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Happy New Year friends and fellow book lovers! I know you will enjoy my first interview of the year with the talented author/illustrator, Michelle Edwards. Michelle has written and/or illustrated several picture books. Her most recent book is a new release of an old favorite, CHICKEN MAN. I’m delighted to welcome Michelle to my blog!

Tell me a little bit about your latest book. Why you were drawn to write about a Jewish theme or character?

My newest book, Chicken Man (January 2008) is actually one of the first books I wrote and illustrated. It will have a new cover and author’s note.

I wrote Chicken Man after living and working on Kibbutz Mizra. I had a friend who worked in the lul, the chicken coop. His charming stories of the chickens and the fun he had in the lul convinced me to work there, too. It was a horrible place and I hated the chickens. That’s when I learned about the power of stories.

What type of research was involved?

I guess you could say that my research was my short, but very memorable tenure in the Kibbutz Mizra chicken coop.

How did you become a children’s writer?

During my first stay in Israel (1974) I filled sketch books with stories and pictures. I knew I wanted to be an artist. One day, I realized that children’s books told stories this way. So I started to teach myself about writing and illustrating for children. It has been a very long course. I am still learning.

What are you working on now?

A book called THE GRAVEL ROAD GANG.

What are a few fun acts about you?

My childhood nickname, Mush. Still in use.
I knit socks!
I love comic books.
I save stamps. And sometimes their envelopes.

What is your favorite holiday?

Rosh Hashanah! I love beginnings. And apples and the first signs of autumn.

Here's to a fabulous new beginning for Chicken Man! Michelle, thanks for stopping by!

To learn more about Michelle and her other wonderful books, please visit her web site at www.MichelleEdwards.com

Are we providing our children with too much entertainment? It seems parents spend much of their weekdays and all of their weekends entertaining their kids. Most kids today are accustomed to their parents or friends’ parents providing them with constant entertainment. What has happened? Some of my fondest memories of summer are the sweet smells of my child coming in from the intense summer heat, after an afternoon of football with is friends. When he walked in you could smell that faint scent of copper boys have after playing, and see the combination of dirt, sweat, and mud in his hair. I can still hear the clang of our back door shut when he strolled in complaining of an empty hungry belly. Children need time alone to make believe, since its practice for becoming an adult. When we provide them with constant entertainment, we’re robbing them of the time needed to take advantage of that opportunity.

So have your child entertain themselves this summer, and you will allow them to dream and imagine living and dealing with different situations.

If we are constantly engaging them in ways outside of themselves to be entertained, it seems they will never look to themselves for their own answers and definitions of happiness as well as entertainment. We all are responsible for how we feel, even children, so it seems like we should be teaching our kids how to make themselves happy as opposed to providing them with instant gratification, and easy entertainment. By easy I mean passive types of entertainment, for instance videos games, television and other quick fixes that don’t provide children with much of a challenge. That’s not to say those things should be outlawed, however, they don’t require the child learn a skill like playing the guitar, reading, writing, and many different types of sports where you have to put in an effort to participate.

In addition if children are given enough chores to do, and other responsibilities to take care of they’re more likely to be grateful for the free time just to play. Its not clear when it happened but it seems our society is so much more child oriented today than it was when I was growing up, or when I reared my own son. I didn’t grow up in the dark ages, (lol) and my son is only 21 years old, so it seems much has changed in a fairly short period of time. For example, it never occurred to my brothers and I to complain of unhappiness or boredom, since my mother would have promptly found an antidote for our affliction. My mother instructed us at the beginning of every summer on her summer rules, and the first rule was we would go outside to play.

One time she went down the street to have coffee with a friend, and we had every neighborhood kid over to our house. Then she came home earlier than expected, before we could shuffle our many friends out our back door. Consequently, they hid behind various pieces furniture in our living room. When she walked in the door she came in and called out every child by their name from their hiding places. For example she said, “Steven, get out from the behind the chair,” and “ Michael you can remove yourself from behind the drapes.” My brothers and I were shocked, and wondered where she got this miraculous talent, the ability to know who was there and their hiding place! Of course there were many days when we just went to a neighbors house and watched T.V. , and didn’t benefit from her rule (sorry Mom) She used this summer rule to teach us how to value the outdoors and use our imaginations, in addition to providing her with the bonus of a quiet house, if only for awhile.

I don’t know what happened to the Norman Rockwell summers when families and their children stayed at home and entertained themselves all summer, however I do know that the best thing you can teach your child is how to live without you, and that begins with knowing how to make themselves happy.

Thus, don’t parents have enough to worry about without worrying about what their middle schoolers have planned for the week-end, or what the Jones kids did the week-end before?

Isn’t boredom good in many ways? When my son was growing up, we were on a tight budget and today I ‘m grateful for that experience.

Since I had to carefully plan our activities it made what we were able to accomplish more amazing, than if the opportunity had presented itself any differently. Most of this worlds’ great things were born out of adversity, hardship, and boredom, since these situations help us learn how to dream, imagine and believe.

So this summer make a list of rules, and buy your kids a book to read when it’s raining, then realize they are capable of entertaining themselves, no matter what age or background.

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