…and triumphs. This is from a story out making the rounds. Be brave, chicken! You never know.

Work is necessary, work is good. But gritting your teeth and working, head down, is not always good for your work. You can carve a rut in your brain. You can stumble in and get stuck there.  Sometimes it pays to look UP.

This time of year, we like to watch the Vaux’s swifts migrate through Portland. One place they stop is the chimney of the Chapman elementary school in NW Portland. 10 or 15,000 or more birds swirl down into this chimney. Living smoke, in reverse. (Good info at the local Audubon Society site, HERE. ) A LOT of people go to see this event, these days. All types; from bookish bird watchers making notes in notebooks, to arty types with elegant picnics and tiny dogs tucked under their arms, to young parents with lumbering, panting, old dogs and burbling babies, and/or young children who break away and spend the hour before sunset shrieking with glee, sliding down the hill on scraps of cardboard… NOT your average bird-watching expedition. But a great spectacle, in the air and on the ground.

Swifts circling over chimney. There was a falcon up there, too, cruising for a quick bite. The crowd screamed and cheered (for both sides) every time he/she swooped through the cloud of swifts.

The birds paid no heed to the noise from below.

Wow! Congratulations to Cynthea Liu for her great Take the Dare: Show You Care fundraising effort for Tulakes Elementary. They raised $15,000 to support various literacy-building activities. Zowie. That’s a lot. I’m glad I could be a teeny little part of the effort. (I donated a Bubble Party Prize Package, with a copy of Bubble Homes, and prints, and cards, a bubble-stuff recipe, and bubble activities, such as ever-so-silly otter-face hat. See above.) I admire people who can organize, and motivate…

Drop by and say Hi!

So here I am, working late late when I’m flying out early, early.

Silly me.

Looking forward to a lot of mingling with books and book people… lovely, lovely books. And lovely, lovely book people. If you stop by the Charlesbridge booth on Saturday roundabout 11 am, I will happily deface a copy of Bubble Homes & Fish Farts for you.

I just picked up my postcards this afternoon, from the nice folks at JDA Creative Color. They were kind to me in my frazzled state, and they did a great job, too.  There’s a bubble recipe on the back! So you can have your own bubble fun.

Forget they’re weeds… aren’t they pretty? On my street.

No, this is not my house. Around the corner. Mark thinks this is a little much, but I love it. And in case you’re wondering… I do pull weeds in my own yard. Consistently inconsistent, that’s me.

Bonus: View out my little house window, of the big hole which will soon be a mighty-fine skateboarding pool.

A young writing friend and neighbor, Bridget Zinn, was recently diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer, just as great things were starting to happen with her writing career. She signed with a super agent (yay!) A week or two later she went to the emergency room with a headache (it was a very bad headache) and a few other mysterious symptoms. She got an incomprehensible diagnosis (She’s young! She’s fit! She doesn’t drink, smoke, or eat meat!) followed by a grueling course of medical treatment, and medical bills, bills, bills. This is SO wrong. She’s a talented, funny person, and a positive force in the writing community. Helping out, organizing events, sending reminders for writer friends’ book events even after chemo, as the nasty side effects kicked in! We need people like this in the world. We need them happy and healthy and on their feet. We can’t fight the cancer for her, but maybe we can help a little with the bills. Here’s a link to an online auction where you can purchase many cool items and services and do good at the same time. I am offering the illustration above, from Bubble Homes & Fish Farts.

Fiona Bayrock rocks the book launch thing! These are scenes from her launch at the Vancouver Aquarium... That's the Vancouver in Canada, not the Vancouver right across the river from me. I wish we lived closer, so I could take advantage of her mad skills, er... I mean, so we could do something together.

Here are links to some very nice reviews. (They’ve all been nice, luckily.) Jen Robinson’s Book Page, The Well-Read Child, The Miss Rumphius Effect, and Just One More Book! (audio review). Anastasia Suen has some ideas how to use Bubble Homes on her blog, Using Picture Books to Teach the Six Traits of writing.

So! It’s out. I have a fart book. A whole box of them, actually. Does this mean no one will take me seriously? (Like THAT was going to happen!) Oh well. Working with great people and having a great time will be my revenge. Ha! I should mention at some point that Bubble Homes & Fish Farts was written by Fiona Bayrock, so it’s her book, too. It was her book first, If you want to get technical about it. I am only the illustrator…

We got a nice review from Kirkus. (One more TOOT.) Interested? Read on.

Bayrock’s love of “way cool science” bubbles over in this surprisingly substantial book. How do animals use bubbles? For sailing, running, breathing, nesting–even playing (dolphins seem to blow bubbles just for fun). Sixteen double-page spreads cover 16 wholly different ways that fish, insects, amphibians and mammals use bubbles. Did you know that one species of spider creates a bubble home to live in underwater? That the popping bubbles of snapping shrimp can be “so loud it gets in the way of U.S. Navy sonar”? That the water shrew can actually run across the surface of the water courtesy of the bubbles trapped between its hairy toes? Lively expository prose deftly combines straightforward facts (the scientific name of each animal), sound effects (the “fwap-fwap-fwap-fwap” of tree frogs creating foam) and kid-friendly comparisons (the gourami fish spitting eggs into its nest looks like it’s playing basketball). Conahan’s whimsical watercolor illustrations, complete with conversational bubbles, add humor and interest. Three pages of additional facts and a combined glossary/index round out a volume that’s sure to rise to the top. (Informational picture book. 5-10) KIRKUS Jan 15/09