Some work from my Cabbage Patch Kids days

I’m hosting a workshop for aspiring authors and illustrators (as well as teachers, librarians or anyone else who loves children’s books) on Sept. 19 at my studio in Mobile, Alabama. This will be a Saturday afternoon workshop, from 1:30 until 5:30. The cost is $45, and includes illustrated take-home resource materials. Come be informed and inspired!

The workshop covers:

• current trends in the children’s book market
• layout and page design
• copyright protection
• how to write a query letter
• what to put in a submissions package
• using images to move a story forward
• what should be included in a publishing contract
• how to build an illustration portfolio
• child-oriented magazine and greeting card markets
• individual feedback

This is always a very interactive workshop, with lots of questions and discussion, all in an informal setting. It’s also an opportunity to meet other people in the area who have an abiding interest in children’s books. And it’s just plain fun.

For more information — or to reserve a spot in the workshop — email me at studio@valwebb.com or send me a Facebook message.

Some of my favorite gardening books are art books, as well.  A Growing Gardener is New York city artist Abbie Zabar’s  illustrated journal of a year in her rooftop Manhattan garden. Pruning topiaries, transplanting seedlings, the nesting habits of mockingbirds — it’s all here, drawn in exuberant colored pencil or elegant pen-and-ink.  Page by page and plant by plant, urban gardener Abbie manages to create an elaborate little habitat in her 200-square-foot piece of paradise.

Leave a comment after this post, and in one week I’ll let random.org select the winner of a copy of A Growing Gardener. I’ll even tuck a little surprise from my art studio inside the front cover. Good luck!

There was a wonderful surprise in my email inbox last night: a message from amazing Chicago artist Anne Leuck Feldhaus. No one on the planet paints a dog quite the way Anne does. Her vividly colored canines leap and fly across the canvas, a kaleidoscope of paws and ears and wagging tails. I dare you to look at her artwork without smiling.

Not long ago, Anne asked for feedback on her web site. She entered all the commenters in a give-away drawing for a signed black poodle print, and to my delight (it’s a beautiful print) and complete amazement (I never win ANYTHING) my comment won. Thank you, Anne!

Now I’m inspired to have my own give-away. Here’s the deal:

1.  Leave a comment at the end of this post. (If you have a favorite garden-related book to recommend, I’d love to know about it.)

2.  One week from today, on Nov. 21, I’ll use random.org to select the winner.

3.  The give-away goodies include The 20-Minute Gardener by Tom Christopher and Marty Asher; a Garden Days Journal by Karen Strohbeen and Bill Luchsinger; and a handbound blank book I made. (It has cream-colored writing paper inside, and is covered in fabric purchased several years ago in San Francisco’s Chinatown. I have written and drawn some inspirations on one page of the blank book … and to round out the whole package, I’m also including a raku kitty cat ornament from the clay studio.)

 You can never have too many books.           Good luck!