There is a page in 'Diary of a Worm' in which the worm tells his sister that no matter how much time she spends looking in the mirror, her face will always look just like her rear end. Any girl that grew up with brothers can relate to the merciless teasing.
I have a lot of nieces and nephews. I was always around kids. I was like the family babysitter because I was the only one that wasn't married.
Police officers, firefighters, EMTs - they are all out there every single day - literally just a phone call away for anyone who needs them.
I'd always been around kids, and when you don't have kids, you have a lot more time to do things. Before I had kids, I was a lot more prolific and wrote books a lot faster.
In junior high, I was still writing poems and stories. In college, I was a journalism major. When I got out of college, I went to work for an educational publisher, so I was still writing, developing curriculums.
Sadly, I haven't been able to find my earliest stories, but the impact of being told by someone important to me that I could do something special is immeasurable.
After 'Click, Clack, Moo' was published, I was still practicing law and had no plans to make a career change.
I started writing stories when I was six years old. I was a very shy kid, extremely shy, and I had a fabulous first-grade teacher who told me to write.
I was an editor for supplemental math, science, and literature programs for the primary grades and became very well versed in elementary curriculum, particularly PreK-2.
I never considered writing as a career - it was always a creative outlet for me and something I just loved to do.
I never want kids to walk away after a school presentation and say, 'I met a writer today.' I want them to say, 'I am a writer.'
The best memories on tour are always of kids who tell me they are going to run back to their classrooms and start writing!
My daughters are in kindergarten and second grade, so many of the stories they tell, write, or illustrate are about each other and our dog, Buster.
I wanted to be a police officer for a long time so I could be just like my dad!
