tennessee to get my masters. I left college in love and followed a boy to Denver where he was attending law school.
We were married his second year at Denver University and I taught preschool. I could have continued in my studies, checked into the Colorado Institute of Art where I am sure everyone was becoming very much aware of what exactly Photoshop was and good do, but I didn't. I wanted one thing, to get my husband through law school, move back to the West Slope and start having babies...


Which we did and all the while I was developing my craft, alone, no internet, no social media and ignorant of what was happening in the digital world of Adobe and computer generated art and was blissfully happy...
Then...

My girls got older and I found my voice as an artist in fabric collage illustration and what do you do as a freelancer to get your name and your services out to art director? Well according to my schooling, that would be sourcebooks, yeah I know. I really knew then too, but so remembered my instructor holding up a copy of The Black Book and it becoming in my mind a testament to truly making it as an illustrator.
So in 2008, I laid out a few thousand dollars to advertise not in the Black Book, way way out of my price range, but in the Graphic Artist's Guilds Directory of Illustration...



Yup, 2008, the year most would say was the start of the "economic down turn." It sounded that way, sitting in the grand ballroom of the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza Hotel, listening to the publishers from New York try to put a good face on the layoff and restructuring the New York power houses were going through at the same time poo poo this new idea of independent publishing.
Yeah...late to the party again.

But I took the jump. I was a decent photographer and had already made the switch to digital, but had never edited a photograph and  had no way to lay it out and design an ad. So I called the people at the directory who kindly told me they could do it, for almost the price of buying Photoshop. I bought Photoshop and had a month to learn how to use it and make a decent ad, the deadline looming...
Luckily an artist friend told me about lynda.com...

Lynda, well actually Deke McClelland became my best bud, me intently watching and listening to his CS3 One -on One class, over and over again.
Good or bad, I got it done...


putting ads in #26 and #27 the following years and at least once in PictureBook, more for nostalgia.
What did I get for a whole heck of a lot of money spent? Well, definitely did not make my cost back by the dollar. It is hard to say if it was the source books, my website or postcards, but National Public Radio found me...

As did Cricket Magazine Group...


Plus an art director in New York whose firm only worked for Broadway. I was considered by a few publishers and art reps, all intrigued but in the end not all interested enough or with not a firm enough idea what to do with me, I pretty much invented or brought to illustration a new medium, as I like to say, putting a new spin on the traditional art form of applique and needlework. One art buyer I chatted with said it was not unusual for those of us with very unique styles to not get a lot of work, but the work we do get is big and that has definitely been my experience.
And through it all, I kept learning Photoshop, mostly by discovery new ways to do things in the process and I kept using the CS3 version, it more than enough to meet my needs of photo editing and simple layout. Until...
Until, I decided to take my destiny in my own hands, instead of finding someone else to give it to and started a publishing company...


Read here, to find out about my days writing a novel as well, in those quiet years of being a stay at home mom.
Now,  I've going back to Adobe again, knowing I would be needing its software and this time subscribed to the Creative Cloud and not only updated my Photoshop, but download Illustrator and InDesign as well.
And I went back to my old friend, lynda.com to learn what I need to and again, not with all the time on my hands, but with deadlines looming of bookcover design and such..

This time I think I managed to be on the front wave of something new, the new era of publishing where those of us looking out on canyons and isolated roads...

can compete with the best of them in the skyscrapers of New York and LA...


or at least tell our stories, the one they are not interested in, just as well.

So Happy Birthday Photoshop...
and thank you Adobe, for invented something that has allowed me to live where I want...

and do what I love...

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So I wrote a book, read about that here, over a ten year period, with a lot of starts and stops, a lot of do overs and motivation from both people being very encouraging and well a few not so much, but being the last born child that  I am, the nay sayers often can motivate me more just to prove them wrong.
And I "got err done"...
But now what?
Well, the conventional way would be to start looking for an agent, since 99% of the big top publishers in New York only take manuscript through their relationships with agents. I have been learning the ropes of publishing for enough years to know that finding an agent could take a writer several years....yup, several years and within that time, long periods of nothingness while agents are "thinking". It is not uncommon for an agent to ask to hold on to something for several months and then say "no thanks," in the end.
Way back, about four years ago, when I thought I was writing a Young Adult  trilogy, I took the first part of  Moonflower to LA for the SCBWI conference...


I know it is a hardship, a week on the edge of Beverly Hills, but I did meet with a New York agent who really liked it, but thought that although the main character, Luna is only eighteen at the end book, the story was too complicated to be a YA and encouraged me to write it as a complete story instead of a trilogy.
Seeing her point, I came home to this...

and went back to the keyboard and wrote another, oh, 60,000 words and tried the whole agent thing again, but this time in the "adult" or general market, polishing the first 25 pages, synopsis and cover letters to hook an agent in the querying process. Did I mention I have friends who have  been "querying" for several years on manuscripts that I think are rather good myself!
So, after pursuing the very helpful blogs, books and online sights that teach you the process, I tried to do step number one....and that is where I got stuck.
The most common advice is to make a list of about 30-50 agents, prioritize them and send out about 5 queries, sending more out when the rejections started coming in, keeping about 5 out there at all times.
Well, I sent out 9 queries, and sent them to probably the 8 top agents in New York, and 1 to the top agency in London....and I got form emails of "not thanks" from about 6 and have not heard from the rest.
Then I decided to get off that train, for several reasons, most of them too personal to really be advice for anyone else, but here they are...
You see many agents in their previous lives were attorneys and several more, well, in their bios they actually debated about a career in law or a career in publishing. Which makes a lot of sense, both paths needing the skills for negotiating and navigating all that "heady stuff".
Why did that matter to me?
Because I am married to an attorney and the thought of "getting in bed" with another one, many of those advice sites talk about the very close relationship writers and their agents have being second only to marriage, well, that was not very appealing to me. One attorney, no matter how cute he is, is enough for me...

Secondly, in my perusing of agents bios and what they did and did not want to look at, I was amazed at how often the New York agents would declare "no Westerns"...


Now, I live about as Far West as you can get and while I would not describe my stories as in the same vein as Louis L'Amour or Zane Grey, they are definitely set in the West and I actually like westerns and if I am not technically writing in that classic genre, it is definitely part of my writing  DNA.
So by this time, New York publishers weren't looking so good.
Next on the list, well how about a regional publisher? One situated in the West and no agent needed, writers working directly with the editors. After perusing about ten of those, University Presses and etc. , I found almost all only published nonfiction and the few that published fiction, were so narrow, it would be hard to work with them.
So, now what? Self Publish?
Self Publishing, or what has now morphed into the term, "Independent Publishing", is certainly the talk and as I mentioned above there are now a whole lot of helpful sites, organization and books that will tell you how to do about everything you don't know how to do and helpful freelance editors, writing coaches and book designers willing to do everything for you...for a hefty fees of course.
Should I just jump on that train?
Did I mention I was a last born child, an artist and a little bit rebellious?
Did I mention my husband was an attorney and could do all that negotiating stuff. He is also a pretty good editor. My papers in college went from B's to A's after he got his hands on them.
As I mentioned, my true profession is as an illustrator and well cover design is really a close cousin as is web design and well all other design.
So, after getting him on board, we decided to start our own regional publishing company, cause our kids were almost raised and well, it was getting a little bit boring...
That was last summer and life has been nothing but boring... read here, but we are holding onto this new crazy idea and Moonflower will be our first offering, our "guinea pig" child, you know the first one, you are still learning on and make all the mistakes with.
Then...well, I have more stories in me and there are a whole lot more stories here relevant to the Four Corners and the Inter-mountain West, both fiction and nonfiction that I know others are writing and I know a few other people who have skills like a retiring elementary teacher who has about thirty years experience in Children's literature and teaching kids to read and even one friend who actual has a degree in linguistics, all close cousins to the jobs we might need help with.
So, I wrote a book and now we are starting a publishing company...


cause we are nuts!

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And since we are right on the edge of the "bean capital of the world"...

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We went "through the woods", over some mesas and down into Farmington New Mexico to do some shopping and see INTO THE WOODS, the 1987 Broadway musical turned into a musical movie by Rob Marshall, director and choreographer of many a Broadway musical and of such other films as...


But we will not hold that against him.

INTO THE WOODS, stars Meryl Streep  as the Witch, Emily Blunt as the Baker's Wife and James Corden, known more for TV and Broadway and London stage as the Baker...


Tracey Ullman is Jack's stressed out mother and Daniel Huttlestone is Jack...


who just had to open his mouth, for me to remember him in his last endeavor...


So how did I like INTO THE WOODS? It was very Broadway-ish. I liked the score by James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim, wonderful songs, especially Meryl Streeps rendition of "Stay With Me". That song could make any mother cry and ponder locking their sweet precious children in a tower to protect them from the world. I was right there with her for a while there.

But what I like best about INTO THE WOODS, well, is Chris Pine's...

spot on impersonation of Captain Kirk...


 Captain Kirk, who is played by William Shatner, but Captain Kirk playing the role of Prince Charming...

still giggling...

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Sunday, knowing it was the "last hoorah" for Christmas Break, we took our eleven month old puppy, Piper, up and over the mountain to Telluride for a late lunch and stroll. How many skiers and dogs can you pack onto a gondola? That would be eight, the lady on the end, busy on her cellphone didn't even know Piper was there until we got ready to unload.  I chatted with the mom and daughter across from me the whole way, sharing stories about our dogs and the daughter even bringing her phone out to show me pictures of her beloved "Walt", a great name for her dog back in Houston Texas. Guess that is two ways to use cell phones when you are packed in like sardines with strangers.
Down the ski slope, we strolled around the old mining town of Telluride, now turned posh with many a photo op, like a Christmas tree made out of skis...

Telluride is the epitome of a ski town...




The above an example of the well, old way of getting around, think that metal tube is for skis and the new way of fat tire bikes...

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After a week of recuperating from a fast paced Thanksgiving week, highlighted here, we got down to decorating our place and for the wreath, I needed something round and one thing we have a lot of in the sheds are bike tires.
Can't take the credit for the idea, its Daughter #2's  via pinterest.com, but really from...

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On Saturday, to support #smallbusinesssaturday, we headed down to the newly renovated Railroad district and partook of local goods...


A few hours later I found the same thing, except this time, packaged up all nice for the out of town tourists in a kitchen store down at the plaza...

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The other Fall activities- discussions of the weather, how cold and how much snow the mountains will have this winter and elk hunting. But it stayed too warm for the elk to come down low enough for a successful hunt this year. Warm enough to keep the windows cracked on the drive back down the mountain in Grandpa's old truck that carries the camper shell...




 Another activity that took much time this Fall...

 who, looking for the grass, worked their way through a wire fence deciding the brown grass on the side or the road looked yummier. To hear them "churp" go HERE, 

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I haven't been active on this blog lately due to some big life changing events, like the ones I talked about HERE, a few weeks ago. The last big event I mentioned in that post has to do with the above picture, well actually book cover and I've been debating how to and in what order to tell everyone about it and the other part of the story. Way to much for one blog post, so first things first and that started over ten years ago, actually I think it could have been more like twelve, when, on Saturday, over in Utah, we hiked in between places like this...

 and along the river beds like  this...


 and along the rim of this...


and there would come a point where bribery would be necessary to get these two...



 
The bribe would go something like, "Wow! When we get back to the town, what do you want...?" And the "want" usually was something sweet, ice cream or a fancy drink and a book at the old Arches Bookstore in Moab, where we would also indulge in dinner or a late lunch before heading back over the border to Colorado.
Arches is no longer there, consolidating with the bookstore across the street a few years back, but a decade ago, it had the best children's section tucked in the far corner of the tiny store and we would trade, Jon and I, one would get to browse and one would take up post near the girls while they debated with much excitement which book to buy.
It didn't take long, when it was my turn to let Jon browse, to discover that the section next to the children's was that of local history and the local history in Utah, is pretty focused on the land, Edward Abbey, the Uranium boom that supplied some of the atomic bomb and most of the Cold War and  Mormons and polygamy. Who knows what I would be writing about if we lived in Ohio?

But in Utah I picked this book...,


Since little girls are tired after all day hikes and the two hour car drive back home is quiet, I would read my book, look out the window at this....


and wonder about the zealous religious people that had the tenacity to hack out a life in this unforgiving land no one else dared even try in places like this,..


and like this...


And so over the years,  as the girls grew, a story grew in my head and then I started to write it down and  to seek out more history and more places to make it real as possible, a willing husband, who was glad to go  along for the drive with the promise of more hiking, backpacking or mountain biking...


This place, the Four Corners, what was cut by the Colorado River and all its tributaries, is known as the backwash of the country, to wild to be tamed and very much looked over in the rush to the more fertile land on the western edge of the country, has moved me since I laid eyes on it, first around Moab, thanks to friends who had been jeeping there for years and then on our own, hiking and backpacking...


Canyonlands, Arches, and far off places like Zion and  Escalante, many of which I have written about and sketched over the years...



But something else was happen about the same time, people were talking about Uranium and the Atomic age. There was a cost to mining the uranium that supplied the atomic bombs of the Cold War. It polluted the land and the people who live here and the government, about ten years ago decided to start cleaning it up. It was in the news and on our drives back to Colorado, we went past the reclamation, clean up sites.
And I started to talk to my dad, way up in Idaho, who as a boy, during World War 2, had to have a security pass to go to the grocery store because my grandfather worked on the antennas for the the atomic bombs in Oak Ridge Tennessee, a town that did not exist before the war and was created for the soul purpose of the Manhattan Project and reading up on my families history and part in such a monumental event in our country's history, I found Utah again, where a covert operation sent soldiers with geological and mining experiences back to find and mine the uranium for the bombs.
And these interesting bits of history melded in my brain, on the long drives home or while doing art and Moonflower came to be...



 Getting it down on paper, is a whole other post as is why I picked the wild Utah flower, most consider a weed for the title of not only my story but as you all know the word that connects me to my art as well....oh! And I have a whole new website...still at moonflowerstudio.biz but now also at juliakelly.biz

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For my birthday, well a few days later, we drove up and over Lizard Head Pass to enjoy the changing colors of the aspens, which were every shade from green to yellow to orange to brown, the weather of rain, cold and snow and warmth, confusing them. You can see, above,  the line of Highway 145 to the left and then below, the old railroad grade to the right, the space in the middle is over 1,000 feet down, if you were wondering.

Right before that we had turned off the highyway to drive up around Trout Lake to get a closer view of part of the San Migels of the San Juans...




Even finding a fish, impervious to the cold, though he was swimming rather slowly...




 But I would be too if I had to swim at 10,000 ft above sea level, burr!...


Driving back down to the highway, while the sun thought about coming down in the sky...


we got to Telluride for a late afternoon lunch or early dinner, enjoying the last bit of warmth, before the crisp cold comes to southwest Colorado. The moon starting to come up....


as the sun came down, captured through the glass of the gondola that connects Telluride below with Mountain Village above...



Back at the truck there wasn't quite enough light to capture a herd of elk graving as we made our way back out to the highway....


Thankful that on the weekend the dreaded road construction crews were taking a break in their race to get as much of the road work done before the snow and the skiers come...

 As we went back over the pass to our own side of the mountains, the sun no longer illuminated the aspens for us, but  in the growing twilight, they were pretty just the same...

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Well, it is finally up and I can declare my illustration for David Sklar's "Sky Fishing" poem which was featured in the May/June 2013 Ladybug has won the Society of Children's Books Writers and Illustrators 2014 award for magazines. Official announcement HERE.
I've known for awhile, but the circumstances of finding out illustrates how everything on this earth is so "relative", because the last few weeks, we, my husband and I have been dealing with the adjustments of taking on more of a caretaker role for one of  our parents, who will be 90 next spring and though amazing fit up until recently, now has health issues and can not drive.

Just getting off the phone in a string of phone cals taking care of said parent, I did not expect the person calling me would be a SCBWI board member announcing my first place win, which she promised came with a plaque. I think I laughed when I finally got off the phone with her. Not that I was and am not very much honored for the recognition, but because in that moment, with my head pounding for all I had to do, the lack of sleep we were suffering under since settling back into life after the racing to the hospital, two flight for lifes, the surgeries in distant cities, the home care, etc. winning an award felt like a far off thing with all the other things in front of it, the laundry, my dusty house, the lack of planned grocery trips instead of grab and goes, the dogs that were bouncing off the walls and on one occasion eating the wall from lack of attention. Don't ask me when I have changed the sheets on my bed, I couldn't tell you, maybe before the weeks end. I know there is art in my studio, I just have to excavate it, a project started that was just going to have my studio messy for a few days, well now, it is what it is.

Today? Today when everyone now  knows, I forgot about it. Only reminded because I received a gracious congratulatory email from the author of the poem. My today has been three trips to the larger town twenty five minutes away, twice for my kid, the third because I finally decided not to given up yoga...again. Another trip was needed in the opposite direction,  to take said parent to Senior Lunch. I'm averaging  an hour and a half at home to get something done between trips. Got twenty three more minutes to get this done and posted!

What else did I do today? Art? Nope. Write? Nope. Do my laundry? Nope. Butchered a deer....by myself. My daughter's first. The outside shed refrigerator is going out and thought we could keep the quarters in it  until the weekend when someone could get it to the processor, but no such luck and I was the only one with the time to do it. So, yep... trimmed out the the meat, I had cut from the bone last night, with my laptop set to watch "Copper" on Hulu on a plastic tablecloth, surrounded by freezer paper and masking tape.

And that isn't the first thing I have harvested this Fall, we are so isolated we have to travel far for specialized surgeries and such and so along home  with the patient from Albuquerque came a bushel of roasted chilies, that once have steamed in their burlap bag after roasting have to be peeled.  Got those  harvested and four crates of apples from our homestead have steadily been turned into cider by my husband, still plenty on the trees  for the other deer, I was watching out of my window as I was filleting the venison of their cousin in my kitchen. Plum rum, which grow wild on our property and makes a yummy fruity rum for the holidays are steeping in our pantry, with another case of just rum, since making the pear rum from our trees just ain't going to happen this year. Rum won't go bad, right?

What was this post about..... oh yes, I won an award and more exciting things are happening and if I had a week, I could get things situated and tell you about our big announcement... I hope this is the week, but it is Wednesday, isn't it and the week, like the last four has sort of slipped by, with this distant echo in my head that reminds me,
" I am an artist" then, " I am an awarding artist." The echo says, "I am a writer" then reminds me the words that I wanted to so get out to the world that will have to wait a little longer. Then the louder voice reminds me, " I am a wife and I am a mother by choice and the rest will have to wait a little bit longer."

And it will. because I have to spell check this thing, upload it and head back towards town...wonder if the construction is done on the highway or if I should go the back roads again. A real dinner or grab and go- that will be decided on the road, I think.

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Jesus

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Happy Anniversary to Me! @moonflowermuse has been tweeting for a year, sending the first tweet out from Taos, New Mexico on  July 5th 2013, waiting in the rain for a table at Orlando's New Mexican Cafe...

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This weekend, everyone is  "twitterpated" on a viral campaign for #WENEEDDIVERSEBOOKS. It has been an on going discussion in Children's Publishing for some time now, but the issue is definitely "trending" due to the announced panel  of the Children's Book "Rock Star" authors  at BookCon this year will all  be white and male,  read about that HERE...
Yes! We need diverse books, but we also need children to be literate enough to read them!
I have taught Art, Reading and Writing Enrichment programs to  Native American and Hispanic kids for over a decade, I'm also a freelance writer and illustrator and it baffles me that this industry does not talk more about literacy then it does. Giving a kid who can't read or reads way below their grade level a book, does not teach him or her to read, it just frustrates them, forget about expanding their world!
Years ago,  an illustrator friend of mine and her publisher very generously donated a huge stack of  her new book to my kindergarten and first graders. The kids were hugging their books as they left to go home. A next day survey revealed that none of the parents had taken the time to sit down to read the book with them. One parent sending her daughter to tears for badgering her. Knowing the parent, I had to wonder if the refusal came from her own poor reading ability.


Why aren't we talking about this side of problem?

I teach at a charter school in the middle of nowhere, near the Four Corners of Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah, across the County Road is the Ute Mountain Indian Reservation. Down the road, is the start of the Navajo Reservation. Some years over half of our students are Navajo. The schools on the "Rez" so bad, their parents drive them forty five minutes to the nearest bus stop to get to our school, which is not great in comparison to the schools in the nearest town, thirty minutes the other direction and in comparison to the school my children go to in our district still another twenty minutes away,  it is down right bad.
Two years ago, word got out we were bringing a modular in to have a library. Reading the article in the local paper, people in the community assumed that meant we did not have books and started donating them. We had books, lots of books, the kids just didn't read them, unless forced too.
It is also a misnomer that these families are too poor to buy books. They aren't. This families might live in shacks and run down trailers, but they have enough money to buy cheap laptops, tablets and video games from Walmart and when it is free time at school, that is what they reach for, not books.
How do you get a kid to read a book? Yes, having characters and stories they can identify with is important. But not struggling over every word is more important.
How do you get reading to come easy? Well, you send home plastic baggies with little books, to practice every night with a reading  log. What do white, educated, middle class parents do? Sit down with their kids and read every night. What do Migrant families do? Make darn sure their kids are learning to read, write and speak English and do their homework, even if they can not understand it themselves.
Sadly, that does not happen in the families who have been in poverty and illiteracy for generations, whatever their skin color. Lack of education drowns  trailer trash white children as well as minorities.


What can we do about it?
If parents are not or can not help their kids practice reading at home, then the schools have to do it and one or two teachers can not practice with twenty some children everyday, so it is up to local volunteers to come into the schools. Who would that be?
Well, I go to the mid day yoga class and it is full of retirees, bored retirees who take yoga everyday and then go work at the Humane Society catching feral cats in town. Nothing against cats, but if those ladies would donate an hour or two of their time a week and read with kids that would make a world of difference and yes I have encouraged them to do so.
What can the Children's Book industry do? Stop thinking the solution is to give kids a book!
The ski industry of Colorado could teach us a few things. Telluride is over the mountain from where my own kids go to school and like most schools near a ski resort, we have a ski program. From a very young age and for a very small fee, the Telluride Ski Resort gladly buses our kids up the mountain a half a dozen time a season, provides equipment and lessons to .........Teach Our Kids To Ski!
Why do they do that? Well, because  full day lift tickets are around $80 dollars and season passes can be upwards of $1000. They are trying to get kids addicted to skiing and build the next generation of people who will keep them in business!

We need to get kids, all kids, addicted to reading and then we would not be having the discussion we are because Publishing is a business, it is not a charity and when publishers take a chance and publish a book for minorities and no one reads it, they have to look at the bottom line.
What else can be done? Send authors and illustrators into low income schools. But who is going to pay for that?  Right now, often a published children's author or illustrator gets a large percent of their income from school visits. What schools can afford to pay $1000s of dollars for fees and travel expenses in this day and age? The well off one, which by the way, those school's  parents ARE making sure their kids read those little baggies of take home books and ARE taking their kids out to see the world and into bookstores. Hum?
Besides the epidemic of illiteracy is not going to be fixed by one time school visits and  the kids in these schools are too uninformed to know to be impressed by a Newberry or Caldecott winner.
Actually, because Art so much better bridges gaps between cultures, we should be sending illustrators out first! Brooklyn Illustrator Sophie Blackall proved that, taking paper and markers to children in Rwanda, scarred with years of brutality...



I've been part of that magic, with Native American kids, time and time again. Without a word, we start drawing together and their world opens up and mine too!
If each of us connected to the Children's Book Industry, made the commitment to adopt our very own classroom, locally or through technology like Skype, and had an ongoing relationship with those 20 kids for the school year, it would make a world of difference.
Say, once a month, a one hour Skype visit. Sending out writing challenges to the class connected to what we write and then giving them individual feed back and praise for their work. Heck, you could even have the same book and help kids learn to read over Skype. Join in with the classrooms book club discussion. The ideas are endless and no longer is distance or time an excuse.


Or....is pushing publishers to produce Diverse books really only for those kids who can already read? Which according to several studies, collected HERE , is a shockingly low number of the US population. The US Adult Literacy rate is around 75%-90% , whether that is just addressing the ability to read labels on medicine bottles, for work, daily living, etc. Those who can read, read, the average for adults is around a 7th or 8th grade level.  15% of us are at the reading level of those in an undergraduate program and well, that would be Us- those in this industry and our children, my argument is what about the other 85%? Pleasure reading is a self motivating activity, surely we all remember that from days when we had to read something we did not want to. You can give a kid a Diverse Book, but you can't make him read it.
Which brings up my last point and I have debated including it, but here goes. Piggybacking more liberal idea like sexual orientation into the discussion is a mistake. The lack of representation in publishing of books by and about people of races other than White European is a huge problem and yes, too few of these are being made, but reading up on industry news, books about gender identity and sexual orientation have greatly increased over the past couple of years. That is all I am going to say about that, but let me illustrate my point with my own experience.
The Four Corner is Conservative in their politics to say the least and the Art Teacher before me, was fired because a parent walked in to see this...

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 is giving one of the keynote talks and a workshop on animal characters, which I am not good at, can illustrate them in their natural habit but not so well in overalls!

What is really exciting on the illustrator front is Monday's intensive, which started about 3-4 years ago and to be honest, the illustrator side did not sound very appealing to me, the first few years more on watching the "big namers" demo their process. Now don't get me wrong, that would be unbelievable fasninating to watch someone paint, I could do that for days, but don't know how helpful that would be be to me, a collage artist in furthering  my career.

But this year, it is all about  inspiration from the Masters, something every artist no matter what the medium we use or how experience we are can benefit from.  There is a option to send in an illustration inspired by a master.....hum, do I want the likes of dePaola or a 2014 Caldecott Honor commenting on my art, have not decided that and while the SCBWI assignment is probably for younger children's illustrations for picturebooks, I already am working on an illustration as a promo for book covers that is much inspired by Wood's American Gothic...

and the works of photographers during the Great Depression that I have been pouring over as of late, these are gorgeous....


I'll show you when I get done and we shall see if I do one for a younger audience for the SCBWI Intensive. But as an art teacher, I love studying the Master and am excited about this years line up of Illustrators for the LA conference, plus the whole conference  is a really great "mom" escape at the poolside bar with a mojito or two, since I just have to find my room, no driving involved.

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Have I told you I am bad at this self promotion thing? Well, it is almost the middle of March and I totally forgot to post that my above illustration is in the March issue of SPIDER MAGAZINE...


This is my third illustrations for the "Bug" magazines, but all with the wonderful Art Director Suzanne Beck. This project was to illustrate a recipe, a Welsh scone recipe and I had a lot of fun researching all things Welsh, like their amazing textile patterns...

 And their Gaudy pottery...


 Really loved that pottery, though the poem is about having a picnic...


Oh, how many antique lunch boxes did I pin on pinterest.com?


When everyone was happy with the sketch, I went to appliqueing and stitching and ta.....da....

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I stitched this weekend, well yesterday, on my bed, all afternoon long. I needed it. Since the beginning of the year, and since cutting back on teaching, I have been trying to adhere to a schedule, to treat my illustrating and writing like a real job. Monday, Tuesday and Fridays...writing all morning, do art in afternoon. Wednesdays....write social media-blogs and twitter and go to yoga. Afternoon....teach Art to kiddos. Thursday mornings...I cook for a soup kitchen and afternoon.....do art, take a nap.
I read others blogs and interact with Twitter in the morning. Problem is I get up 5 o'clock mountain time and the only illustrators up at that time are in the UK. But wow, have I found some wonderful artist and illustrators over there and have really enjoyed following them.
 I made a pact with myself not to work on my manuscript on the weekends, but to work on blog post, peruse Twitter and do art. Saturday, I didn't listen to myself.
Spent most of the day, here, in my office, the kitchen table and outlined a prequel to my work in progress that is in revisions. The idea sparked by my work on Friday basically building a family tree for the characters, to keep track of all their names. But in the process, a story started to come out and excited, I devoted my Saturday to getting it down.
I should have stuck to my pact because now everything is off kilter and  am writing this in the am on Monday and should be starting to work on my manuscript.
But stitching yesterday helped get things back in line. Too much grandiose thoughts can come when you are creating a world that does not exist and the brain hurts too much. I have to actively push words out of myself and onto the paper, with many fits and starts.
On the other hand, when all the design decisions are made, stitching is effortless, feeling the drag of the thread through the fabric I also can feel the release my tension with it and a balance to world. I stitch on my bed, while listening to a movie or the whole season of a television show I have seen before, so I don't have to look up at the screen so much to know what is going on.
One series I love and should  buy to watch when it  is no longer airing is PBS's CRAFTS IN AMERICA...

'Tis the gift to be simple, 'tis the gift to be free

'Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,

And when we find ourselves in the place just right,

'Twill be in the valley of love and delight.

When true simplicity is gained,

To bow and to bend we shan't be ashamed,

To turn, turn will be our delight,

Till by turning, turning we come 'round right

from the Enfield Historical Society Webpage

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Meant to post this on Friday. But, alas, it did not happen. Could have been that I was finishing up mailing 200 Valentines postcards out to Art Directors, or that I was hanging my charter school's art show at our local Art Center or that I had whooping cough and a fever, probably thanks to the little darlings. But I did save back a couple dozen of the valentine postcards to give to them, complete with a Kit Kat bar taped to it.
As they filed out of the art room, after their tables were clean on Wednesday, I "mom-ed" them and told them it was polite to appreciate the card and sentiment, before ripping off the candy.

But a late Happy Valentine's Day to you...

I shouldn't admit to this, but I will, cause well, that is what I do. The illustration is heavily Photoshopped because of changing my mind midway and well, not seeing some errors early enough.

I started on my 2014 Christmas card early in January, cause well, I have a hard time getting it done. This...

was actually my 2012 Christmas postcard, which just didn't happen and having the illustration from a year ago I still barely got out my 2013 postcard, which I sent out to 400 art directors at book publishers, magazines and ad agencies.
Promo is something that really slid when I was teaching three days, so now that is down to one and I'm in my studio four days, really trying hard to do it.
Where was I?
Oh, yes, so I started a very early attempt, still somewhat in the Christmas spirit of getting an image ready for next year, Card companies actually have a year lead time for Christmas illustrations. So started on collaging the illustrations, using a dark blue for the night sky, stitching the window, etc. Then...
I realized I am an illustrator not a fine artist and why was I illustrating pomegranates? And, Valentines was coming up and in my 400 postcards from Christmas, I had concentrated more on general markets and there was still many from the 2014  Children's Writers and Illustrators Market book, I had not sent a postcard to, so.....switched gears, kept the window, the snow scene outside, the cat, changed the holiday to Valentines and stuck a kid in it!
But I think moving on to make the collage, after all the planning is done, the fabric chosen, is kind of like finally getting in your car and heading out for a long road trip. It is when your mind relaxes and boom, you realize you forgot to turn off the iron or forgot your children, etc.
I was almost done when I realized there were some color problems. Here is the untouched original...

The same value as in squinting you can not differentiate between the two colors.
Plus on the other end, the night sky is so dark and the snow on the mountains is so white, well in digitizing that extreme in color value it gets..."whonky" and that is a technical term for " unsteady, shaky,awry or wrong"
Arghh...not like I went to Art School or anything!
But almost done and well, having as of late ripped apart too many illustration, I decided to use it as a practice in correcting in Photoshop, so finished the illustration and digitally did this...


The chair, shirt and overalls are still on the dark side, but they have contrast, as does the glue bottle and the green of the scissors handle, stands out from her hand. I did lighten the sky a little but too much messing can really effect the digital file, there is only so much you can do in Photoshop, well I can do in Photoshop.
I also realized too many of my illustrations are more of a landscape view and really need to more close up work, of faces and detail, so on the back of the postcard included him...

And am now, working on a whole gob of spot illustrations, which was hard to get started, but picked the Beach as a theme, cause it is February and the Blahhhhhs are setting in and my thought went here...



I'm collaging away at them and will post as I get them done. Kind of fun to have pretty much a one day project and am using a lot of my scrap fabric.
I have to give credit where it is due and a thank you to...


I just "snipped" his twitter header @pinocastellano  because his name is too hard to spell. It took me three days to pronounce it correctly at the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators conference this summer in LA, where he gave several great workshops, real nuts and bolts stuff like...
1. Be on Twitter...check, you can find me at @moonflowermuse
2. Show process, sketches, line drawing....check
3. Throw out your neon colors......I'm trying!!
4. limit orange.....can't remember if he said it or someone else taking the workshop said it, but orange can get "whonky" in CMYK- what most books and magazine publishers are printing in, cause it is cheaper then what a fine art printer would use.
5. and no job is too little....which I totally agree with and would so love to get a bunch of little jobs!

Thus working on the spots and then am going to try and get some work in my portfolio for the educational market, as in "See Spot Run" sort of thing.

So get on twitter and let me know so I can follow you and follow Giuseppe for some good advice, he even does portfolio reviews on occasion.

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According to my husband , the Great Salt Lake and the Salt Flats around it,  is all that remains of a greater prehistoric fresh water lake called Bonneville that mostly evporated away. If you have been there, you know what I am talking about if not, read HERE...
I so have to put new art work up on my website, I have it, just needed to block out the week to updates things!

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wrote her wonderful novels like...

 who wrote riveting mysteries like....

 always put "married woman" as her occupation, never "writer" and slipped away, after her other duties  were done, to write...

On the other extreme were artists like Georgia O'Keeffe (1887-1996)...


who coming from a certain level of society and having a certain level of success, could stay in bed as long as she wished and paint as long as she wished, either on the East Coast or in her hide away in Abiqui New Mexico, because others were figuring everything else for her. No need to think about food, house hold duties or traveling itineraries. I know that from reading many of the letters between O'Keeffe and one of her assistants Marla Chabot,


who would get the artists homes in New Mexico ready for her through World War 2 and then cook and drive the artist around the high desert to paint scenes like this...



Having staff, an assistant, a spouse or a lover that pretty much took care of everything else was certainly a big perk for the artists featured in Currey's book and Alice B. Toklas, Gertrude Stein's companion certainly has to take the cake for the most willing to support Greatness...

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This Morning the ALA, the American Library Association announced the  winners and honors for 2013's best work in Juvenile  Literature. Amongst other awards the Newberry for the best writing went to Kate DiCamillo, who has to also get the award for getting the announcement up on her website the fastest...



and  the Caldecott, for the best of Illustration of a picture book went to Brian Floca's...

It's a big deal, this year with a live feed Monday morning, which I watched on my laptop, in my PJ's, in bed at 6:30 my time, while trying to keep up with the #alayma or #ala14yma on my tablet... yeah it is a bit much for someone with dsylexia.

For the Caldecott, I was rooting for David Wiesner's MR. WUFFLES...

An absolute hilarious depiction of tiny aliens invading our planet and becoming play things for a bored cat! The near wordless picture book did get a Caldecott Honor Silver award this year.

I have taken workshops from Wiesner, twice at the SCBWI LA Conference and this last August he treated us to the process of making MR. WUFFLES , from the pretty "loopy" spark of an idea that started with mini plastic soldiers in a sand box and then evolved to the hilarious first steps of the aliens on our plant and well, Mr. Wuffles, who is based of his cat. Wiesner following the poor cat around with a "kitty cam" on a stick! Go HERE for more delightful info on an ingenious book!

Wiesner is such a delight to learn from, for him everything goes back to craft and excellence,  and it is so nice to hear, amongst the ever present push of platforms, social media and well "hyping" up your book. Wiesner's books need no hyping up, proven by  his 2007 Caldecott wining book...

and he was gracious enough to write a little note to my art students in it...


Well, I actually asked him to write "Miss Julia is right, draw all the time" but he corrected me and wrote correct.

I'm planning on using the picture book to teach an art unit this spring. The antics of Arthur and the hard to handle Max, who won't slow down. Wiesner's book of two lizards with the back drop of the Southwest experimenting with splashy painting  like Jackson Pollock and dots like George Seurat will be a wonderful connection for my Native American and rural ranch kids who live very far way from high cultural.

I'm exicited now for the 2014 Society of Childern's Book Writer and Illustrator Conference in August to see who will be coming... probably not Wiesner this year but who knows, maybe Brian Floca or Aaron Becker, who also won a Caldecott Honor for ....

So apparently Flora was a popular baby book name, for writers a few years ago!

All the news, so very exciting, as was cheering along with everybody else live this year. To read all about it go to NPR's coverage on their blog HERE

Oh and one more shot out for Holly Black's DOLL BONES, a Newberry Honor this year,  which I have not read, but have chatted with Black when she was at SCBWI LA a couple of years ago, so big Congrats! but have to say Eliza Wheeler's illustration is my favorite of all the book covers up for awards...


Is there an award for the best illustrated book cover?... there should be!

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I can't take credit for this amazing picture, taken above Salt Lake. My daughter took it at the top of one of Park City's ski runs, or I should say snowboard runs.
After two days humoring me and going along for the ride around Salt Lake City, see here, we headed up into the Wasatch Mountains, and in about forty minutes were in Park City...


And Daughter #2 doing some Nordic and X Country skiing with her dad....

 After dropping everyone off on the mountain, I intended to "get some work done" for the afternoon, but ended up going back to the hotel and taking a nap, Holiday planning is exhausting for the mom. But after a few hours , everyone was ready for a break...



and  we warmed up at Atticus Coffee and Books.... 






                                    where we found food and drink at the Wasatch Brew Pub.



Even though it was a little weird to have IN-N-OUT in the snow. Places we usually get it- Arizona, Nevada or California where you can spot the burger joint by the towering crossed palm trees....I don't think palm trees would grow in Salt Lake.

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