Crayola Creativity Week

Hi friends! We are fast approaching something I have been anticipating for a while– Crayola Creativity Week! It’s a free program for schools, libraries, and homes that gives access to an entire week’s worth of free creative content. You can sign up at this link to receive notifications when new videos or activities go live and be entered in giveaways, etc. It’s fun! I love Crayola.

Back in September, I gave my studio a little glow-up and set up a mini recording studio (two cameras!) to make some drawing demo videos and do my best at acting excited to appear on video talking about my illustrations in the children’s book, JUST BECAUSE. I recorded a few segments, Matthew McConaughey recorded a few segments, and they spliced them together like magic! 🪄✨

I’ve seen it and if you watch it next week, you too may be fooled by my casual demeanor. However, know this truth: I was terrified! I spent the weeks leading up to the recording session miserable and irritable. I planned relentlessly. I wrote and rewrote my script. I memorized said script. I drew, redrew, and timed my two drawing demos knowing they were only supposed to be 5 minutes each.

Still my favorite type of warm up drawings- cats!

I practiced talking into a camera 😬/🐿️:

I practiced reciting my script while making the art, in an attempt to combat the imposter syndrome I felt. I was SO ready!

And then!

On recording day, all of this training COMPLETELY FAILED ME. I forgot every darned thing and winged it. When my drawing demo was done, they said “That was great, but…”

…Can you do it again?”

I agreed but also died inside. I guess I leaned too far into my desk and all they saw on one camera was my shoulder. 😂 The rest of the day was foggy. I only remember that it was election day and I spent the rest of the morning outside with my pup and have exactly one picture to show for it:

I’m an introvert. I need to use more energy than most people when I socialize or “perform.” Stuff like this just destroys me for the entire day. But, I did it, and when I watched the final product, it surprisingly wasn’t the worse thing I have ever seen. (✨The magic of editing!✨)

I am, however, mentally preparing for the comments section because inevitably someone somewhere will think it IS actually the worst. (I watched the live feed during my It’s Winter presentation and my nervous system nearly exploded with embarrassment because of a few negative comments). 😵‍💫 Serves me right for looking!

Crayola Creativity Week is sprinkled with celebrity appearances and I’m not sure how celebrities ever avoid the chatter. Ever since I have illustrated JUST BECAUSE, I have gotten a little taste of what it is like to be a celebrity (like…the kind of taste where you have a Level 2,000,000 on the Scoville Scale bottle of hot sauce sitting in front of you and you’re like - I’ll-just-try-the-tiniest-dab-and-it-burns-your-tongue-for-hours kind of taste) and I am happy to say I very much like my little secluded life where I only have to do so much as peek out of my window every 6 months.

ANYWAY. All of this to say, I enjoy the creative part of my job…the drawing-in-solitude-with-headphones-on portion. The performance part of this job, I might not ever be OK with. 😂 Regardless, there are some other really fantastic guests contributing to Crayola Creativity Week and I highly recommend checking it out! It starts on Monday, January 27th with yours truly and that other guy. 😜

Behold the entire reason I changed my author pic last year. I suspected it might end up next to MM’s one day and gosh derrnit it had to be pretty- HA!

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Art by Sydney Hanson

A group of wonderful creators have organized an auction to raise money for California wildfire relief. The kidlit community is always so generous, but you have to just take a look at some of the offerings because - wow.

Please share and consider bidding to donate to one of the suggested organizations if you haven't already, even a little will make a difference.

🌈 Here is a link to my auction:

🌈 Here is a link to everything (again, wow!)

@kidlitforlosangeles is:
@carolinelperry
@picturebookrecommendations
@taraluebbe
@jocelynrish
@sydwiki
They are working around the clock to put this together and have already raised over 50K! Amazing. 🙏❤️

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**In other news** I decided to put a pause on paid subscriptions until I have at least 2-3 months worth of content to publish. If you have already subscribed, I LOVE YOU. Thank you. I am going to give you your money back.