Teach 'em young

This past weekend I took the boys to our library's annual Children's Book Festival. This is by far my favorite local event.

Each year the library gives each child a free book, and we're not talking a 10 pg. paperback either, they offer several beautiful hardcover, board and activity books for the children to choose from.

They also get to meet several authors and illustrators, attend workshops, make crafts and more.

This year we had the pleasure of meeting Suzy Kline, author of the Horrible Harry and Herbie Jones series. She was such a sweet lady! We chatted for a few moments before she began her workshop and the boys got their photo taken with her. She gave an excellent presentation as well.

I really love how she emphasized the importance of carrying a little notebook with you everywhere you go. Ace has been in the habit of doing this for the past 8 months or so and I continue to try and encourage him to keep it up, so it was really nice that she mentioned this as well. Ace likes to practice writing words or doodling in it. I usually write somewhere on each page what exactly he was trying to describe. It's a lot of fun going back and looking at all the funny moments he chose to record.

We also got to meet Frank Remkiewicz, the illustrator of the infamous Froggy books and also of Suzy's Horrible Harry series. The boys took a photo with him and he signed a couple of their books. He also gave an awesome workshop teaching the children different ways to illustrate their stories.

After the workshops the boys got to play with slime, make their own paper frogs and enjoy a yummy ice cream cone from the local ice cream parlor.

And guess what was the first thing the boys wanted to do when we got home?

Write in their little notebooks. Thanks Suzy!!