I have many different reasons for inviting illustrators onto my blog. Many have become friends, all are gifted artists whom I admire, sometimes their daily doodles inspire me, others have won portfolio awards or I have contacted them after drooling over … Continue reading
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Blog: Miss Marple's Musings (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Interview, SCBWI, Illustrators, Ruth McNally Barshaw, E.B. Lewis, LEOPOLD, Denise Brennan Nelson, Ellie McDoodle Diaries, Add a tag
Blog: Tara Lazar (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Picture Books, Ellie McDoodle, Ruth McNally Barshaw, PiBoIdMo 2014, Add a tag
Ruth McNally Barshaw grew up in the Detroit area. When she was little she wanted to be an artist. She thought books were written by companies, not real people, so she didn’t want to write books. She changed her mind in 2002, and three years later connected with a fabulous agent who sold the first Ellie McDoodle book to Bloomsbury Children’s Books. Then it became a series.
She is the author-illustrator of the six Ellie McDoodle Diaries (often compared to Diary of a Wimpy Kid). She’s the illustrator of Leopold is Lost, by Denise Brennan-Nelson, due out in 2015 with Sleeping Bear Press. And she is author-illustrator of several other picture books currently in various stages of development.
She and her writer-husband Charlie frequently take their story creation workshop on the road to schools, libraries and conferences. Otherwise you can find them at home or at a local bookstore, writing.
View Ruth’s artwork, books, and workshop details at RuthExpress.com and connect with her on Twitter @ruthexpress.
You can win a signed-and-doodled copy of Ruth’s latest Ellie McDoodle book! It’s not a picture book, but it does have art on every page.
This prize will be given away at the conclusion of PiBoIdMo. You are eligible for this prize if:
- You have registered for PiBoIdMo.
- You have commented ONCE ONLY on today’s post.
- You have completed the PiBoIdMo challenge. (You will have to sign the PiBoIdMo Pledge at the end of the event.)
Good luck, everyone!
Blog: The Official SCBWI 10th Annual New York Conference Blog (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Ruth McNally Barshaw, #LA14SCBWI, Conference Illustrator Journals, Add a tag
About Ruth:
Author and illustrator Ruth McNally Barshaw worked in advertising and won big bucks creating grand prize winning entries for national essay contests (Kudos, Suave, American Library Association, Stouffers, Robitussin...) before getting into kids' books. Sketch-journaling the 2005 SCBWI Winter Conference directly led to her getting published. Her sixth Ellie McDoodle book comes out this September with Bloomsbury, and she's illustrating a picturebook for Sleeping Bear Press for 2015. See her work at http://ruthexpress.com
Author and Illustrator Ruth McNally Barshaw |
An example of Ruth's illustrations, the cover for her "The Ellie McDoodle Diaries: The Show Must Go On" |
Blog: Mindy Alyse Weiss (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: contest, ellie mcdoodle, ruth mcnally barshaw, Add a tag
Today on the Mixed-Up Files...of Middle Grade Authors blog, I posted an interview of Ruth McNally Barshaw, the amazing author/illustrator of the Ellie McDoodle series. She shared an awesome writing and illustrating exercise that I can't wait to try, and wait until you see her giveaway!
Tomorrow afternoon, two lucky people who comment on the Mixed-Up Files site will not only win an autographed and personalized paperback of her newly reissued Ellie McDoodle: Have Pen, Will Travel book, but Ruth will draw a sketch of each winner with Ellie, and will also create a version that could be used as an online avatar, like this wonderful sketch she drew of herself.
Most of our contests are only for people who live in the US and Canada, but anyone can enter this giveaway! If winners live outside the US or Canada, they’ll still receive the sketch. Instead of the autographed book, Ruth will give them a peek at a few digital pages from the next Ellie book, Ellie McDoodle: Most Valuable Player, a work in progress that will be published in Spring, 2012.I had so much fun interviewing Ruth. She's such a sweet, helpful, down-to-earth person. She always has so many gems to share, and I love how easily she let us all into her life. Growing up, my mom always wanted everything to seem perfect when we were out in public. When I first became serious about writing children's books, I thought that I'd have to try not to show my fears or flaws in public, and I'm so glad that there are people like Ruth who show me that I can can let my writing friends know that I'm a little nervous when reading a new project to one of my groups for the first time. Or when I finish polishing up a project, there's a part of me that wonders if I'll ever be able to write something as strong as that manuscript again. It really helps to be able to share this part of me, too, instead of locking all my insecurities away. Talking about it makes the obstacles much easier to overcome, and I'm grateful to have so many amazing writing buddies to share this journey with.
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Blog: Picture Book Junkies (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: ellie mcdoodle, ruth mcnally barshaw, Add a tag
Ruth McNally Barshaw is a children's writer and illustrator. She's the creator of the Ellie McDoodle book series. Ruth has compiled a treasure trove of her sketch-diaries of both past experiences and SCBWI conferences she has attended. To peruse them, click here . They are definitely worth the read.
> Ruth's blog, Ellie McDoodle
Blog: Post-Its from a Parallel Universe (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: Children's books, Ellie McDoodle, Ruth McNally Barshaw, Add a tag
Ellie McDoodle — New Kid in School was written and illustrated by Ruth McNally Barshaw and published in 2008 by Bloomsbury USA Children’s Books. It is Ruth’s second Ellie book for middle grade readers. It reads like a graphic novel slash girl’s sketchbook. I highly recommend this book as a fun and uplifting read.
Not only is Ruth Barshaw a talented children’s book author but she is “the Bomb!” when it comes to her fans! My ten-year-old is a ginormous Ellie fan and when I emailed Ruth to let her know that her Learn to Draw class at the Orion Township Library was full and hence, Sarah would have to see her at another event sometime in the unbearable future to a ten-year-old – well, Sarah received a wonderful call from a wonderful librarian named Kris and Ruth had opened her class to Sarah and all the kids on the waiting list.
To top it off, Ruth is warm, open, extremely funny and a hit with the kids.
She takes her time when autographing books, drawing the children a special picture and writing encouraging messages to them. Not to mention, she is pretty gosh darn good at teaching art.
And these characteristics of Ruth come clearly through her work in the Ellie McDoodle books. In her new book, Ellie and her family are moving and Ellie is both characteristically funny and also poignantly truthful about her feels of loss. Sometimes, it is the details of our everyday lives that we love the most — the little things about our home and friends and school.
Ellie right away finds the library in her new town and finds refuge and new friends there. Reminding me of the hours I spent at the library when I was a child. I simply love libraries. All the books — I could hang out there ad nauseum. At my local library, the librarians are my friends.
Ellie then solves her own bedroom problem in a hard-working and mature way, meets a boy in her class and then shows up to school on the first day in pants when all the girls are in dresses/skirts. The next day, Ellie wears a dress, but oh no!
Ellie plays games with the other kids in the neighborhood as we used to in our neighborhood. She has a supposedly horrible art teacher who appears to know nothing about art (but redeems herself later in the book) and she lives in a family that likes to play pranks on each other. Ruth brought Mrs. Claus to her Learn to Draw class and yes, she is horrifying.
But Ellie’s big accomplishment is the organization of her own nonviolent protest against the long lunch lines at her new school. She regains her self-confidence and cements her budding friendships.
The book also contains directions for playing the neighborhood games, for making things (origami piano), and how to draw and keep a sketchbook. There is also an Interview with the Author.
“Artists draw on the world for inspiration … and to inspire.” Ellie McDoodle
Blog: Scribbled Business (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
JacketFlap tags: free, evolution, sketchbooks, blog contest, looking back, retrospective, timeline, drawings by children, free, sketchbooks, evolution, blog contest, retrospective, looking back, timeline, drawings by children, Add a tag
I spent a bit of today looking through old sketchbooks and had a good laugh. Take a look at a sketch I completed in 1989:
From 1997:
And some from 2002 (I was a student at Grant MacEwan College):
Evolution is a wonderful thing!
*there's only one more day until my blog contest ends! Scroll down for more information.
Good words of advice. From experience (with a different genre) success is simply putting your butt in a chair, writing, editing, and then doing it all over again. Persistence is key.
Thanks for this inspiring post!
I love the illustrations and the affirmation cards!
What a fun post! Not just picture books have pictures!
What DOES the fox say? ;-) Thanks for a fun, upbeat post Ruth!
Good advice! Thanks, Ruth!
Thanks for the reminders!
Sweet drawings and the encouragement is much appreciated. Thank you!
This was so great to read! I loved the motivational Fox! Thank you.
I am hanging on to your encouragement! Thank you!