Changing Course in 2014

January 12, 2014January 12, 2014 | Doreen E. Lepore

As usual in the beginning of the year I think of all the millions of things that I want to do and this year I’m going to start with focusing on one thing. It’s a huge thing, sort of overwhelming at times, but, I think I need to do it …… and it will consume the whole year.

For the past two years I’ve been participating in PiBoIdMo (Picture Book Idea Month) held in November – which is a challenge that Tara Lazar has organized. So, now I have two files of ideas, about 65 in all (not all good ideas) and it seems there ought to be something worth pursuing. http://taralazar.com

This year I’ve joined Julie Hedlund’s group – 12 x 12 in 2014, which is a writing challenge to write 12 children’s book drafts during the year, one a month, from the ideas generated in the aforementioned idea challenge. http://www.juliehedlund.com/

So I’m challenged and motivated to get some work done this year.

2013 Sketchbook Project – Frogology

February 8, 2013 | Doreen E. Lepore

My 2013 Sketchbook Project is called Frogology because it’s about Frogs. Most of the frogs in the book are extinct and on the back cover there is a list of frogs that are missing. I wasn’t able to scan the whole list but the website is written there where you can read the list for yourselves.

Again, I used mostly watercolor crayons and ink. Some drawings are in colored pencil and the last is graphite. It was a fun sketchbook to do because the frogs are colorful and fun to draw. It also felt good to give the frog issue attention. The cover is brightly printed fabric.

Nanowrimo and PiBoIdMo

November 30, 2012December 1, 2012 | Doreen E. Lepore

The month of November is always hectic and to add to the usual hecticness is Nanowrimo [National Novel Writing Month]and now PiBoIdMo [Picture Book Idea Month], both of which I wanted to participate in. This year was more difficult because I had to take precious time out because of a hand injury, which is healing now, thank goodness.

As usual, I didn’t finish Nanowrimo but am okay with that because I did finish PiBoIdMo.

piboidmo12winnerlarge

It’s been difficult to get the badge inserted somewhere so I’m posting it here now.

The creator of PiBoIdMo is Tara Lazar and she hosted daily guest posts on her blog which were very insightful and inspiring: http://taralazar.com/

The idea is to come up with an idea a day for the month of November. Since it wasn’t necessary to actually write the whole book every day, it was do-able and I exceeded the goal. Some of the ideas might actually pan out. I sure hope so. In the mean time I’m still working on a tree frog book, now with several more ideas to follow.

Thanks to Tara and all her guest authors and illustrators.

P.S. Last night’s fortune cookie: “Right now there’s an energy pushing you in a new direction.”

My tree frog obsession

August 27, 2012 | Doreen E. Lepore

Lately, I’ve been working on tree frog drawings and paintings because I’m totally obsessed with frogs. Well, I’ve always liked frogs and I’m not really totally obsessed but actually trying to write and illustrate a children’s book about tree frogs.

This drawing is just my idea for a character I call Aunt Lily.

While researching the tree frogs I came upon disturbing information about our amphibian population and if you are a facebook friend, I’ve posted this organization on there a couple of times and want to put their link here too.

Amphibian Rescue

http://amphibianrescue.org/

Also, here is a very informative video that you can watch in full on PBS.org – “Frogs – The Thin Green Line”

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/nature/episodes/frogs-the-thin-green-line/video-full-episode/4882/

Hopefully you don’t get bored with the subject of frogs, but they are in serious danger from many environmental factors and a devastating fungus that has recently killed off way too many frogs. The situation needs as much attention as it can get.