HELLO CHARLOTTE, NC!

I had a great visit to Providence Day School in Charlotte, NC!

I started my day with a BIG breakfast.

They have a beautiful library! I assume they wash the books once a week in that bathtub.

Even though he visited 30 years ago, Syd Hoff is still a tough act to follow! I LOVE his work.

Just to let you know, not a single book about Pez dispensers. I checked.

We had a great time! Here I am drawing a picture of my friend Doug from my book Doug Unplugged.

All that drawing made me hungry. This is the cafeteria. Wow!

There was a bunch of books waiting to be signed when I returned from lunch.

I wonder how many times I've signed my name? I never get tired of it.

I couldn't leave the state without sampling flash fried mac 'n cheese! It was swell.

Thank you Charlotte, North Carolina!

HELLO SYRACUSE, NY!

I was graciously invited to speak about my career in children's books at Syracuse University, so I headed straight for the airport. Then they called back and told me it wouldn't be for a couple of weeks, so I went home.

A few weeks later, I was back at the airport.

My trip was off to a flying stop. My flight was delayed due to a bird flying straight into the windshield of the plane I was supposed to board. I offered to clean it up if they had a spare squeegee, but they refused and waited for the professionals. This took an hour.

Finally in my seat and in the air.

Although I didn't realize it before I opened the Sky Mall catalogue, I needed absolutely everything in it.

It wasn't long before Syracuse was in view.

My escort from SU had to wait until I mastered the Big Buck Hunter video game at the airport.

What a lovely campus! I felt so collegiate. I wish I had one of those little triangular banners on a stick and a sweater with a big letter on it. Rah! Rah!

I spoke to the illustration department.

I hope the students had as much fun as I did.

I was eager to share my 20 years of experience with the younger generation, but this guy just wanted to get directions to the men's room.

Afterwards we had a great lunch with the faculty and a few students. Sorry! No photo of my food.

Very old chum James Ransome joined us. We swapped salty tales of our years in children's books.

Thank you for inviting me, James!

THE DOUG UNPLUGGED BOOK TRAILER!

Take a look at the trailer here!

MORE DOUG!

What can I say? I love this little guy!

DOUG READING POSTER

I've created a poster the UNPLUGGED campaign a few months ago. I thought it would be fun to have our friend Doug reading a book in a crowd of people and robots using their digital gizmos. Here's my original rough sketch.

Here's my tightened sketch. I guess you can tell I had a lot of fun designing the people and robots. 

And here's a cleaned up version, which I followed to do the ink lines.

This is the ink drawing. I used black India ink and a Windsor Newton series 7 brush. Yes, I know, it doesn't look complete, but that's because I hadn't applied the color yet.

And here's the final! I scanned the ink drawing and applied color in Photoshop. 

EGGS OVER EASY WITH AUTHOR LENORE LOOK

As you may know, writing and illustrating can be pretty solitary work and authors and illustrators need to get out of the studio once in a while. What better way to take a break from it all than to have breakfast with another author to talk about- what else? Work!

I recently had breakfast with the wonderful Lenore Look, author of many books, most prominently the sweet and funny ALVIN HO series.

I thought I ate a lot and ate quickly, but I guess I was no match for this 5-foot tall dynamo!

Read about Lenore and I sharing the most important meal of the day on her blog.

TURN THE PAGE in Newtown, CT

It was a great honor and privilege to be part of the TURN THE PAGE event in Newtown, CT.

I spent my first day there visiting classrooms and speaking to the students. We had a great time! There were so many wonderful friends new and old participating. It was a regular who's who of children's book literature. On the second day, we all signed books, talked and laughed with folks from Newtown.

Here are just a few of the ultra-talented authors and illustrators who participated: (back row) Barbara McClintock, Brian Selznick, Tony DiTerlizzi (front row), Christopher Paolini, Jeff Kinney, me, Robin Preiss Glasser, Nick Bruel and Judy Schachner.