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We recently had the pleasure of having Lisa Brown over to Knuffle Manor and celebrated with a doodle dinner for her with Holly Black, Theo Black and the family. A fun night of food and doodles!  Here are the results: (click to bigafy)  And here are some details. Theo: Cher: Myself: Holly: Lisa: The Trixter: Huzzah!  A fun night was had by all!  Why not have your own doodle

...to be home with the family making doodles on the paper table cloth during dinner.It's also fun to get Cat the Cat mentioned in James Kolchalka's cartoon diary American Elf!

It's always nice to have a house guest, even if it is animator/author Mr. Warburton*.If nothing it's an excuse for a gathering. And since it had been a while since our dining room chalkboard walls had been attacked by various and sundry, we made sure to leave out the chalk.Here are some highlights.Mr. Warburton returns the warm feelings.Hilary Price isn't so sure about the evening either:Book

Happy Summer!
One of the best parts of summer is having extra time, and what better way to spend your quality time than creating art with your little one?



A friend of ours from the Delaware Valley Art Therapy Association, Megan Van Meter, LPC, ATR-BC, shared this helpful list of tips for Responding to Children’s Artwork:

“A piece of artwork is a piece of communication, not a piece of clutter. When a child (or anyone, for that matter) shows you her or his art, here are some guidelines for responding in a way that lets the individual know you are listening to her or him.

DO:
• Express appreciation that the work is being shared with you (“It’s really great that you wanted to share this with me.” In doing this you communicate that you are interested in your relationship with your child.

• Accept each piece of art as valid in as-is condition (“I see this must be about something important, or you wouldn’t have made art about it.”) In doing this you communicated you accept the child the child as having validity and worth

• Ask the child to discuss the world (“Can you tell me a little about this?”) In doing this you communicate you are interested in understanding the child’s thoughts, feelings and perceptions.

• Recognize the effort that went into the making the art (“You used up the whole sheet of paper- that really must have taken a lot of work!”) In doing this you communicate that effort, not ability, is necessary for success.

Remember: appreciating a child’s efforts, not her or his ability, is what paves the road for the individual’s success. This applies to artmaking as well as behavior in general!”


This weekend at Please Touch Museum, chalk artist Jeannie Moberly will be participating in our first Chalk It Up! Sidewalk Chalk event to celebrate the start of summer! The first 500 kids (ages 12 and under) through the door on Saturday will receive FREE pack of Crayola Sidewalk Chalk from the Crayola Factory. Visitors will be able to watch Jeannie as she draws a unique mural on the ground outside of the Carousel House. We can't wait!

http://www.pleasetouchmuseum.org/events/calendar/

When we invite friends over for dinner, especially if they're cartoonist Hilary Price and Kristen Gottschalk...[click to enlarge images]We've drawn on the table (and walls) before. This time we made an added discovery during the candle light dinner:Crayon wax MELTS!As the evening progressed, so did the silliness.(Booze-O the Clown)(Wine lady)The Morning after.Why not have a doodling dinner?

We had so much fun drawing on our paper table cloth during dinner last night...that after dinner Zazz -the hamster of adventure!- decided to drop by and check out the doodles.

Right before I left on tour, it was my birthday, so we didn't get to celebrate until my return from the road.And celebrate we did, because my gift from the family was the one thing I'd most wanted for the longest time!That's right, I got my very own one of THESE:I KNOW how jealous you are right now (even if you don't know what that thing is). Long time visitors to the site know of my family's

Yesterday was Knuffle Manor's 3rd annual luncheon/party for the awesome pals who do all of the hard work editing, designing, publicizing, representing, and supporting my feeble efforts and turn them into books. This year the gang included folks at Hyperion, Harper, and Shelly's.Affectionately dubbed "Sausage Fest" (on account of a menu consisting of homemade Dutch Meatball Soup, Suzitije

It's been a while since the family altered the chalkboard walls in Knuffle Manor's dining room, so for the new year we decided on a theme of Coats of Arms.Much like our portraits, we were looking to provide symbols for fictional families.The deal was thus:One person drew the shield and motto ribbon.Another person drew the inside of the shield.A third person drew the animals around the shield and

It's time to return once again to our dining room chalk board walls.Looking for something more serene than the last adventure, the family hit upon a series of portraits to grace our dining experience. So, first off we had to create a series of frames (ornate and modern) to house our portraits.Here are the (fuzzy) results:We had so much fun making these little frames that we decided to keep them

So, it was time to redraw our dining room chalkboard walls once again....This time we decided on a new theme, and new collaborators. The Willems clan pulled out our chalk and asked a few neighborhood pals to come over for dinner and draw on our walls with us. They included author Holly Black, her web-king/illustrator hubby Theo, and Rhymes with Orange's Hilary Price. The next week, we had

Cute. Till Lassmann’s Chalkies.

This music video for Autumn Story by Firekites, was animated with chalkboard drawings by co-directors Lucinda Schreiber and Yanni Kronenberg.