International SCBWI Conference in LA

Thank you, Lin and Steve, for creating SCBWI! I drew Lin Oliver, Steve Mooser, and their grandbabies in my Penguin Cha-Cha book to thank them for the marketing grant for that book and all SCBWI has done to help me with my career. 

Last weekend was the international SCBWI conference in LA. It's a crazy huge conference with over 1200 attendees, lots of keynotes, breakout sessions, parties, and the works. You can read some notes from each of the sessions on the extensive conference blog: http://scbwiconference.blogspot.com

My favorite session was Mac Barnett's keynote. He told us that kids who read his picture book about a boy with a pet whale can send in for their own pet whale. In reply they receive a letter from a Norwegian law firm saying the whale was held up in customs, but they can leave messages for their whale by calling a 1-800 #. The phone number has whale sounds and then a beep. Kids would call and leave messages for their whales, and Mac played a number of messages left by a sweet boy. Kids are so willing to suspend disbelief!

Loved the photo booth at the SCBWI Black & White Ball!
With fellow Regional Advisors: Anushka Ravishankar from India, Leslie Helakoski from Michigan, and Susanne Gervay from Australia.

The winners of the Black & White Ball costume contest.

We headed to the Santa Monica pier at sunset after the conference was over. Ahhh...