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Our senses were first enticed by the lovely scent of fresh, natural flowers as we approached Lois Ehlert's apartment in a beautiful old downtown building on an otherwise blustery day.

Ehlert welcomed me and Megan Yanz so Megan could photograph her remarkable collection of folk art while I learned more about Ehlert's newest publication for children, The Scraps Book: Notes from a Colorful Life (a limited quantity of copies signed by the author are available to buy online). With the feature exhibition Uncommon Folk: Traditions in American Art now on view at the Art Museum, the timing was perfect to visit Ehlert's cozy, artful and welcoming home.

Lois Ehlert's many devoted fans will find The Scraps Book: Notes from a Colorful Life a necessary addition to their family library-it is illustrated with original sketches, handwritten verses and collage materials from her most recognizable books, mingled with art project suggestions and personal family photos sharing the story of her lifelong journey as an artist. She explained her vision for The Scraps Book to me during our recent visit:

"I really wrote it for [aspiring young artists] who are in a classroom, wanting to hurry up so they can draw a little bit or something and wondering: when I grow up, how am I going to make a living? But it's interesting, because big people like it, too! ... It's interesting to make books by creating both the words and the art. I put a lot of stuff in there for the kids to find."

Ehlert counts herself fortunate to have been brought up by parents who were entirely supportive of her artistic interests as a child and her desire to become a working artist as an adult. She admits that "you have to be pretty tolerant as a parent" to accept the messiness inherent in the creation of young children's artworks. Although, she notes that kids who are engrossed in art can be relatively self-sufficient for a time:

"You'll notice at the workshop [in the Kohl's Art Generation Studio] at Art in Bloom, that it is not a noisy room. [The kids] are busy working, they are focused. When they visit [me], my grandnieces... will race to get to my drawing table. They'll sit quietly or they'll hum songs. They have a nice time working by themselves."

The author reflects that while growing up, "I didn't know how I was going to [make a living as an artist], but I knew that's what I wanted to do. It's interesting, in Beaver Dam, there isn't a museum or very much art in a way, but there is the natural world." Nature was an important part of her life growing up and a clear inspiration to her as an artist. She tended vegetable gardens with her parents as a child and she and a friend kept a community garden plot when she was an adult living in a Milwaukee apartment.

Stay tuned for Part Two of this blog, when we go into more detail about Ehlert's inspiring gallery-like home, studio, and personal art collection. But in the meantime...

Bring the whole family to the Kohl's Art Generation Studio this weekend, March 29 and 30, during Art in Bloom (which goes from Thursday, March 27 to Sunday, March 30). In the Studio, make art projects like the one pictured here, inspired by Lois Ehlert's The Scraps Book: Notes from a Colorful Life and the exhibition Uncommon Folk: Traditions in American Art. The Studio will be open from 10 AM to 4 PM on Saturday and Sunday, and Lois Ehlert will be present and signing books from 1 PM to 4 PM each day. Join us!

Stay in-the-know about artist studio visits, sales, drawings and special offers when you sign up for the Museum Store eNews!

Donele Pettit-Mieding organizes events, promotions and communications specific to the Milwaukee Art Museum Store and loves to introduce art and design objects for visitors to take home and enjoy in their daily lives.

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Milwaukee Studio Visit: Author and Illustrator Lois Ehlert

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Our senses were first enticed by the lovely scent of fresh, natural flowers as we approached Lois Ehlert's apartment in a beautiful old downtown building on an otherwise blustery day. Ehlert welcomed me and Megan Yanz so Megan could photograph her remarkable collection of folk art while I learned more about Ehlert's newest publication for...

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Amy Ludwig VanDerwater | Children's Author and Writing Teacher

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Amy Ludwig VanDerwater | Children's Author and Writing Teacher

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Official Website of Children's Author, Poet and Writing Teacher, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater. Author of Forest Has a Song, Every Day Birds, Read! Read! Read!

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This Page has been generated by Temean Consulting...

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The Very Hungry Caterpillar is one of the more than 70 picture books that I have written and/or illustrated. I was born in the U.S. and was raised in Germany. My background is in graphic design but since the late 1960's when I illustrated Bill Martin Jr's Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?

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Todd Parr | Children's Book Author and Illustrator

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Todd Parr is the best-selling author and illustrator of over 30 children's books about love, kindness and feeling good. Todd's books are published in the United States and Canada by Little, Brown and Co.

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Exceptional non-fiction content for children, families and educators on this Webby Honoree website from best-selling children's science writer Seymour Simon.

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Copycat stories, subtraction stories, fables, character stories, graphic novel scenes, poetic stories-so many kinds of stories to teach

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The Interweb's HQ for Children's Lit Author & Illustrator Scott Magoon

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Visit the bookshelf

Click the bookshelf to find out all about Emily's books. Click each book to find our more about each one.

Find out more about Emily

Find out more about Emily by clicking the noticeboard. You can even find out more about events and where your nearest library is.

Play some activities!

Download activities to play at home or create your own bookplate to print out!

Read about characters!

Find out more about your favourite characters in exclusive interviews!

Watch videos on the library computer

Watch videos on the libraries computer! Learn more about your favourite books and how to draw and paint.

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Click the bookshelf to find out all about Emily's books. Click each book to find our more about each one. Find out more about Emily by clicking the noticeboard. You can even find out more about events and where your nearest library is. Download activities to play at home or create your own bookplate to print out!

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Peter Brown is an author and illustrator of children's books. His titles include New York Times bestsellers like The Wild Robot, The Curious Garden, Children Make Terrible Pets, and Mr. Tiger Goes Wild. Peter's illustrations for Creepy Carrots!, written by Aaron Reynolds, earned him a Caldecott Honor.

Current Happenings
THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC
As schools around the world close due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it's important to maintain some normalcy for students. Many educators have been contacting Peter, asking for permission to record videos of themselves reading his books to share online with their students. We are so grateful that educators are willing to go above and beyond like this, and yes, we are happy to give permission for educators to share these kinds of videos. There is no need to email Peter to get approval in writing.

Peter's main publisher, Little, Brown Books For Young Readers, has made some simple guidelines for educators to follow as they share videos online. We've included those guidelines below. Thank you so much for following them, and for continuing to do your important work in these difficult times.

From the Blog

In 2016 I published my first children's novel, The Wild Robot. It's the story of a robot named Roz and her struggle to survive on a remote, wild island. As it turns out, Roz doesn't just survive, she adapts, and learns to communicate with the wildlife, and then she develops animal friends and even a family. Roz makes the island her home. But that wasn't the whole story. You see, from the moment I started dreaming up The Wild Robot, I was also dreaming up the sequel. It would be another survival story, only this time Roz would have to...

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PETER BROWN Studio / Children's Book Author & Illustrator

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Peter Brown is an author and illustrator of children's books. His titles include New York Times bestsellers like The Wild Robot, The Curious Garden , Children Make Terrible Pets , and Mr. Tiger Goes Wild . Peter's illustrations for Creepy Carrots! , written by Aaron Reynolds, earned him a Caldecott Honor.

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▶ Oliver Jeffers: Picture Book Maker - YouTube (NF)

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I was born on June 11, 1945 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I grew up in a family of 9 kids. At least, that is where I lived when I was young. My mother says I never grew up and still act like I was 6 years old. She may be right, but I figure that I act like a very mature 6 year old.

When I was 12 my older brother kicked me in the mouth the day after I got my braces off. He broke off some of my front teeth and knocked me out. My dad says I have been acting strange ever since. My mom says I always acted strange.

I almost flunked first grade and also the second, third, fourth, and fifth; but my younger brother was in the grade behind me, and he was a brain and nobody wanted to have me be in the same grade as him, so they kept passing me. I never learned how to spell, graduated from eighth grade counting on my fingers to do simple addition, and in general was not a resounding academic success.

I did, however, all through elementary school, write poetry. Funny poems, silly poems, all sorts of poems. Nobody thought that was very important, including me. When I went to high school, I didn't get along with anybody, read lots of books and decided to be a Catholic Priest.

I studied for 7 years to be a Jesuit priest, only to find that I was lousy priest material. [While I was studying with the Jesuits, I got an undergraduate degree in History and a Master's degree in Anthropology. A Master's degree in Anthropology isn't worth much, but that's what they give you when you flunk your orals for your Ph. D.]

While I was studying to be a Jesuit priest, I worked part-time at an orphanage to escape from deadly classes in philosophy. So I knew I liked working with kids; and when I left the Jesuits I decided to work in daycare for a year till I figured out what I wanted to do; and what I figured out I wanted to do was: work in daycare.

After I had been in daycare for awhile I decided to learn something about what I was supposed to be doing, so I went back to school for a year at the Elliot Pearson School of Child Studies at Tufts University in Medford, Mass. It was there that I made up my first story while on a student teaching placement at the Wellsley College Child Studies Preschool. I did it for a circle time. I did not know that it was going to be a book called "Mortimer". It took it 12 years to get to be a book.

Back in daycare I discovered that I could get the kids to shut up during nap time by telling them stories. For ten years I did this without thinking I had any special skill. After all, while I made the best stories in the daycare centre, most of the other teachers made better play doh. I eventually got a long list of stories I told, but I never wrote them down.

Once when my wife [I met her over a diaper at Bromley Heath Infant Daycare in Jamaica Plain, Mass] and I were both out of work because a daycare lost its' funding, we decided to try to look for work in Canada. We both ended up at a lab preschool at the University of Guelph in Guelph, Ontario. The wife of my boss happened to be a CHILDREN'S LIBRARIAN and she heard me telling stories.

She told me to publish and I didn't listen, she told my boss to make me publish and my boss told me to publish and I listened. In fact, he gave me two months off to do it. So I had a great two months off and on the last day, I wrote down 10 stories and sent them off to 10 different publishers. Nine said, "No" and one said, "Yes" to a story called 'Mud Puddle'.

So I became a writer. Mud Puddle sold 3000 copies the first year.

Oh WoW!

But Annick press kept putting out my books and they slowly sold better and better. [Mud Puddle had its' best year 10 years after it was published!]. Finally I quit my job at the University and started just writing and telling stories. About then I became a Canadian citizen and lost my American citizenship. It was nice to have only one country again.

I kept using real kids as characters in my books even though I was not working in daycare or preschool anymore. The first kid I make up the story for sort of 'owns' the story and gets to be the kid in the book - if the story ever gets to be a book. My publisher did not like this because it meant that I changed characters for each book.

The storytelling sometimes got very big once I was discovered by children's festivals in Canada and then by entertainment promoters. Sometimes I was telling stories to 3,000 kids at once - and that is a lot different than a daycare nap time. But I still kept doing schools and daycares because I liked doing them.

I also started to travel all over Canada and stay with families while telling stories. I first started staying with families because I did not have money for a hotel, but I soon found out that families were a great place to look for stories when a book called 'Moira's Birthday' grew out of staying with Moira's family in Hay River, NWT.

Along the way I became Canada¹s best selling author, but I was not selling much in the USA. Then LOVE YOU FOREVER came out as a Canadian book in 1986. I had written it as a memorial for two stillborn babies we had in 1979 and 1980. The story actually started out as a song.

I really wanted this story to be a book and I had to change publishers since my regular publisher did not want to do it. I was really worried that it would not sell. It sold 30,000 in 1986 and was the bestselling kid's book in Canada that year, 70,000 in 1987 and was the bestselling Canadian kids book that year too. It sold 1,000,000 in 1988 . It was the bestselling Canadian kid's book that year too. The strange thing was that it was also the bestselling kid's book in the USA, only nobody knew it, including me. It never occurred to me that it could be an invisible bestseller.

Then, in 1994, the 'New York Times' did an update of their list of bestselling children¹s books that they had last done in 1978. They did not update the list often since it was very stable. GOODNIGHT MOON had been #1 since forever! They found LOVE YOU FOREVER at the top of the list with 8,000,000 sold. {It¹s at 18,000,000 as of 1999} This was very strange as they had never reviewed it, did not know it existed, and it was a Canadian (foreign) title that did not even have a US publisher or distributor. Somebody from the Times called me up and wanted to know, "Who are You?".

So I have kept on doing about 2 books a year and now I have 54 books published. My latest one is PUT ME IN A BOOK.

And here are some STRANGE things about me:

1. I visit schools and daycares for free and usually I do not tell them that I am coming. Like on a book tour in California in October, 1997; I looked at a map and figured out that I was going to be near a school that had written me. (I have a really good secretary who keeps track of these things) I decided to drop in. I took along the letter the class had written and showed it to the school secretary. I said, "Look, Ms. Clebanoff in grade 2 asked me to visit."

I showed the letter to the secretary because one of the jobs of secretaries is to keep weird people out of school and I wanted her to know that I was not a weird person. The secretary decided I was not weird and wanted to call Ms. Clebanoff and tell her that I was coming, but I convinced her to let me just go and knock on the door.

So I went and knocked on the door of Ms. Clebanoff¹s grade 2 and said, "Hi! I'm Bob Munsch. Remember you asked me to come and visit when you wrote me last year?"

Mrs. Clebanoff just stood there and didn't say anything so I tried again.

I said, "Hi! My name is Bob Munsch and I am from Canada and your class wrote me a letter and asked me to come and visit and I was driving by on the Ventura Freeway and I came by for a visit and do you want me to tell some stories to your class or should I go back to the Ventura Freeway and stop bothering you?"

Mrs. Clebanoff said, "Canada? Bob Munsch??? Stories????"; And then she finally figured it out and yelled, "Kids, drop everything, we have a visitor!"

Then a really neat thing happened. The principal came running in the door and said; "I don¹t believe this! Mr. Munsch, you have to visit the kindergarten. They have just finished a big letter that they started yesterday. It is to you! Why don't you go and pick it up and it will save them stamps?" So I went to the kindergarten and told stories and got my letter. The kids thought it was very nice of me to come down from Canada to pick up their letter.

2. I still like to stay with families. When I was a prize for Scholastic USA book clubs they thought I would fly to the winning school and tell stories for an hour. Instead I called up the winning teacher and told her to choose 2 kids by lottery and I would stay with their families. And that is how I came to stay with Brittany Edwards in Georgetown, South Carolina and that is how this conversation took place:

BRITTANY: My Great-Grandfather broke both his arms.
BOB: Both!
BRITTANY: Yes. He fell out of the back of a truck while he was trying to shoot a deer.
BOB: Is he OK now?
BRITTANY: Yes, he got tired of the casts and he had my cousin come over and saw them off so he could go hunting.
BOB: Do you think that was a good idea?
BRITTANY: Yes. They just put the casts on him cause he was old.
BOB: So how old is he?
BRITTANY: 101

And that led to me telling a story called "Brittany's Granddad" which will be a book someday. i would NEVER have thought of a story about a kid visiting her 101 year old grandad. And there was Julia Muckpah who asked me to visit. She lived in Arviat, Nunavut; and the visit turned onto a book called A PROMISE IS A PROMISE that I wrote with another Inuit from Rankin Inlet. That is the trip where I learned to like raw frozen caribou, which would not have happened at a hotel.

In 1999 I stayed with a family in Sidney, British Columbia. They live out in the middle of the coastal rain forest and the kids happily dragged me through several kilometres of forest and swamp, which they felt was their back yard. Their real back yard was fenced and had 4 large dogs whose job was to eat any mountain lions who happened to jump the fence. We saw no mountain lions on our walk, and I don¹t know if any mountain lions saw us. The whole purpose of the expedition was to climb "Mt. Everest" . "Mt. Everest" turned out to be a small rock knob. When we climbed it, there in clear view, was the fenced back yard of their house. I told Jon, age 7, that it seemed there was a shorter way to Mt. Everest. He said, "It's not Mt. Everest if you come that way". I think he has hit on some sort of universal truth and here it is ---> JON'S RULE: Where you are depends on how you get there. Which is the story of my life and yours too.

3. I sometimes make up stories on air planes. Once I sat near a kid named Timena who had a whole backpack full of DOLLS. I made up a story and then I introduced myself to her mother and asked if I could tell the story. The mom said it was OK so I told Timena the story. Now the story is going to be my next book. We are still arguing about its' title. It might be TIMENA'S DOLLS or TOY ATTACK or it might be something else. STAY TUNED. I had trouble finding Timena to tell her about the book. Finally my editor found her on the internet. She had moved to Europe.

NOTE TO PARENTS

I am a storyteller. I write books for kids, I talk to kids, and I listen to kids.

But that is not all that I am. Several years ago I was diagnosed as obsessive-compulsive and manic-depressive. Those challenges have led me to make some big mistakes.

I have worked hard to overcome my problems, and I have done my best. I have attended twelve-step recovery meetings for more than 25 years.

My mental health and addiction problems are not a secret to my friends and family. They have been a big support to me over the years, and I would not have been able to do this without their love and understanding.

I hope that others will also understand. I hope that everyone will talk to their kids honestly, listen to them, and help them do their best with their own challenges.

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Hi, welcome to robertmunsch.com. I hope you enjoy this selection of my work, as well as the creative art and short stories donated by kids and teachers.