The Weasel That Inspired It ALL

There's A Weasel On My Easel !

A clip of the weasel that jumped onto my easel while I was painting... and inspired it ALL.

I’m thrilled to be unveiling a preview of our current project. It has been a long time on the drawing board...

My daughter Anola and I have authored and illustrated a children’s book! Finally I can say – it is getting VERY close.

This project has been on my list ever since a weasel jumped onto my easel when I was out painting. Really! You can see the video clip for yourself. Too obvious of a children’s book in the making to ignore it. The book concept percolated for quite a while. Not completely in my wheel house, pushing my limits out further into rhyming verse, authoring and illustrating, but a fun challenge to take on.

I was sure hoping for a collaboration with my daughter on the book. As our family ‘caricature maker’, she’s great at adding cute or funny twists onto animals, pets and family members ;-) Yes, I have been the brunt of some of those 'twists'. Good to keep a healthy sense of humor when you have artistic creative teenagers in your home. I could see the talent there, between my laughter!

Luckily, she had some time while applying and preparing a portfolio for her architecture graduate school applications. While she had her pencils out, we got to work on weasel ideas too.

At that point, I had the story mostly laid out in verse. And as the Universe seems to work, had recently been invited into a writer’s group (through my art group) with fabulous generous writers who were willing to help me tweak and cajole it into rhyming existence. (A hearty Thank You! You know who you are.)

Anyway, we're in the final stages now. With the book mostly formed, it's time to fine tune the rough draft. Perfect timing, as those graduate school applications of my daughter's proved commendable. Acceptance letters have been received, decisions made and she'll be starting classes in a month or so.

If you’d like to look through the rough draft and give me your comments, stop by the Manzanita Farmers Market in Manzanita Oregon on Friday May 16 or May 23 from 4:00 – 7:00pm. I’ll have a copy there to get some feedback to finalize it, before we call it D O N E.

And, please add your email to my list if you want to get the latest updates. Of course, I’m an artist first, so you will definitely NOT be inundated with emails from me. To the contrary… probably more like ‘random and infrequent’. But when there’s something noteworthy, like the book coming out! I will be sure to announce that – when I get back from painting at least. ;-)