Who here remembers Poochie?

 

                                               

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How about those Lovable Shirt Tales?

 

 

                                               

If  you’re nodding yes to any of these, then there’s probably a really good chance that you are of the age where walking into a room and forgetting what in the heck you came in there for is an everyday occurrence! Or maybe you’re like me and you stop mid-sentence wondering what on earth you were talking about in the first place!

I’m quite certain you also tell your children that climbing on top of the counters to eat a bowl of cereal up there is not allowed “BECAUSE I SAID SO!” which you swore you’d never say, and you remind your children on a daily basis that “This is NOT Furr’s Cafeteria!” so just eat the spinach and carrot meatloaf already!

Ketchup. It just needs Ketchup.

You probably also remember when Back To School meant a new pencil box, a set of crayons, glue bottle, and scissors…and that was IT! Seriously, who needs 4,000 pencils, 600 glue sticks, 30,000 boxes of tissue, and 436 different colors of composition books and binders in order to head back to school?

Sigh… The Good ‘ol Days…

Speaking of the good ‘ol days, remember that “I just won the lottery!” feeling when you saw your teacher wheeling one of these babies into the room? Best. Day. Ever. “I play safe for you and me, cause I’m. No. fooool!”

You know what I’m talking about, right?

Right?

I know, I’m all over the place today, but they don’t call it The FRIDAY FRENZY for nothing, my friend.

Remember this guy?  I’m pretty sure you grew up with him too.

Who is this you ask?, because you haven’t actually met him in person and you don’t know what he looks like because what ten year old back in the 80’s had access to Google in order to stalk find out more about one of their favorite author/illustrators?

It’s Tomie dePaola!

Yes, THAT Tomie dePaola!

I remember spending many a day gazing at all that gorgeous artwork in Tomie’s books. I loved them! LOVED them!

And guess what?

I have that “I just won the lottery!” feeling again, and it’s not because I have a chocolate cake downstairs ready for the weekend…well, yes it is that too, but mostly it’s because I am attending Picture Book Summit for the third straight year and Tomie freakin de Paola is one of the mentor speakers!!!!!!

Cake!

I need CAKE!

Tomie, I  You!

Calm down Chicken, It’s just a childhood picture book crush!

You want to tag along on my date with Tomie?

Oh I guess I could let ya, just don’t expect me to share my cake!

Head on over to Picture Book Summit and sign your heinie up! You know who else is tagging along?

Funny man, Adam Rex. Yeah, It’s going to be one heck of a date! So what are you waiting for? Go sign up!

But do me a favor first will ya?

I want to know what your favorite Tomie dePaola book is, so please leave the title in the comments! I always adored Nana Upstairs and Nana Downstairs, but my favorite will always be STREGA NONA!

Now, how about a little dePaola inspiration…

Get your STREGA NONA on and visit Pinterest for even more fun links!