Cynthia Lord's Blog, page 45

Hamster is Making Friends in Houston!

Thank you to Jennifer Frances of Bess the Book Bus for these awesome photos!

It's a Book Baby

 Congratulations! It's a bouncing book-baby!

Name: Oh Nuts!

Date: September 18, 2012

Weight: 32 pages

Proud Parent: Tammi Sauer ( tamarak )

Godparents: Bloomsbury USA Childrens

Apples

My family went apple picking last weekend.



And now there is pie.  :-) 

Compassion

I was pleased to see Rules included in this list of books that teach compassion. 

Boston

We rode the subway and saw Fenway Park.



We walked down Newbury Street with all its shops and restaurants.  Some of them were unusual.  Do you remember  the book, Corduroy by Don Freeman, about the little bear wearing overalls? 

Here's where Mrs. Corduroy does her shopping!



 My daughter took me to the Boston Public Garden.



I loved the swans.



And we rode a swan boat around the pond.  The driver sits behind the swan and pedals the boat like a bicycle!



We walked around the park until we found the statue for Robert McCloskey's Make Way for Ducklings.  There was a long line of children and families taking photos with Mama Duck.



We went out to lunch at a wonderful Italian restaurant, and later, we stopped at a cupcake shop.  The cupcakes were really big, so we split a lemon-blueberry one.



It was a great day!

Off to Beantown

Charles River, Boston. Photo by my husband, John

I'm off to see my daughter today. It will be lovely to spend the day with her. :-)

Five Things on a Friday

1.  Milo is not a fan of the car. He had an appointment at the groomer yesterday and he sang me a sad song while I waited for the stoplight to change on the way over.

2.  But all was well when we got back to our driveway again with his new haircut. Note the wagging tail blur. :-)


 

3. I'm off to see my daughter in Massachusetts tomorrow!  I'm so excited to hug her and let her show me her new world.

4.  I had a great meeting with my critique partners last night.  I love those ladies so much.  They're such interesting people and they do such beautiful work.

5.  It's been a few months since Rules was fully in my thoughts, and my first school visit presentations are less than a week away at a middle school where Rules was their all-school read this summer. So I need to let go of the new books and characters I've been working on over the summer and let Rules back in my mind again.

This was the song I used to play through my headphones when I was writing Jason's scenes.  Listening to it yesterday, I imagined Catherine and Jason and David and Kristi had been on vacation this summer or away at music and art camp and have come home, dropping their suitcases in my living room and a new toy in the fish tank. 

Deep Breath

Georgetown, Maine. Photo by my husband, John

Whew. I came home to six new school visit requests. I don't think I've ever gotten that many so quickly. Two are from schools I've visited before, so that's an especially nice affirmation. :-)

Home from North Carolina

I had such a lovely visit to North Carolina to meet with the people involved in "The Little Read." About 2500 fifth graders will be reading Rules as part of this program this year, and I'll spend almost a week here next spring with them.  I was so touched and impressed with everyone I met and the ideas they have for Rules.

"The Little Read" is also part of the visiting authors' series at Lenoir-Rhyne University. I've never had my face on the side of a building before!  Me and Nicholas Sparks! How awesome is that?! 

Back to School

I very touched by This blog entry from a teacher reading Rules to her class.