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Posts Tagged ‘NYC’

The Joy of Children’s Books

Posted in Art, Authors, Books, Children's Books, Creativity, Good Reads, Illustration, Novels, Writing, tagged , , , , on January 25, 2014| 4 Comments »

BoyReadingYou can Kindle all you want, but I think I will always want a book in my hand. And the joy of reading with a book in hand is never more important than for a child.

I subscribe to an e-mailed newsletter from the biggest children’s bookstore in NYC, Books of Wonder. Each week, into my Inbox comes a colorful announcement of the latest books for children across all genres, and photos of authors and illustrators who will be doing book visits and signings. I don’t subscribe to many things like this because I am already overwhelmed with work-related e-mails, but I always look forward to their newsletter. The Books of Wonder e-mails keep me in touch with children’s books, where I continue to devote time to writing and illustrating, whet my appetite for something new, and keep me apprised of what’s selling in picture books. middle grade, YA and more.

This Friday, something even more exciting arrived, a video … a video of a young girl perusing the shelves of the bookstore, running her fingers along the spines of the books. (This so reminds me of Liesel in Ilsa Hermann’s library in The Book Thief and makes it even more meaningful, but that’s for another post.) When the girl picks up a book, we hear the sounds of the subject, a train whistle from a locomotive story, the whinnying of a horse, cackling from the Oz books, and all with Strauss in the background. It’s brilliant.

I believe you’ll enjoy the YouTube video from Books of Wonder, and please visit their website for the latest that’s happening in children’s books, and/or to sign up for their newsletter:

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One Reason Why I Love Summer

Posted in food, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 29, 2012| 3 Comments »

It can pretty much be summed up in one photo … fresh, local farm produce.

They don’t call New Jersey the Garden State for nothing! And even though many people have the sadly mistaken idea that New Jersey is all about the refineries and crammed highways that occupy a very small portion of the eastern part of the state, far more of the state is devoted to agriculture. In fact, New Jersey is the number one producer of blueberries in the nation, and second in cranberries. And anyone who’s ever been here knows there is nothing like a Jersey tomato.

This morning I passed the small farm stand in Alpha where I’d stopped last week. The corn is outstanding – I bought bi-color and white, both super-sweet – tomatoes, white peaches – yum! (see above) and a few other items. Starting in the spring, and straight through summer and fall, there are farmstands and farmers’ markets everywhere, and you can easily find whatever is in season. A farm more local to me, Phillips Farms in Holland Township, has “outreach” if you will, into the city. Their produce is featured in farmers’ markets in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens. If you live in the city, check here to see where great produce is near you.)

So you can keep your heat, your humidity, and crazy weekend shore traffic.  My summer leans towards great fresh food!

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