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Dress Me!

Written by Sarah Frances Hardy
Illustrated by Sarah Frances Hardy
Sky Pony Press           5/05/2015
978-1-63220-823-3
20 pages               Age 3—7
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“This little girl can be a lawyer, doctor, superhero, or plumber. She can be graceful, creative, brave, caring, silly, and even scary. She can wear braids or glasses, a crown or a beret. There are infinite, limitless possibilities, and this little girl gets to choose who and what she wants to be. And there’s always the option for her to be ‘just me.’ From the author/illustrator of Paint Me! comes a delightful, imaginative story about a little girl with some incredible aspirations.” [book jacket]

Review
The nameless young girl, along with her loyal puppy, take readers through part of their day as they move from room-to-room, outfit-to-outfit, and activity-to-activity. They start their day deciding what to wear. Deciding to start with some exercise, the girl pulls down her pink tutu, matching top, a violet sash, and . . . wait, what about her feet? No worries, pup has fetched the girl’s pink ballet slippers, dutifully waiting for his friend to slip them on her feet. With a high twirl and a long leap the pair dance, never out of step. The young girl and her dog take on a gamut of outfits (tutu, smock, scrubs, dresses, and masks), and identities (artist, teacher, lawyer, diva, builder, or plumber), as they dance, paint, fly through the air, and take lunch orders.

Older children have books such as WIGU Publishing’s When I Grow Up I Want to be a . . . series to help them decide what they might like to become. Dress Me does the same for younger children, in terms they y understand. More than that, Dress Me is about being yourself while enjoying who you are, right now. The illustrations tell the majority of the story. I like that Dress Me leaves much of the narration to the reader—or he young listener. While the young girl teaches a couch full of attentive stuffed animals (and one real puppy), the text reads,

“Teacher me.”

I like that kids can decide why the girl is teaching, what she is teaching, and to whom she, dong a great job of blending in to the scene. Pup does the same in this scene. Dress Me will appeal to young girls more than boys, even though Hardy includes male-oriented careers and activities boys enjoy. The illustrations are delightful. Each spread is loaded with detail, adding continuity by carrying items from one spread to the next. For example, the puppy pulls a blue-striped tie from the laundry basket. In the next image he wears the tie while pretending to be in court, on the wrong side of the young girl’s law. She has pushed a pair of glasses atop her head while waitressing and worn correctly as a teacher.

Dress Me is the perfect book for preschoolers beginning to self-explore their world and their place in it. Parents will appreciate the creativity Dress Me can inspire in young girls, who will begin to think out of their prescribed female roles. More importantly, Dress Me encourages young girls to enthusiastically be themselves.

A final note: the illustrations are the best yet from Hardy who improves with each book. Dress Me! is Hardy’s third book. Her others are Paint Me! and Puzzled by Pink (reviewed HERE).

DRESS ME! Text and illustrations copyright © 2015 by Sarah Frances Hardy. Reproduced by permission of the publisher, Sky Pony Press, New York, NY.

Purchase Dress Me! at Amazon—Book Depository—Sky Pony Press.

Learn more about Dress Me! HERE.
Meet the author/illustrator, Sarah Frances Hardy:
Website:  http://www.sfhardy.com/
Blog:  http://sfhardy.blogspot.com/
Facebook:  http://bit.ly/SarahFrancesHardyFacebook
Twitter:  https://twitter.com/sfhardy2
Find more picture books at the Sky Pony Press website:  http://www.skyponypress.com/

Sky Pony Press is an imprint of Sky Horse Publishing

Also by Sarah Frances Hardy

 

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Review word count = 455

Copyright © 2015 by Sue Morris/Kid Lit Reviews.

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Filed under: 4stars, Library Donated Books, NonFiction, Picture Book Tagged: aspirations, be yourself, Dress Me!, enjoy being yourself, inspiration, little girls books, make-believe, puppies, Sarah Frances Hardy, self esteem, Sky Pony Press

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Hi, folks! This month I'm calling the series Uplift. The idea of uplift is to improve socially, culturally, morally, spiritually, etc.  We are all hungry, our hearts beating, struggling for contentment and a sweet spot to thrive. This is part of journey for uplift. 

This week I'm going to wander some, but I hope that you capture the uplift from my words and find ways to thrive.

Here is a little story from my life. Recently, someone expressed disappointment in my lack of faith in in my writing and art. She seemed very assured that my work is total genius and the fact that I'm not doing more with it is a crying shame. She derided for my lack of respect for my own abilities. Part of me wanted to scream: You think I don't have faith in myself? You think I don't believe that my work is profound? You don't think I've tried to find a place for my voice? I had to squelch the wave of anger inside me and recognize that someone believed in my work passionately. I felt gratefulness for the connection. 

Writing is a passion of mine. Almost every writer has a different reason why he or she writes. For me it is to connect with an audience. I want to say something that will kindle light within multitudes of readers. I literally ache with this need to connect. I am seeking an army of friends. This is a soul hunger within me. Some people want shiny stickers, truth on the page, I long for scores of letters and emails from people who have been moved by my art. I want to write back and rejoice in our connection. 

My major writing goal is to travel close to the bone, and hence I put a lot of myself on the page. Here is some full disclosure honesty: my book, out this year, PLUMB CRAZY, was an intimate journey for me. My veins were opened and blood poured onto the page. My craziness. My laughter. My sadness. I know a few of you fell in love with my book, but that number is basically limited to my dearest friends and few new dearest friends. Of course, I TREASURE those who were moved by my literary journey, but I had great expectations that more people would love this book.  

I've considered a new vocation of howling at the moon, but the better angels of my nature have appeared. My better angels whisper: all journeys bring gifts into your life. This is so true. I've learned a few things this year. My readers don't want prizes or swag. They don't want curse words. They really appreciate uber careful editing. I also see that my wheelhouse is sweetness, kindness, friendship and family, hence my sexy cover isn't exactly connecting for many. These are all good things to know. 

I am not done. As I move forward on my creative journey, I plan to avoid the pop culture glue of brittle success and positive thinking, and guide my heart toward completeness and authentic thinking. I find denying failure and negative thoughts as a worthless endeavor. I embrace failure and negativity. These are a part of me, but I am so much more. I am joy and light, too.  I am sinner and saint.  I am angel and devil. I am art and craft. I am ridiculous and profound. I am mouse and lion. For me, true life is about being open to all this contradiction and embracing all of it with a tender heart. I will continue to put my garbled real on the page.

I will keep trying. I can respect this even if I ultimately fail. Giving up. This is the thing I can't respect. So stay the course or plot a new one.  You may chose to abandon a dream but never abandon dreaming. 

Come back next week for more Uplift. 

Here is a doodle for you: "Cone Flower."

Friendship is born at that moment when one man says to another: "What! You too? I thought that no one but myself . . .
― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

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Hi, folks,

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We all have dreams and aspirations they grow within us from any age, from the time we’re two years old and scribbling on any blank piece of paper in sight to the years in university when your dreaming up a life of bigger things you want to do and places you may want to go. Although as time goes by sometimes unless your extremely determined you can feel swayed or lose sight of the things you dreamed of and that’s why you need to grab a pen and sketch them out.

Sketching out your dreams keeps them in sight, gives you a reference to go back to when your feeling a tad lost in your aspirations or feel your not sure where your going. So here are 5 steps to sketching out your own creative dream for 2014.

1.  Grab a huge piece of paper or wallpaper roll across the floor , a couple of pens and your inspiration and start doodling and jotting out your aspirations and future plans.

2 .  Break them down with someone who motivates you the little steps you need to do to work towards those dreams ( They don’t seem so far away when the two of you narrow them down into tiny steps).

3.  Start paving roots and pathways to begin implimenting your plans .

4.  Meet new people and make connections with those who might help you on your way to where you want to be :).

5. Block out those niggling negative thoughts and “I can’t do this”, stay positive if something doesn’t work out brush yourself down and keep going as being self motivated is key and the effort you put in is sure to pay off.

Image by Designer  Alyssa Nassner you can find more about her and her designs “here”.

 

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Following the creative path to live a creative life isn’t always an easy instant road to success.  You’re going to put in the effort and hard work so you’ll no doubt get there but like any journey there will be challenges to face and obstacles to overcome to become who you want to be.  Whether you’re a current art student at college, just graduated from university or are bettering your creative practice in your own time with the aspiration of running your own business there’s one teeny tiny obstacle we all have niggling away inside called “expectations”.

Expectations can be anything from aims you set to accomplishments and standards you may put on yourself or those that people around you may have of you themselves but today I’m going to cover self expectations.  Having expectations in general isn’t a bad thing as they give you points to work on and creative insight into ways you’d like to grow.

However sometimes when we set such high aims to reach and aspiring results to follow, when we fall short it can really knock us down and sometimes make you second guess what you’re doing and why you’re doing it. You may find yourself questioning whether you did something right, whether your skills are at their best , if you met the brief you were set and whether you can be as good as the next guy the list goes on and you’re not alone in thinking so.

 However amongst all this expectation you also need to be your biggest motivator and you need to brush yourself off and tell yourself “Believe you can and you will achieve all you set out to”.  I believe you can achieve anything if you put the effort and the hard work into all that you do, although one thing you must truly believe in is yourself.  Remember these few things when you feel your inner expectations are clouding your creative motivation;

1. Your work is surely to be at its best when you are as well. 

2. Everyone’s story and journey is different don’t compare your beginning to someone else’s middle.

3.  A success is to be perceived through your own eyes, however if you don’t try you’ll never know how far you could have gone. 

Featured image created by designer Stephanie Ryan and you can find out more about her and her beautiful designs “here” .

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I thought I'd fill my blog this December with some of the things I've loved about 2009 and some aspirations for 2010. I swear Longfellow wrote the below about me...

There was a little girl, who had a little curl
Right in the middle of her forehead,
And when she was good, she was very, very good,
But when she was bad she was horrid.

...If I'd worked as hard as I've procrastinated during 2009, my wrists wouldn't sting so much because I've just slapped them hard. Sort of. Okay, not at all. Feeling a brave sort of gal, I opened up my diary and read the entry for January 1st, you know the one with all the goals. Erm, bad me. It is impossible to have a story accepted by a market if you don't send them anything and throwing all your eggs at one basket is only going to leave you smelling rotten. Seriously, Clarkesworld must be sick of my submissions and Fantasy & Science Fiction must be feeling very left out. Still I believe God loves a trier, and Neil Clarke is close to God for us writers. And who doesn't worship at the altar of Ellen Datlow.

I hope you all enjoy December as much as I intend to and repeat after me, "We are going to cut our swath through 2010."

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