The Texas Library Association Annual Conference is next week and we’re so excited to meet everyone! The conference takes place in the George R. Brown Convention Center and LEE & LOW will be Booth #1746!

See below for our signing schedule as well as a few other events that our authors and illustrators will be participating in:

AUTHOR SIGNINGS

Wednesday, April 20

Guadalupe Garcia McCall (Shame the Stars), 11:30 AM-12 PM,  Authors Area Aisle 3

Guadalupe Garcia McCall, 12:30-1:15 PM, booth #1746

Frank Morrison (Little Melba and Her Big Trombone), 3-3:30 PM

Thursday,  April 21

Lulu Delacre (Olinguito, from A to Z!), 9:30-10 AM, booth #1746

Frank Morrison, 9-9:30 AM, Authors Area Aisle 11

Pat Mora Signing (Water Rolls, Water Rises), 3-3:30 PM, Authors Area Aisle 11

 

OTHER EVENTS

Tuesday, April 19

Donna Bowman Bratton (Step Right Up) @ the What’s New with Texas Authors and Illustrators for Elementary Readers? panel, 2-2:50 PM

Wednesday, April 20

Guadalupe Garcia McCall @ Spirit of Texas Reading Program, 2-3:50 PM, 362 BE, Level 3

Lee & Low Publisher Jason Low @ We Need Diverse Books…In Texas! panel, 4-5:20 PM

Frank Morrison @ Children’s Book Illustrators Ultimate Sketch-Off, 5-6:20 PM, Convention Center 370 A-F

Thursday, April 21

Pat Mora @ Diversity In Action with Elementary Literature panel, 10-11:50 AM

Friday, April 22

Lee & Low Marketing & Publicity Associate Keilin Huang @ Diverse and Digital: Ebooks, Bilingual Books, and More panel, 10-11:20 AM

Hope to see everyone there!

 

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I don't take one darned thing for granted.

Every book is hard, and every bit of luck really is sheer luck, and goodness comes at you from unforeseen places, or a friend steps in, or something.

So I'm saying thank you today to the unforseen:

To Cleaver Magazine and Melissa Sarno, for naming One Thing Stolen to its Best of 2015: YA Staff Picks. To the Texas Library Association for slipping the book onto its 2016 TAYSHAS Reading List (among so many other powerful novels and nonfiction selections).

One Thing Stolen really was a book I hoped into being—hoped and fervently re-visioned. Then stood back and hoped some more. To all of those who read the book, encouraged the book, were there for the book, thank you. You might now know how much that matters, but it matters. Much. And so, again, I thank you Cleaver, Melissa Sarno, and the Texas Library Association.

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I’m pausing just a moment to catch my breath between last week’s whirlwind (my first school visit for The Amazing Age of John Roy Lynch —

— the Fay B. Kaigler Children’s Book Festival, and the San Antonio Book Festival) and this week’s excitement of the Texas Library Association annual conference here in Austin.

While I’m pausing, I’m happy to share a few things published elsewhere recently either about my new book or written by me, starting with this generous review by Margie Myers-Culver at Librarian’s Quest:

The Amazing Age of John Roy Lynch written by Chris Barton with illustrations by Don Tate is a remarkable biography. This is a man with whom we should all be familiar. The blend of narrative and pictures is compelling from beginning to end. After the two pages of his speech a single page shows an older John Roy Lynch with a continuation of his beliefs about this country. There is a single page Historical Note about Reconstruction, a Timeline of important dates in John Roy Lynch’s life alongside historical dates, an Author’s Note, an Illustrator’s Note, sources For Further Reading and two maps. This is a back matter goldmine.

School Library Journal also has good things to say about The Amazing Age of John Roy Lynch:

Tate’s illustrations, rendered in mixed media, ink, and gouache on watercolor paper, are extraordinary and carry the lengthy story well. The excellent cartoon-style paintings soften potentially disturbing details, such as the Ku Klux Klan burning a church. The book concludes with a thorough historical note. Teachers will find this remarkable story of hope and perseverance a valuable supplement to social studies lessons on the Civil War and Black History Month.

Meanwhile, I’ve been busy with a couple of guest posts. At The Little Crooked Cottage, I was asked to write about my favorite picture book biographies:

There are too many excellent picture book biographies — and too many excellent authors and illustrators working in this field — for me to narrow them down to my all-time favorite five. But there are a handful that have been especially meaningful to me at one time or another, so I’m going to limit my list to those.

And Austin Reading Mama asked for my reading recommendations for grown folks. I was happy to offer up a handful — all of them nonfiction, as it turned out. And the list doesn’t event include the book I’m in the midst of loving right now, Tomlinson Hill, Chris Tomlinson’s fascinating exploration of the histories of his white Texas family and of the African-American Tomlinsons whose ancestors had once been owned by the author’s forebears. It’s eye-opening and well worth your while.

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We’re soon to touch down in one of our absolute favorite literary states for the Texas Library Association Conference in Austin! If there’s anything better than talking books, hanging out with authors and librarians, and enjoying sunshine and Shiners, then we don’t want to know about it.

If you’ll be in the Lone Star State, too, please swing by our booth, #1341, for galleys, giveaways, and face time with the HarperCollins Children’s Books School & Library team. We can’t wait to chat and put books in your hands.

But if you’re reading this thinking, “sure, you guys are nice, but we’re here to meet the AUTHORS, silly!” check out our top-notch signing schedule, here:

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 15TH:
11:00am–12:00pm, Joy Preble, Aisle 7, Finding Paris
11:00am–12:00pm, Melissa Marr, Aisle 8, Made For You
12:00–1:00pm, Kiera Cass, Aisle 8, The Selection Series
1:00–2:00pm, Thanhha Lai, Aisle 8, Listen, Slowly
2:00–3:00pm, Dan Gutman, Aisle 8, Genius Files #5: License to Thrill
4:00–5:00pm, Lauren Oliver, Aisle 8, Vanishing Girls

THURSDAY, APRIL 16TH:
10:00–11:00am, Sherry Thomas, Aisle 3, The Elemental Trilogy
11:30am–12:30pm, Neal & Brendan Shusterman, Aisle 1, Challenger Deep
2:00–3:00pm, Gordon Korman, Aisle 1, Masterminds
2:00–3:00pm, Julie Murphy, Aisle 2, Dumplin’ galleys
3:00–4:00pm, Becky Albertalli, Aisle 1, Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda

You don’t want to miss our coupon in the aisle by aisle guide, either! It points you to our booth for a free copy of BONE GAP, by Laura Ruby (*while supplies last), and a chance to enter to win a piece of framed original art by Jef Czekaj, from his upcoming picture book, AUSTIN, LOST IN AMERICA.

We can’t wait to see y’all!

 

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The Texas Library Association Annual Conference is next week! Will you be there? If so, we’d love to meet you. Here is our exciting signing schedule below:

Wednesday, April 15

• 10:15 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.: Pat Mora, Authors Area (Water Rolls, Water Rises)
• 2:00 p.m. – 2:45 p.m.: Don Tate, LEE & LOW Booth (It Jes’ Happened)

Thursday, April 16

• 10:00 a.m. – 10:45 a.m.: Guadalupe Garcia McCall (Summer of the Mariposas)
• 12:00 p.m. – 1:00 p.m.: Valynne Maetani, Authors Area (Ink and Ashes)
• 1:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m.: Pat Mora, LEE & LOW Booth (Water Rolls, Water Rises)
• 2:00 p.m. – 2:45 p.m.: Valynne Maetani, LEE & LOW Booth (Ink and Ashes)
• 3:15 p.m. – 4:00 p.m.: Andrea Cheng, LEE & LOW Booth (Etched in Clay)

We’ll be at Booth 2051 and look forward to meeting you!

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This month, at least one subscriber to my Bartography Express newsletter — maybe more! — will win a copy of my new brand-new book.

To celebrate next week’s publication of The Amazing Age of John Roy Lynch (illustrated by Don Tate, and published by Eerdmans Books for Young Readers), the children’s department staffers at Austin’s BookPeople came up with several questions for me to answer. I hope you enjoy my answers as much as I appreciate their questions.

If you’re not already receiving Bartography Express, click the image below for a look. If you like what you see, click “Join” in the bottom right corner, and you’ll be in the running for the giveaway next week. Good luck!

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This month, one subscriber to my Bartography Express newsletter will win a copy of Burning Nation (Scholastic), the second book in Trent Reedy’s Divided We Fall YA trilogy

If you’re not already receiving Bartography Express, click the image below for a look. If you like what you see, click “Join” in the bottom right corner, and you’ll be in the running for the giveaway at the end of this week.

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If it weren't for Tamra Tuller, there would be no Small Damages, nor would there be the Berlin novel, Going Over. If it weren't for Chronicle Books, I would not have just spent an enriching two days in San Antonio, a city I have longed to see, among Texas librarians, who (rumor has it, and so it seemed to me) are among the very best in all the land.

Were it not for Susan Schilling, I would not have joined Dana Reinhardt, Andrew Smith, Nina LaCour, and Blake Nelson on the footwear spectacular TAYSHAS panel.

Were it not for the Texas Tea, I would have not finally met Justina Chen in person.

Were it not for a certain signing, I would not have found my best elementary school friend standing at the start of a line, waiting for me. Oh, my!!!

Were it not for a Chronicle dinner, I'd not have chilled with talented authors/illustrators K.A. Holt, Jeff Mack, Lizi Boyd, and Molly Idle; guests Renee Sanders, Debbie McComb, Sherri Bell, Ty Burns, Sheila Acosta, and Lynn Butler; and Chronicle stars Tamra Tuller, Sally Kim, Stephanie Wong, Anna-Lisa Sandstrum, and Jaime Wong.

Were it not for San Antonio itself, I would have never seen the Alamo, walked along the river, found my way to a secret cove, or peered into the wax museum.

We owe so much of our happiness to other people and well-loved places.

I am home. I am grateful.

I am grateful, too, to the incredible bloggers who kept the Going Over blog tour alive in my absence. And so, a few days late, I wish to thank:

ForeverYoungAdult, for asking me great graffiti questions, for posting such a beautiful review of the book, and for Tweeting out while I was airplane bound. That's all here.

KidLitFrenzy, for asking fantastic questions about the Going Over research process—and about my favorite indie bookstores. That's here.

Tales of a Ravenous Reader, for letting me talk about truth. That's here.

Like all the bloggers on the Going Over tour, these offer a chance to win a signed book and the audio book, among other things

Lots of gratitudes today.

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In its starred review, Publishers Weekly said that “from the first sentence Lamar will have readers hooked.”

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Librarian Eduardo Zepeda (pictured) won $20,000 worth of graphic novels and prizes in the Great Graphic Novel Library Giveaway at the Texas Library Association’s (TLA) annual conference.

Zepeda’s library, the Weslaco Public Library, will be endowed with 700 graphic novels, fixtures, and furniture.

Here’s more from the press release: “The Great Graphic Novel Library Giveaway was open to Texas public and school librarians. Twenty semifinalists were selected on Thursday evening, and the winning librarian was chosen on Friday morning at 9:30 a.m. Central time by Gene Ambaum, librarian and cocreator of the online comic strip Unshelved.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

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Around the office, we refer to this time of year as “Conference Season”.  You’ll see why – here’s the schedule:

April: Texas Library Association Conference
May: International Reading Association Conference
May: SLJ Day of Dialog/BEA
June: ALA Annual Conference

It’s crazy…but we also have lots of fun.  First up is TLA in Austin where we have a phenomenal line-up of authors signing with us:

Wednesday, April 13th
10:15 am – 11:00 am Pat Mora (author aisles)
10:15 am – 11:00 am Rafael Lopez (author aisles)
11:30 am – 12:30 pm Lauren Oliver (author aisles)
12:30 pm – 1:30 pm Will Hobbs (author aisles)
12:30 pm – 1:30 pm Bettina Restrepo (author aisles)
1:30 pm – 2:00 pm Crystal Allen (Harper booth 1824)
2:00 pm – 2:30 pm Sophie Jordan (Harper booth 1824)
2:30 pm – 3:00 pm Tera Lynn Childs (Harper booth 1824)
3:00 pm – 3:30 pm Suzanne Harper (Harper booth 1824)

Thursday, April 14th
9:00 am – 10:00 am Diane Stanley (author aisles)
11:30 am – 12:00 pm Jason Henderson (Harper booth 1824)
2:00 pm – 2:30 pm Jennifer Archer (Harper booth 1824)
2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Kevin Henkes (author aisles)
3:00 pm – 3:30 pm Don Tate and Audrey Vernick (Harper booth 1824)

And don’t miss JAMIE LEE CURTIS as the Keynote Speaker on Wednesday, April 13th at 9:00 am!

Aside from our outstanding authors, we’ll have galleys galore at our booth (#1824) and we hope you’ll stop by to say hi to Patty, Robin, and me!

See you in Texas!

~ Laura

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Just wanted to share a few pictures from my Texas Library Association trip in April. I had a fantastic time!

The San Antonio Riverwalk ran right behind my hotel. I took this pic the first day I arrived, and then it rained the rest of the time. I never got to take a guided tourboat ride, but it was fun to wander along the Riverwalk anyway.

I visited the Alamo--in downtown San Antonio. I thought it was out in the middle of nowhere! Not so.

Enjoyed the cactus garden at the Alamo. Brought back painful childhood Florida memories, though. We had a huge cactus in our backyard.

Walked to Conference Welcome Party at the Institute of Texan Cultures--and it started pouring. Wound up wet as a rat, with raccoon eyes to match. But the event was very cool.

Had dinner one night at an Italian restaurant with jazz (not really) and a belly dancer (for 15 minutes) and bad decor. Went with my writer friend Dori Butler, whose new Buddy Files easy reader mysteries are fantastic!

The hightlight of the trip was the Poetry Round Up, organized by Sylvia Vardell! I read four or five poems from Stampede, two from my forthcoming Bookspeak. And I was barely even nervous once I started reading (a miracle). Every one of the poets did such a great job! I wanted everyone's books (and have most of them:>) . Here are all we presenters: Pat Mora, Douglas Florian, Robert Weinstock, Leslie Bulion, me, and Jen Bryant. It was a wonderful event, and the audience was really enthusiastic.

Here I am with Sylvia Vardell, blogger, professor, and poetry maven extraordinaire. We had a yummy Mexican lunch my last day in San Antonio.

Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 13. Take a Chance on Art (Disaster Relief For Texas Libraries) and Royal Bats 0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next By: Mark G. Mitchell, on 2/6/2009 Blog: How To Be A Children's Book Illustrator (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  News, vampires, Cynthia Leitich Smith, watercolor, Don Tate, Austin, Charlesbridge, Texas Library Association, Special treats, How to illustrate children's books, "Eternal", "Make Your Splashes; Make Your Marks", Duke Ellington, Museum of the Coastal Bend, Rosenberg Library, Add a tag                        The Texas Library Association  (TLA) has been raffling a chance to own this beautiful original art piece by children’s book illustrator Don Tate.  The $5 you spend for your raffle ticket will go to the  TLA’s Disaster Relief Fund, which will go to help libraries hit hard by Texas storms along the coast last year. The Rosenberg Library in Galveston lost its entire children’s book collection (it was on the first floor) in the flooding that followed Hurricane Ike. (Most of Galveston Island went under water.) It was one of many libraries along the Texas coast that suffered damage.   The TLA Disaster Relief Fund auction has been helping Texas libraries contend with natural disasters since it was started by Jeanette Larsen and Mark Smith in 1999 –  always with original art donated by children’s book artists.  Read an interview with the co-founder Jeanette Larson by Cynthia Leitich Smith in Cynthia’s blog Cynsations here. Tate, of our Austin chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) joins the ranks of  renowned    illustrators such as Rosemary Wells and Diane Stanley who have furnished paintings for the fund.  The winning raffle ticket will be drawn at the TLA annual conference, held this year, appropriately enough,  in storm-pummeled Houston March 31 - April 3.   You can buy as many as you want. Go here, print your raffle tickets and mail them (with your check, of course) to the TLA office  at 3355 Bee Cave Road, Suite 401, Austin, Texas 78746-6763. Straightout donations to the Relief Fund are also accepted of course. The Duke Ellington piece is for a book Don is illustrating by musicologist Anna Harwell Celenza, about how the young Ellington and composer/arranger Billy Strayhorn collaborated on their own version of Tsaichovsky’s Nutcracker Suite. Publisher Charlesbridge is said to be looking at a 2010 publication for the nonfiction work tentatively titled Duke Ellington’s Nutcracker Suite. There’s also an interview with Tate on his illustrations for the Ellington story in Cynsations here.  (Cynsations and Don’s blog, Devas T. Rants and Raves!  are on this  blogroll.)                                                                        * * * * * Speaking of the storm ravaged Texas coast, I just got back from there last night. I was a guest children’s author at the Victoria Public Library’s 2009 Victoria Reads community reading program, and spoke at the library and a stunning historical museum, the Museum of the Coastal Bend on the Victoria College campus, where I saw Native American decorative pieces — scrimshaw-like carvings and patternings on oyster shells dating back 5,000 - 8,000 years  B.C.  The region surrounding Matagorda Bay apparently teemed with First Americans. Victoria County was a crossroads of Indian trade routes (not more than well travelled Indian trails, really), which explains why various spearpoints and arrowheads on display at the museum can be traced to South America, Mexico, and Canada. It’s like NAFTA existed back then.  I had a great time talking with museum director Sue Prudhomme, volunteer archeologist Jud Austin and many other supporters of the museum.                                                                        * * * * * Returning home from that trip, I saw a blog post that I wish I’d alerted  you to earlier — about your chance to win, among other goodies, a T-shirt with one of the coolest YA  novel logo designs ever!  Logo for "Eternal" You have a chance to win a shirt sporting  the impossibly elegant Princess Dracul logo (designed by Gene Brenek), a book,  a finger puppet, a signed bookmark,  stickers and more – well, just look at all the loot. It’s the Eternal Grand Prize Giveaway  – a contest celebrating the   release  on Tuesday of the second novel (Eternal) in the Gothic YA fantasy trilogy by Austin author Cynthia Leitich Smith, who has been called “the Anne Rice for teen readers.” Eternal is preceded by Tantalize, which is set in Austin and features vampires and assorted were-folk. (Austin is kind of a bat capital of the South, in truth. ) Eternal also has vampires and other new characters you can sink your teeth into — wait, I mean it the other way around — and one of these in particular, Princess Dracul  inspired the great glyph by artist-author Brenek (also of our Austin SCBWI chapter!)  It’s one of  many supernatural/regal emblems he’s designed for the book. (They convey such a  spooky verisimilitude. ) See for yourself and enter the Eternal Grand Prize Giveaway.  But go quickly. The give-away cutoff is Tuesday, February 10, when Eternal goes on sale! Cynthia interviews Gene here.                                                                     * * * * * Author-illustrator Sarah Ackerley, a member of our SCBWI chapter’s Inklings illustrators group  who now lives in San Francisco sent a link to  this funny video about a year in the life of children’s book author-illustrator Jarrett Krosoczka. It features guest appearances by Jane Yolen, Tomie dePaolo, Mo Willems, Jon Scieszka and some of the  Blue Rose Girls .                                                                     * * * * * You can get some free lessons on color and a group of surefire palette strategies here.  They’re from  my online course about how to illustrate a children’s book,  Make Your Splashes; Make Your Marks!    Northern California artist Susan Sorrell Hill  wrote me Thursday about how  these lessons helped her: “In all of my research (on-line and in books) in the last several  years, I have never come across a clearer, more work-able approach to color that can be applied practically to a painting…and I have  looked far and wide for this information, recognizing that it was of  major importance…. The need for a sustainable, predictably  successful approach to color, for illustration as well as fine art,  became crystal clear to me when I switched from oil painting to  watercolors…the old ‘keep messing with it until it’s right’ approach  just was NOT working with watercolor… “As you predicted, the results are immediately recognizable. I heave a huge sigh of relief!” You’ll find the signup for the free lessons here.  0 Comments on Take a Chance on Art (Disaster Relief For Texas Libraries) and Royal Bats as of 1/1/1900 Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 14. TLA Part Eight 0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next By: Barbara O'Connor, on 4/24/2008 Blog: Barbara O'Connor (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  Texas Library Association, Add a tag I know, I know...I'm really dragging this TLA thing out, aren't I? So, anyway....I leave the Bluebonnet luncheon, smiling and nodding and not talking to anyone because of my hoarse and scratchy voice. Next up - the publishers' cocktail party at the Hyatt. ALL the publishers and ALL the authors! Woohoo! My voice made a comeback and I was able to schmooze with lots of librarians, publishers and authors. (l to r) Gennifer Choldenko, Toni Buzzeo and me (l to r) Betty Birney, Gennifer Choldenko, Toni Buzzeo In addition to loads of librarians, I spent time chatting with Linda Sue Park again, Lynne Rae Perkins, whom I met for the first time, fellow FSG author Will Weaver (one word: gentleman), fellow FSG author Mona Kerby (one word: adorable) - and of course, the amazing FSG marketing team of Jeanne McDermott, Director of Marketing, and Katie Halata, Marketing Associate (thanks to Katie for many of these blog pics). More later....I promise, it's the last one.... 0 Comments on TLA Part Eight as of 4/24/2008 6:10:00 AM Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 15. TLA Part Seven 0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next By: Barbara O'Connor, on 4/23/2008 Blog: Barbara O'Connor (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  Texas Library Association, Add a tag After my signing, I went to the Texas Bluebonnet Award luncheon. That ole cliche about everything being BIG in Texas is true. I'm telling you, this thing was BIG. I read that there were 8100 folks at the conference. I think at least half of them attended this luncheon. This picture doesn't do this luncheon justice. It was BIG. I didn't save my program so I can't give you this kid's name, but he was amazing. He was one of the student representatives. He was introducing the award winner and giving some of her bio. He hardly ever even looked at his notes! (You are viewing him on a mucho gigundo screen because I was sitting so far from the podium.) This is Bluebonnet Award winner Lucy Nolan, who won for her book Down Girl and Sit: On the Road. Her speech was terrific. (Very DOG-oriented, which suits me to a tee.) Now, by this time, I have almost no voice at all. So there I sit at a big table full of librarians and all I can do is whisper, "Please pass the bread." I smiled a lot, though. More later.... (I'm dragging this conference out to maximize my blog entries. Clever, huh?) 0 Comments on TLA Part Seven as of 1/1/1900 Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 16. TLA Part Six 0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next By: Barbara O'Connor, on 4/22/2008 Blog: Barbara O'Connor (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  Texas Library Association, Add a tag After my presentation - my signing at the Farrar, Straus & Giroux booth: After an hour of so of yakkity-yakking, my voice continues to get hoarser and quieter and hoarser, and quieter, and crackly-er (that's not a real word, but it should be), and......... More later... 0 Comments on TLA Part Six as of 4/22/2008 6:52:00 AM Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 17. TLA Part Five 0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next By: Barbara O'Connor, on 4/21/2008 Blog: Barbara O'Connor (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  Texas Library Association, Add a tag Okay, so the next day, I was thanking the cowboy gods that I hadn't stayed at the restaurant the night before and had another Manhattan. Instead, I had a lovely evening with: And woke up refreshed and ready to participate in the panel: 'Tweens in the Twilight: Life's Little Challenges. Co-presenters: (l to r) Gennifer Choldenko, me, Betty Birney Panel moderator, librarian Viki Ash and me. Later that day, at the Bluebonnet Award luncheon, Viki received a MAJOR award for her outstanding achievement in children's library service. Congratulations to Viki - and many thanks for organizing and moderating a terrific panel. The table is set up and ready for our presentation: That image on the screen is Pat Boone. Why is Pat Boone part of my presentation, you ask? I'm not telling. I may have to recycle this presentation some day. Here I am saying something hilarious...or, at least, Viki and I think so: Now, one thing to keep in mind (this will be important to my story in a later post), at this point, my voice is getting hoarser and hoarser....... More later..... 0 Comments on TLA Part Five as of 4/21/2008 6:11:00 AM Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 18. TLA Part Four 0 Comments | Previous | Top | Next By: Barbara O'Connor, on 4/20/2008 Blog: Barbara O'Connor (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  Texas Library Association, Add a tag Okay, so after 8 hours at the airport in Boston, which included three attempts at standby (the last flight I waited for had 37 people on the standby list while they were begging people to sell their seats because they were severely overbooked. American Airlines, I have so many nasty things to say about you.....) I arrived! The beautiful Adolphus Hotel in Dallas. This has never looked so good: But, pioneer woman that I am, I resisted the calling of the big fluffy bed, jumped in a cab, and headed to the latest Dallas hotspot (according to the cab driver) - to meet up with my DDR bud, Linda Sue Park - and meet for the first time one of my co-presenters for the conference, Gennifer Choldenko. (l to r) me, Linda Sue, Gennifer Linda Sue and Gennifer I was too danged tired to stay for dinnner, but Linda Sue forced me to drink a teeny tiny little Manhattan (I think she and I have many great vices in common.) Then for once in my life I used self-control, grabbed a cab and headed back to my true love: More later..... 0 Comments on TLA Part Four as of 4/20/2008 9:25:00 AM Jennifer said, on 4/21/2008 9:11:00 AM I'm enjoying your progress... By the way, I thought I heard last week that AA may be offering big chunks of $$ to people who were cancelled/bumped... (the airline, that is.) I'm sure that Manhattan tasted good! ;-) Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag 19. Alanna Kawa answers a question from Jessie’s Letters! Add/View Comments | Previous | Top | By: Scribe Chronicler of Aventar, on 10/10/2007 Blog: LadyStar (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap) JacketFlap tags:  The Tree Shores High School Band Room, band, Jessie's Letters, Jessica Hoshi, Ranko Yorozu, Alanna Kawa, Shannon Ka Yoru, bass line, drum major, drum major tryout, high school band, mace routine, marching band, sousaphone, Add a tag “We got another questionnnnnnnnn!” “Who is it for this time?” “It’s for Alanna-sama.” “Hey Hoshi, what’s up?” “We got a question on my super-neat Jessie’s Letters page! It’s from ‘Letter writer person’ and they said Alanna-sama, it says in the story time and again, and even in your profile that you’re very confident. How did you become so confident?’” “Heh. It helps when you’ve got that mace and whistle and you’re in charge of the whole band.” “Well, I wasn’t always in charge. I had to try out for Second Drum Major. I got a lot of encouragement from my friends in band though. When I was a freshman, I was the only girl in the bass line, but the rest of the guys in my section were always rooting for me. . .” “What’s the matter Alanna-sama?” “She gets kind of emotional about the Drum Major tryouts. That was the year I was a freshman and I remember the day she did her parade routine.” “My whole section showed up in full uniform with their instruments for my tryout. . . and they stood at attention along the route I did my parade routine on. It was the first and only time that the bass line has ever done that at a Drum Major tryout. It was the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me in band. I was so proud to be a sousaphone player that day. The day I got the call that I had been promoted to Second Drum Major, all seventeen of the other sousaphone players called me to congratulate me.” “The bass line is a unique group.” “They gave me a lot of encouragement and helped me even when I made mistakes. They taught me how to build confidence in others and that’s how I learned to take things one step at a time and not to let temporary failures depress me. By teaching confidence, I learned to be confident myself.” “They helped her learn how to march a brass sousaphone in parades. That takes confidence by itself.” “Word. Those things are like silly huge.” “My section taught me I could accomplish whatever I decided I wanted to accomplish. That’s something we want everyone in the Tree Shores Band to learn.” “We all want to learn to be as confident as you, Alanna-sama! If you have a question or a comment you can e-mail meeeeee at my Jessie’s Letters page and maybe I can get one of my best friends to help me answer your question! Ja!” Add a Comment More from this Blog | Email This | Add a Tag © 2017 Jacketflap.com                         About Us   FAQ   Advertise on JacketFlap   About our Widgets program for Publishers   Privacy   Terms