Last Florida Post

This is the last Florida post. I promise...

(l to r) Harlem, Bird and Miss Delphine

Me!

Kids presenting me with a terrific book of drawings.


Me (left) and librarian Starr Anderson, who makes the world's best Spanish bean soup.

At the FAME conference in Orlando, I got Jane O'Connor's (Fancy Nancy) gift basket and she got mine. So I got a cool wand that made magical noises when you waved it - and a feather fan. There's also a chocolate alligator there.

Now I'm home. Whew! A great trip but my pillow sure looked good last night.

Florida IRA Dinner

Signing books with Alexandria LaFaye at the Florida IRA dinner. I signed a gazillion books. Okay, okay...half a gazillion.

Me (left) and Alexandria LaFaye




Speaking at the IRA dinnner. For some reason, when my contact told me 300 people, it didn't look like this in my head. It looked smaller.

Florida Again

This was the coolest thing ever ! At this school, they are creating a Reading Garden: a garden with plants and trees and benches where the children can go to read.

Each author who visits the school gets something planted in their honor.

This is me with the most amazing librarian on the planet, Dee Dee Schatzberg, planting the three bushes that are MY bushes in their garden. (A Barbara Bush?)

Other authors represented in the garden include Jim Aylsworth, Tom Birdseye, Herb Packer, and Laurie Byars.





Me with a banner made by students.











Me (left) and teacher, Ms. Torres (right). All the kids think she looks just like Miss Delphine in Fame and Glory in Freedom, Georgia - and she does!! Exactly!

She has great red hair and dangley earrings and even sparkly high-heeled shoes that go clickity clack.

And she is uber nice, like Miss Delphine.

The kids adore her.







The amazing Dee Dee getting roses for her birthday. Everybody in the entire city of Tampa adores Dee Dee.

(Thank you, Dee Dee, for being my chauffeur and BFF.)










Kids showing me their spelling bee!

More from the Sunshine State

I'm sitting in the lobby of the Comfort Inn in Tampa, Florida, getting ready to begin my last day of school presentations. Wow - these Florida folks know how to do it right!

I have a zillion pics but not time to post them yet.

Have to give a major shout-out to Librarian Extraordinnaire Dee Dee Schatzberg, who chauffeured me around endlessly and presented me with the most excited kids on the face of the planet. AND - she planned a lovely ceremony at her school's "Reading Garden", when they planted three bushes in my honor! How cool is that?

Hey - they can be Barbara Bush!

Off to FAME conference this evening (Florida Association for Media in Education.)

The Sunshine State

Greetings from Florida. My first day of school visits started at the most beautiful elementary school ever. It was 80 years old and had so much character. Check out the tiles on these stairs, made by children (the tiles, that is...not the stairs.)

Me, yammering away about Fame and Glory in Freedom, Georgia (my book that is on the Sunshine Young Readers Award list):

Joan McClelland (left), librarian at Mabry Elementary in Tampa and Abby Russell (right), author event coordinator for Barnes and Noble, standing in front of the terrific welcome signs made by the students:

Some words of encouragement from a student:

Abby Russell (left) and me:

Welcoming words from a student:

One of the many drawings of Fame and Glory in Freedom, Georgia:

One class gave me a terrific book of poems they had made.

AND - another class made a banner about various writing elements they found in FAME AND GLORY IN FREEDOM, GEORGIA. I have some great photos of it and will post it at a later date.

From Sunny Florida

Here I am in the Sunshine State.

Driving, driving, driving...

And this was waiting for me!


Hillsborough County libarians sure know how to make a gal feel welcome. That's a Battle of the Books T-shirt in that basket. There was also this cool backpack kind of bag - and lots and lots of food (including chocolate).