Early August, I attended the Society of Childrens Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Summer Conference in LA. All the fun and excitement took place at the Century Plaza Hyatt hotel. Below, and in the next few posts, I’ll share the highlights of my trip, a few observations and then some..:-)
Happenings this Month
The School Visit Front :: I celebrated Asian Pacific American Heritage Month and Children’s Book Week with the students of Earhart School of Alameda, CA where I appeard for a full day of assemblies, a family evening presentation and some kinder book readings.
Above photo: Teaching the kids a sitting hula. * Special thanks to Principal Joy Dean and Media Center Teachers, Ana Soria-Kevy and Jeni Marr. I had a fantastic time at your school!
The Internet Scene :: My interview with editor Tarie Sabido of Into The Wardrobe, a delightful children’s and YA literature blog is up now. This month, Tarie highlights kid lit authors and illustrators who have a unique Asian Pacific connection. She posed some excellent questions that I hope I answered well. FYI, I stayed up into the wee hours of the morning, typing out my answers to the best of my ability ** note: bleary eyes but full heart** I am honored to be part of this month’s festivities. Please check out the interview and blog here.
Remember doing Show ‘n Tell back in grade school? That’s essentially what I do when I visit schools and libraries as a visiting author/illustrator. I love sharing with young audiences the process of creating a picture book. Depending on how long I have, I take my audience through the journey of book-making from idea to publication and printing. Often, I’ll share a little bit extra about the culture and food of Hawai’i. If there is time, I’ll even perform a sitting hula like I did at Fairytale Town in Sacramento this fall. The photos above and below show the audience involvement. Fun for all ages!
I’ve performed in classrooms and school assemblies of all sizes since my book, The Sleeping Giant: A Tale From Kaua’i was released in fall 2006. I look forward to doing more school and library performances in 2009. To find out how to book me for a school appearance, please visit this link.
Hau’oli Makahiki Hou! Happy New Year!
September came and went, but I’m baaack! Lots to share and pictures to post—next time!
Meanwhile, I discovered how to make a word cloud from my picture book, The Sleeping Giant: A Tale From Kaua’i. (The above image resembles a fish, doesn’t it? Thanks to the online program, Wordle, you too can create a special word cloud from your text of choice. All you have to do is copy it into an online form and the program will conjure up a unique word cloud that represents your text, based on frequency of word usage. You can edit the word cloud by typeface, color, layout, etc.
It’s easy and fun. Give it a try here!
Wonder how an old love letter or school report might look? Hm, could be interesting... but I’ll leave that up to others. If you decide to make a word cloud, I’d love to see it. Just leave a comment with a link.
Go here to create your own word cloud. Feel free to post it in a wordle gallery—like I just did!
This major doodad consists of a bunch of little doodads. That’s about all I know of this so-called Victorian Strobe. I found it on a 2007 holiday gift blog. Go there and discover exactly how useless this doodad is or stay here, prop your feet up and peruse my happenings…
Group Show at MOCHA
Children’s Book Illustrators Then and Now at Museum of Children’s Art (MOCHA) will show from April 5 to May 31. View an original image from my book, THE SLEEPING GIANT, and a self-portrait I created when I was a teen.
Meet the Artists on Saturday, April 5, 2-4 PM. Come on down to Oaktown!
From the City of Oakland’s Calendar: Popular annual exhibit features the current work of children’s book illustrators alongside works created by the artists when they were children. See stories illuminated by some of today’s most innovative and exciting illustrators – and see what they were creating way back when!
Wicked Lovely Art Contest
Wicked Lovely author, Melissa Marr, held an art contest. The deadline for submissions was set for Winter Solstice when I submitted my illustration of characters, Sasha and Donia. I’m not sure of the status of winners but a selection of art from the contest can be viewed at Melissa’s site. Lots of teen talent there! Scroll down to peek at adult artwork, including mine.
I’ve Been Listed…
…by author, Kim Norman. on her new Visiting Authors by State site. Now, if you or your nearest school want an author/illustrator to visit with the students for the day (wink, wink), you can search from a list of CA authors. Thanks, Kim!
Soup’s On!
Last month, I was fortunate to be interviewed by children’s book author Jama Rattigan on her blog, Alphabet Soup. Jama asked a lot of good questions, posted a ton of pics and she even squeezed in my mom’s recipe for lumpia. Check out the fun here.
This weekend an “earth-shaking” literature event is taking place: Reading the World X, a conference dedicated to multicultural literature education, held in San Francisco, CA at USF. I say earth-shaking because my lovely neighboring city of San Francisco, is rumbling with the footsteps of attendees from all over CA and other states, who have gathered together to celebrate, educate and share with one another—a wealth of voices in multicultural literature. Guest speakers include: Ashley Bryan, Naomi Shihab Nye, Alma Flor Ada, Leslie Tryon, Laurence Yep, Sarah Ellis, Peter Sís, Rita Williams Garcia, Jack Zipes and Doris Orgel.
I’m honored to participate as a presenter my first year at this event. Today, I’m putting on a workshop titled From Hawaiian Talk Story to Printed Page. I’ll be leaving shortly and will update this post with stories, updates and hopefully, pictures. Stay tuned…
The above image is from the picture book, Starry Messenger: Galileo Galilei by Peter Sís, which graced this year’s Reading the World X posters and promotional materials.
This year has seen the completion of Sir Anthony Kenny’s acclaimed four-volume series A New History of Western Philosophy. To celebrate the occasion we recently held a wonderful party at The Oxford and Cambridge Club in London, and some photos from the night are below. Sir Anthony gave a speech, and has kindly let us reproduce an extract from it below. Here he talks about the challenges, questions, and goals he encountered as he wrote the series. (more…)
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