Website and Interview

It's a happy day!

I have been interviewed over on author Joanna Marple's Miss Marple's Musings blog, which I was quite thrilled to do. Joanna regularly blogs about illustrators, her traveling adventures, and kidlit in general, and I suspect she might love kayaking almost as much as me. It's worth following, so check it out. 

If that weren't cause enough for thankfulness, I've also just launched my new website, which you can view by clicking on the Wordy Bird Studio tab above, or by clicking here. It is still a work in progress, and I look forward to completing its evolution with a page just for kids, and the Wordy Bird Studio store, where you'll be able to purchase giclee prints of my work and other items. 

AND... I also have a new Wordy Bird Studio Facebook page, where I'll be posting links about writing, publishing, illustrating, and all sorts of kidlit goodies. You can find and follow it here. 

Thanks for dropping by the birdhouse. 

Strange, Sweet Homecoming

Rainbow lorikeets, Noosaville, Queensland

It's been a quiet blog start to 2012 and very quiet for me creatively, too, but with good reason. It's funny really how the best intentions in the world (I will write every day, I will journal! Will blog? Oh, will I!) mean nothing when you find yourself in a situation which, though reasonably planned out, was essentially unanticipateable. (Yes, I'm aware that's not a word, but it fits.)  


I'm *home* in Australia, for the first time in five and a half years! It's a strange homecoming, in some ways, but maybe all homecomings are like that a bit. You know just what to expect, but they still deliver copious quantities of the unexpected. Granted, I've had some rather incredibly tedious paperwork-y, dealing-with-personal-effects-in-storage, and medical-ish things to take care of here (while still managing my editing schedule), which have taken lots of time, vast amounts of energy, and which I've more or less just had to grit my teeth to get through. And I'm missing my little girl. 


BUT it's been unspeakably lovely too, to see my family, to see my closest friends (who are also really my family), and to find an exquisite moment here and there to wander along the Australian coastline or through the bush. If you have never been to Australia, I hope you will place her high on your list of places to go. She is stunning and rugged, cultured and caffeinated and foodie, and her people are down-to-earth, warm, and generous on the whole. She'll launch an assault on your senses the moment you set foot on her: the pungency of the eucalyptus trees, the subtle shades of bush-land and the startling aqua-blue ocean, the overwhelming and constant sounds of more birds than you've ever seen in one place.


A few pics of things I've seen so far: 

Mt. Cooroy (one of a number of volcanic plugs), Queensland  

Hell's Gates, Noosa Heads National Park, Queensland

On the golf-course near my mum's house! 

Sorrento Back Beach, Mornington Peninsula, Victoria

I'm hoping to do a picture or two a day for the final two weeks of my stay and blog...now things are settling down a bit.