Amber B.

Mitchell Thanks, Amber, for joining us today on the Adventures in the Heart of Children's Book Authors Podcast.

For everyone who's listening, Amber's written a very cute story.

Her children's book entitled the Chickadee who Knew?

Amber uses a very special technique that I haven't seen used before by my guests.

I always like to tease the audience a bit.

I always look for what is this children's book author done differently in terms of a technique I haven't seen before.

I'm interested in knowing what does being a children's book author mean to you?

It has a special place in my heart.

I to me, it's a way to spread positivity to kids.

There's so much good that comes from it to those I'm gifting it to as well as to myself.

It's a creative outlet for me and I feel like there there's just so much bad in the world.

And this is a way to spread something good.

This is a way to help kids understand things that they may not be, things they may not have taught in their home and or in other circumstances where important messages can be spread in a good way.

Fantastic.

Because it's interesting.

I'm very fortunate in that I came to being to be a children's book author because of my oldest granddaughter wanting to write a children's book.

That's pretty special in itself.

And all the children's book authors I've met are very unique people.

Thank you for that.

Tell us about the inspiration behind your book.

We know why you want to be a children's book author, but how did you come about with the inspiration of this book?

So it came from my own life experiences.

I've always been a dream.

I've always been one who loves to come up with scenarios in my head of what life could be like.

A, B or C were different or such.

And I that's just always been me.

And I've also had struggles with being a pessimist, I feel like.

And so I wanted to combine that because I've tried as I've gotten older, through the years, I've tried to really combat that training, try to see the positive side of things, to combat that pessimist inside of me and try to be present as I've done that.

I've noticed the importance of it, the importance of being present, the importance of seeing the good and the optimism and things.

And so that's where the inspiration came.

Was there one incident that happened to you or was it a combination of things over the Years.

It was a combination of things.

I remember, I think the time that the incident, I guess you could say that opened my eyes the most to this was after I graduated high school years ago.

I, I was so anxious as I, I think a lot of young people are to move on to that independent phase of your life.

And my home life was amazing.

I had great support at home.

It was wonderful.

But as we all come of age, we want that independence.

And so I was so anxious for.

And I moved out and was on my own and I started to realize, okay, this is great, there's a lot of great things about this, but I actually really miss home.

That was the first eye opening experience for me to help me realize, okay, there are great things coming, but I need to be present and be grateful for what I have in the moment because it may be gone someday, right?

I may have moved home.

And so that was the first time it really, truly opened my eyes and helped me to realize I used to be a huge.

I would count down the days for things.

I'd look forward to something and there's nothing wrong with that, but I would count down the days.

Kids do growing up, we do that, we count down the days to our birthday or big events or whatever it may be.

And I stopped doing that because I realized there's.

Why am I just so wistful of what's coming tomorrow to the point where I can't be happy with what I have now?

I love it because it definitely shows a sign of creativity on your part.

And you, it sounds like you dug deeper into your creativity as you've gotten older and taken that energy and funneled into something very cool like your book.

Thank you.

I'm curious and I only started asking this question probably in about the last six or seven interviews and I found there was a trend.

And so I'm interested in do you have a book business plan?

So when you started writing your book and thought, oh, now I actually got this book.

Tell us about your book business plan.

My book business plan, that's a tricky one.

And I feel conflicted with it because originally I went through a hybrid publishing company for the tickety who knew?

And it was wonderful.

They gave us amazing tools.

They helped us even motivate us with marketing and give it gave us wonderful suggestions.

I've watched other authors and so I've had a lot of help that way.

The hard thing with that is I am not a huge fan of social media and I don't like what it does to my mental health.

So I'VE had to take a step back from the social media side and so marketing my book has been a little tricky and so the neck.

My next plan.

I'm actually working on another manuscript right now for a different book and I'm planning.

I saw the teaser on your website.

Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah, I'm planning to write more and so I'm working on one right now.

My plan is to work on.

To have three polished manuscripts.

So I'm going to do the best I can with these on my own, then find an editor and have them edit these manuscripts for me.

And then I'm going to try and find an agent and try to see if I can get in with maybe some traditional publishing.

Because I'm not going to lie, I'm not one who's great with the marketing myself.

Also, I'm a mom with four young kids.

My personal interest is more in the writing and so I would love to just throw my extra.

I don't have time.

I would like to throw that time that I can dedicate to writing into the actual writing and hopefully have some help with the marketing.

So we'll see where it takes me.

I know traditional publishing can be really difficult to, to be able to be accepted into and so I'm just trying it.

I'm testing the waters in that area and if that does not work, then I'm going to just try to completely self publish on my own again and I will have to jump in more to the social media and just bite the bullet and be okay with it.

And so at this point, again, I'm just picking up on the book business plan.

I noticed on your website, it's cool and we'll certainly get to your website.

I noticed you have primarily two revenue sources, so that's selling your book.

And also I noticed you have a published rate for doing school visits.

So can you tell us, tell us about both sides of that revenue model and what's been the most significant revenue so far for you?

Okay, so for actually selling the books, I've actually had the most success at farmer's markets and that's been a really fun way to actually sell books individually.

I think if I want to be able to sell more on Amazon, I'm going to have to market myself more on social media and so I've taken a step back from that again.

But the school visits have been really great.

The school visits.

The interesting thing with that is I earn more money from the fee that the school pays me.

Tell us a little bit about that.

So did you go To a school board.

And from the school board, you said, I'm interested in going to any school within my demographic, and this is my fee schedule.

Is that how you did it?

I started by reaching out to several different schools in the area, and I quickly got a feel for which districts were going to be more receptive of this.

There are some districts who I think, just don't have the budget for it.

They don't have the budget, and some of them aren't even willing to have authors come in for free, which is fine.

It's totally fine.

I understand there are reasons for that.

Right.

But it's just funny how different it can be.

So there happens to be my.

I actually got the connection through my sister, her daughter's school.

My sister had connections with a PTA for her daughter's school, and so she was able to connect me with the pta, and that particular district had to have me approved as an author presenter.

The PTA that introduced you to the district, Is that how that worked?

Yeah.

So they got me in contact with the district.

I had to fill out some forms, and the district then approved me.

And then I worked directly with the PTA again.

And I've actually only had one assembly visit.

I've had several other school visits that I did for free for other districts that didn't have the budget to pay.

But I've done one paid assembly, and I'm.

I'm having to hold off until the next school year because everywhere is totally booked.

It just so happened that my first assembly visit was in March, and then after that, the schools have already booked everything for the rest of the year.

So I will reach out again in September or October to the other schools in the district in hopes that other schools can bring me on.

And I've noticed you have a.

Is it a classroom fee and then an assembly fee?

I haven't done any classroom fees advertising myself for assemblies.

I enjoy the assembly environment.

For some reason.

I feel like it's so much easier to engage the kids and in bigger groups because just the way I've set up my presentation, it's more feasible with an assembly type of environment.

And so that's what I advertise.

I'm not definitely not opposed to classroom visits.

Those are so fun, a more intimate setting.

So those are great too.

But as far as fees go, I focus on the assemblies.

Okay.

Good to know.

Last week I went and read to my youngest grandson's class.

Now he's in grade six.

Now.

It was a little different dynamic because our demographic for our book is 4 to 10 and of course these were 12 year olds and so a little different.

But the neat thing about it is we were able to incorporate.

We broke our book down and I showed them the formula of storytelling and how to write a children's book.

It was fun.

And that's the only.

I've only done a class visit and we of course they have what they call a log board and it's like a digital.

A large digital big screen and you just plug your iPad in.

And I had my book on my iPad and I just read from my iPad which was projected up on the screen.

So it was a lot of fun.

It is fun.

And it's.

So both settings are fun.

Assembly visits are fun.

The classrooms are very fun because you can get for individual engagement and like you said, be able to break it up and have more of that individual interaction, which is really fun.

So at this point you're hoping to bring in more revenue from your assembly visits versus your book?

Yes, and I actually enjoy.

I just love connecting with the kids.

It's so fun.

So the more opportunities I can have to actually connect in person with the kids about my book, the better.

And so if I can be paid for that, then that's great.

Absolutely.

And so at this point you're feeding your ambition to bring your next book to market, is that right?

Yeah.

With your revenue.

Yeah.

So most of us, including myself and my.

And of course my co author, my granddaughter, at this point, it's hasn't been a break even situation.

No, no.

It'll be a while.

It'll be a while.

And I think we all accept.

That's why I talk to people about a book business plan, because it's interesting.

I think we all just dive into the pool and then we figure out how to swim.

So with our passion.

Right, Our passion is what fuels us.

And then figure out the marketing later.

Absolutely, absolutely.

I want to talk to you more about your publishing approach because you said you used a.

I forget the terminology.

What did you call your publisher?

A hybrid publisher.

A hybrid publisher.

Okay, so we've talked about that before on our show because I looked on the back of your book and of course on the back just above the UPC code, just so that for the audience to know it has Miriam Laundry Publishing.

Correct.

So that's the service you use?

Yes, Miriam Laundrie Publishing.

And they're phenomenal.

I would recommend them to anyone.

If you don't mind, I'd just like to get into it a bit more.

First of all, how did you find the publishing service?

Like how did you find them?

The cookies on my phone.

Somehow they knew you were.

I was researching self publishing and yeah.

Okay.

To stumble across.

So Miriam Laundrie, she is the owner of the publishing company, she's the CEO and she has created a free course for anyone to take that kind of just introduces you to tips and tricks for writing children's books.

And then from there on she had other things to offer.

She had a more in depth course course to offer.

And then beyond that, the publishing package where they actually help you publish your book.

And so I just started from the beginning, went through her steps and to publishing my book.

Her company offered different packages, is that correct?

Yes and no.

So there's the CBM course which just goes into depth of how to write a children's book.

And then the other package would be the publishing mastermind.

And that's where you actually sign up for the program.

They give you.

They give you like a helper through the program who can help help you through the process and be your cheerleader through along the way, answer questions and then you also are put in a group of other authors who are all.

You're given a timeline.

You have from this date, this month to go through these steps and get the book published.

We all do go along together through the same steps.

We have periodic meetings and talk about our progress goals, how we can support each other.

So we all move along the program from start to finish.

It's really wonderful how she set it up.

You feel like you are supported through the whole way.

It helps you realize it's not as scary as you thought it was or not as daunting as it seemed.

Do you get a guarantee that at the end of the whole process you end up with a beautifully published children's book?

Yes, they will make sure of that.

They provide an editor who will give you three edits.

We had to find our own illustrators, which I was honestly okay with because I loved that process.

I loved picking my own illustrator.

And then they also provide the book designing.

Okay.

And then they also helped get it uploaded to Amazon and ingramsparks.

Okay, so you weren't committed through them to purchase any large quantities of books?

No, no.

Okay, so you just went to the print on demand service like Amazon and within group Sparks.

Yeah, exactly.

And just so our audience knows, again, Amazon, and that's who I purchased your book through does generally softcover and eBook.

Yes, Ingramsparks does soft cover and hardcover.

They just tend to be more costly than if you went to an offset printer.

Yes, they are.

Yeah.

I focus on selling my soft covers because it's more reasonably priced.

But yeah, the hardcover, you do have to charge more because ingramsparks charges us authors more for them.

And just so everyone knows, too.

The thing I like about Amazon, but to Amber's credit, understand that you're the book author.

It's really entirely up to you how you go to market and how you market.

Sell your book through Amazon.

The beautiful thing about that, if you can get your people to notice your book, generally people can order your soft cover book and overnight or within two days, the book is at your door.

And it's because Amazon has printing facilities all over, I'm going to say all over the world, right?

Yes.

And very accessible, which is really nice.

You got your beautiful book into the marketplace.

Does Miriam Laundrie offer any other services to market or then they have your little chickadee.

So Amber the chickadee.

And they go like this and say, fly.

Newly minted children's book author, fly.

Yeah.

Is that what happens?

That's pretty much it.

They give us tools throughout the program.

They'll bring marketing specialists on for zoom meetings to give us tips and tricks and show us some of the things that have helped them be successful.

We also have a community with each other so we can watch what the other authors are doing.

But yes, it is.

There's a lot of freedom for us to market it the way we want to.

I could tell again when we were talking and you lit up about being involved to find your own illustrator.

So tell us about that process.

Tell us how did you find the illustrator?

Because the graphics are beautiful.

It's a beautiful book.

So tell us about that process.

Yeah, the illustrator is truly phenomenal.

And I found him through Advocate Art, the website Advocate Art.

You go on.

And it's basically a collection of different artists portfolios.

And so I started out with a list of probably 20, because there are so many just talented artists.

I had to narrow it down.

I had to decide, okay, what's the feel that I want for this book?

Because this artist has more of a whimsical style and this other artist artist has more of a sentimental style.

And so I had to choose, I had to kind of narrow it down based on the artist style.

And I'm feeling like if it matched my vision for my book.

You had 20 choices.

When you first started, you said, how did you eventually get down to one?

Because that's like going from 20 to one.

Wow.

Like, how did you do that?

It was Hard.

I just had to look.

I just kept looking at their portfolios over and over, and I would just narrow it down bit by bit.

And finally, did you have any contact or when did you start making contact with the illustrators?

Was it when you got down to 5 or down to 3, or how did you do that?

So Advocate Art has a representative that works as a mediator between you and the artist.

So I know contacted the artist, any of the artists directly until I have made my decision.

This advocate was in the middle helping us.

They were like an agent.

They were an agent, yes.

And.

And I.

So I believe when I had two, when I had narrowed it down to my top two, I had contacted the agent when I had my big, long list, and I was like, can you tell me about.

I think I had five different.

And she said, let me know.

Basically, narrow it down more.

And then.

Okay, they encouraged you to get it down to.

Now, was it two or three?

I know you said two, but did they have a number in mind before they wanted?

They would let you contact the illustrator?

I had two.

And what I was talking to the agent, just telling her, I don't know which one to go with.

They're both so great.

So she said, what you can do is ask each illustrator to draw up a picture of your main character.

And I had to pay money to do that.

But to me, it wasn't outrageous.

And it.

To me, it was worth it because I wanted to make sure I was getting what I was going to be paying for.

And so I narrowed it down to his name is P S Brooks, and they both drew my.

He and the other artists both drew pictures of my main character.

They were both really great.

And which almost made it harder because I was hoping one of them would just be like, oh, no, that's not the language.

But they were both so good.

And so it was really hard.

But I just narrowed it down to P.S.

brooks, and he did a phenomenal job.

Yeah, very nice.

So I always ask this of children's book authors that have been on the show that have multiple children's books published.

And so I know you're working on a second book.

Would you use the same illustrator?

Yes, I would.

I would use his work for any book he's.

He's done really great.

I do have to say I think I enjoy his illustrations of animals more than his.

And his illustrations of people are great, too.

They're really great.

But for my style.

I love his style of animals.

And then I've seen other illustrators who maybe I Enjoy their style of people better, if that makes sense.

So.

Right.

I would be opposed to using him again because he.

Again, he did such a great job.

He added so much beautiful detail to it.

Nice.

You know what?

The illustrator that we use is out of England, believe it or not.

Our book is called the Adventures of Caboose the Rocky Mountain Bear.

We actually have people and animals living together in a community.

We needed an illustrator that the balance was there between what animals look like and the humans look like.

He was able to accomplish that.

But it's interesting.

That's why I always talked about illustrators is.

It seems to me most cases it has to match what you're trying to convey.

Because I've had some authors have up to three or four illustrators and at first I thought there was maybe an issue with the illustrator, but it wasn't.

It was their ability to match what the author had in mind.

And some did.

Just did it better than others in terms of.

For that instance.

Yeah.

Coordinate with your.

Absolutely.

So we talked a little bit about your website.

Which came first, your website or your published book?

I started working on my website before the book was officially published, if I remember right.

I'm trying to remember back, but I had it pretty much set up.

I don't believe I actually published it.

I was working on it in the background and then I officially published it once the book was published.

Okay.

And I noticed you use some of the graphics from your.

From your book and incorporated into your website, Correct?

Yes.

Okay.

And the reason I talk about that is that the one thing that I found, and it's interesting because next, next Tuesday, I actually have a website designer coming on as a guest and he's from Buffalo, New York.

We got into the importance of a website because to your point, you know, whether you look at Instagram or Facebook or LinkedIn or any of the social media platforms.

TikTok.

The thing is, you don't own those.

You're just a visitor or a renter, depending if you pay for services, then you're a renter.

But they have total control.

So if they decide they don't like your posts or whatever, they can take you down and you've lost your audience.

Versus when you have your own website, it's yours and as you collect email addresses, it's your property.

Yes.

Yeah, that's a good point.

And I do like that aspect of having our website.

I think that's one way for you to get around the social media in a way is promote your website more and hopefully build a following through your website.

When you looked at your website, did you have help or did you do it on your own?

I did it on my own.

It's not as aesthetically pleasing as some other websites, but I go it's through GoDaddy.

And they make it really easy, and they make it very doable for those of us who are not tech gurus.

Right.

And so I.

That's what I liked about it.

And I felt like, for me, it was good enough.

I felt like it was what I was looking for.

Maybe in the future I will pay to have someone do a better job for me than I did on my own, But I was already putting so much money into the book itself that I felt like this is something I can do on my own.

And again, GoDaddy made it very easy to do on my own.

On this upcoming episode that I have next week on Website development, episode 31 with David Servey.

And it's interesting because we talk about building your website around your book brand or building your website around your author brand.

So you chose to build yours around your author brand, correct?

Yes.

Yes.

In our case, because ours is called the Adventures of Caboose the Rocky Mountain Bear, we have multiple stories written with my grandchildren.

38 stories.

Wow.

We don't have 38 books, but we have 38 stories, and they're all Adventures of Caboose or Caboose's Community or Family and Friends.

That's so fun.

Everybody does it a little differently.

I just want everybody to understand that I don't think there's any right or wrong answer in terms of as long as you know what you're doing in terms of branding and why you're doing it, that's the most important piece.

And I feel like it would make more sense to build it around the book if you have a series.

I wasn't planning on making this book a series, so that's why I wanted to just build it around my author name.

And I find that with a lot of children's book authors, they have, they might have.

Like, one of my first guests, Darcy Guy, had three books in this book series, but he had another idea for another book.

That's why he kept it in his author's name, because the fourth book was not part of the book.

His first three books that were in a series, you really have to think it through.

So that's why I like bringing it up on the show so people understand the internal struggles that we all have on deciding what do we do here.

And if you decide to rebrand Later.

Is that going to be hurtful ultimately to your following or, you know, have to consider all that?

Absolutely.

We talked about inspiration behind your book.

What about motivation?

Was there one specific person or event that you said, you know what, I'm a children's book author, Tell us about that.

So I, I would say it started when I became a mom and I began reading to my oldest son and we were just building our own little collection of books.

I remember reading Sandra Boynton's Moobala to him quite often and of course, the Dr.

Seuss classics.

And I remember just thinking, this would be such a fun career to be able to write these books and books that make kids laugh.

And it's funny because people, some people will say that they don't appreciate the.

Just the silly nonsense books, but I appreciate it all.

I think it's so fun.

I love the books that have deeper meaning for kids, but I also love just the silly books that make kids laugh.

And so that was kind of my motivation was reading with my son.

And so I had it in my mind that I would someday do this.

And it was interesting because I was on.

I was actually on an airplane and my assigned seat was next to this woman who was in the Peace Corps.

And she.

We started, we began talking and she was very inspirational to me.

And she was asking me about going goals in my life.

And I told her, I want to write a children's book.

I told her I actually wanted to write and illustrate it.

I'm not an artist, but it's my goal someday to become one.

And so anyway, I told her this and she said before we carted our ways after the flight, she said, I hope someday we run into each other again and you will have fulfilled that dream and you can tell me about it.

And so it was just a touching moment.

And I thought, you know what?

I'm going to do this.

I'm really going to make this happen.

So did you track her down?

No.

I didn't even get her contact info, but she was a source of inspiration to me and helping me realize, you can do this, you should do it.

And what was her first name?

Do you remember?

I do not even remember.

Oh, okay.

I know I should have gotten her contact info.

This was.

Man, this was almost 10 years ago.

No problem teasing you.

I thought maybe through this magic of the digital world, someone in the Peace Corps would realize that they had inspired you to actually get your book to market.

Yes.

Hopefully someday.

Someday I'll run into her again by fate.

I want to talk a Bit about character development.

Many books have one main character, and in your book, the Chickadee, who knew your main character is Finn and his interactions with others, which there's lots of interaction.

So tell us why you took this approach and how did you do Finn's character development?

I took it again for myself.

I pulled out that little bit of pessimist inside of me and said, this is going to be Finn.

And then I.

But also added to that how I've seen myself grow over the years and be able to pull myself out of pessimism and be more optimist.

And that was going to be fin at the end of the book.

Why not a female Finn?

Why a male Finn?

I think because I have four sons.

I always like to ask that because it's helping others who are inspiring to be an author understand that there's, again, there's different reasons why people do things, and I just like to get a little deeper.

So having four sons, I think that would definitely be a strong motivator.

I wanted my sons to connect with the book and with the character.

And it's funny because at one point I remember thinking, should I make my character a female?

But it just didn't.

Never even crossed my mind.

I just always knew it was going to be a male because of my sons, and I wanted to have that, have them be able to connect more deeply with it.

Now, are any of your sons close to Finn, or is Finn more close to you in terms of character?

It's hard because I do feel like I try to make Ben's character relate with children.

I feel like a lot of children, my sons included, can probably relate to the whining that, yeah, I would say that he relates to my sons, but not completely.

I don't believe we all have moments where we're more whiny than others.

Absolutely.

Or we're more grateful.

And so, yes, aspects of his character does relate to my boys and myself and all kids.

I would say, okay, I want to get to what I think is so magical, what you did.

And I know I teased everybody at the beginning of the show, including Amber.

I teased her like, what am I doing?

Special and magical that Rick hasn't seen with any other children's book author so far.

And when I looked at your website videos and you were at the assemblies and you had a puppet, a fit, I thought, oh, my goodness, that is phenomenal.

And the reason I get so excited about this, and I'll tell you why, is if you look behind us, and so those who are listening In I tell the story on some of the episodes when my granddaughter and I came up with our idea about this adventurous bear, it was all based on a real story that happened to us.

And what happened was my granddaughter went to a daycare, and the daycare had two stuffies.

One was a rabbit named Georgia, and one was a bear named her brother, George.

So there was Georgia the rabbit and George the bear, and they were brother and sister.

And the daycare would give the them to children if they were going on vacation.

And then when the children came back, they would tell stories about their adventures.

So Kira brought Georgia a lot, the stuffed bunny.

And we did so many adventures.

We ran all over the Rocky Mountains, and we just had so much fun.

Kira outgrew the daycare, but we had all these adventures.

We had all these stories.

But we need the character.

We had a character in mind.

We just didn't know how to bring the character to life.

My wife and I talked about this adventurous bear so much to my wife that I'm sure she thought I was crazy.

But we were down in San Francisco on a holiday and went into one of these plushie bear places, build a bear.

And they had this bear, and then they had this engineering outfit.

It was magical.

Caboose was born, and we actually used the.

This bear in the background that, of course, anybody listening can't see.

But the bear ended up being our inspiration for our main character.

I took a picture of the bear and gave it to the illustrator.

And our illustrator built our whole book series around one stuffing.

I love that.

That's why I'm excited about what you're doing, because I never thought about a puppet taking your main character and turning it into a puppet.

So I'm so interested, and I think as a storyteller, like, what a great thing to do.

Tell us about that whole experience.

How did you come up with that idea?

I'm trying to remember where I did come up with the idea.

I think I was trying to figure out a way.

So in my book, there are several times throughout the story when Finn, my main character, will sing, Chickadee Dee Dee this place is not for me.

And then at the end he'll say, Chickadee dee Dee this place was made for me, but I wanted the kids to sing that phrase with me, the Chickadee dee Dee.

And I thought, what's a good way I can engage the kids to get them to say it, but the to also quiet down after so they can continue to hear the story.

And I thought, what I'm A puppet.

And I can hold him up in the air and say, when Finn flies up in the air, that's your cue.

And it's time to say Chickadee Dee Dee.

And then when he comes back down, we need to be quiet so we can hear the rest of the story.

I've used him as a tool.

And it's funny because I.

I did it in reverse of the way you did it.

I had my character drawn first, and then I sent the picture that the illustrator created a Finn into a company called Budsies.

And they created the puppet, and he came looking more like a penguin.

I'm not gonna lie.

So I.

That's fun, though, because I will joke about that with the kids when I go.

And I'll say, how many of you think he looks like a chickadee?

And how many of you think he actually looks more like a penguin?

And they think that's fun.

That's hilarious.

The nice thing about the.

On the front cover.

Finn's on the front cover is he's pretty fat.

Yes.

Until you said that, I.

Of course, I.

I haven't seen Finn live as a puppet, but I thought, wow, that's pretty darn cool.

But when the hard thing is, I'm like, in the company's credit, I don't know how you would make it look more like a chickadee.

Cause the coloring is very similar to penguin.

Tell us about the interaction with the kids.

Have the kids said, can I get a puppet to go with the book?

They've never asked for a puppet.

Actually, I'm.

I'm shocked that I.

Yeah, so am I.

But I do have to say they haven't asked for that at school visits.

But when I've been at my farmer's market, I will set my puppet out on the table with my book, and they will ask if they can buy the puppet, too.

And I said, no, that one is just for when I go and read my stories.

But I'll let them hold it and pet it.

And.

Yeah, I want to share something with you, because when we first started out, we went to several independent bookstores.

And one of the independent bookstores, Stonewaters, we went to, is in the Rocky Mountains.

They've been selling our book, but the owner of the bookstore said, have you got a stuffy to go with the book?

And I said, oh, no, we don't, Mike.

What are you talking about?

And he said, if you come over to the section.

So he took us to the section of the children's books, and.

And a lot of Them had a book and a stuffy.

And he said a lot of the times we sell the book and the stuffy together because it's such a cute idea and people like doing that when they know that they've got, they're reading Caboose, the Rocky Mountain Bear and, and the child has caboose in his or her lap.

Romantical kids.

It is the only thing is that in retail they always like to double their price and then you also have to make a profit.

Exactly.

My wife and I did a lot of research trying to figure out how to do it.

And at the end of the day we just, with the margins that everybody wanted, we just couldn't do it in North America either.

You live in the United States, you live in Canada.

It, the cost is prohibitive.

And so what we did is I was interviewing a guest from Oklahoma and she actually had her book, hard hardcover books offset printed in China.

And she told me about this service called madeinchina.com and she said they'll make anything for you and the price will work in North America.

Yeah, yeah.

And I, we said, oh.

So anyway, she gave me the lead.

I went and actually did that.

I thought, okay, I'm going to try this.

And so I've got to show you this.

So this is actually for those again, listening, you can't see it.

This is actually what they did.

Made.

Yes.

And isn't that incredible how anyone listening?

Our sample of our bear that we bought in San Francisco and the one that we just had designed in China are almost identical except for the size.

And yet the pricing won't work for us.

The only reason I bring that up is I think, you know what, as you're trying to build some revenue with your book, possibly it might be too cost prohibitive to do it in the usa, but it might not be such a bad idea if you could source it.

So now just so you know, our minimum order is 500 units.

They A lot of times they want bulk orders.

Correct.

So that's the only, that's the only thing.

And we had to pay for the sample up front.

Okay.

So it currently it's on its way to us because we only have pictures.

I only mention that because especially Amber with you being so honest about your approach about social media.

It's something that you don't really want to embrace at this point, but you still want to be a children's book author.

And how do you create some revenue that could offset if you're not reaching people through social media?

How do you create Some revenue and possibly your puppet, which I think is a phenomenal idea.

I was thinking a parent or a grandparent or a friend reading to the child and they got the puppet on their hand and the book.

Oh, and then the puppet becomes the friend of the child.

It's so magical.

Just saying to you, I'm so excited about it because I think you have something very special there that might fit into your building your book business a different way.

Thank you.

Can you repeat the name of that website again for myself and the listeners?

So it's Made in China.

And just so everyone knows, Amber's been giving us so many great insights into other companies.

We'll make sure all the links are in the show notes.

So have no fear, the links will be there or something.

It doesn't rhyme.

But that's okay.

You have something magical there that you could really take advantage of.

And if you love going to farmers markets to.

Then you could have a combo pricing.

So the puppet itself might be $5 more and the book, and then you have a combo price and then your chances of selling more but making good margin to help you do your next book just might be a big possibility.

I think what you've done is so magical and it's such a genius idea.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And yeah, it's funny you mentioned that with a farmer's market, because I actually did find my booth was next at one of the markets, my booth was next to someone who crocheted cute little stuffy animals.

And so I said, oh, can you crochet my main character?

And she did.

And I bought some from her and she did a great job.

They're so cute.

But it's the same thing.

It's like she's trying to make money, so she has to charge.

And they're handmade, so there's a lot of value.

Not too.

I was running into the same issue.

I tried to sell them and I actually could not sell them at the farmer's market because of stipulations, which the way the farmer's market was ran, I couldn't sell the stuff along with the book at that particular market.

But I think if I were to have one made separately, not from another vendor.

Yes.

From like you say, from this website, then I think that would be.

What I'll do is I'll send you my contact name that I used.

Oh, that would be wonderful.

Yeah, I know.

I'd be happy to do that.

Their service was unbelievable.

Oh, God.

I thought, why?

They don't even.

Like they're sitting In.

Now they're in Singapore.

It was like it almost instantaneously because we live in a technological world where there.

There is no.

There is no boundaries.

It's amazing what they did.

And they would.

I.

It was $85American to have the sample made up.

Now, I don't know if that'd be the same for a puppet, but probably in that range.

Right.

And.

And then I had to pay $25American to get it shipped to Canada.

Yeah.

And you know what?

They don't do anything.

These are all their pictures.

They took the picture of the front, they took the picture of the back, they took the picture of the side.

Well, that is so cute.

And just sent it to me.

So they would do, I'm sure, the same thing for you, except they put it on their hand.

Yeah.

Anyway, sorry.

Sorry to digress there, but I think we're just.

You've done it so wonderful.

I want.

And I always want to bring value to our listeners, to understand there's so many ways we live in a fantasy world as children's book authors.

The imagination is boundless.

Absolutely.

I want to talk to you about your theme.

I want to come back to your book.

I know you have a clear theme in your book and it's right on the back of the book.

And I really like that.

Join Fin as he discovers the true meaning of home and how our perspective can change everything.

Would that be the underlying story?

Yes.

Yeah.

Just that coming back to the good and realizing that sometimes there is value in being able to step away from what we have in order to realize how good we actually have it.

And then when we come back, our eyes are opened to something new.

You have perspective, gratitude, realizing the good in what we have.

When you go to the school assemblies, is that your central teaching?

Yes.

Yeah.

So I'll usually read the book and then we will talk about the themes of the book.

Perspective.

We do some fun hands on interactive activities with that.

And then I talk a little bit about the publishing process, the hybrid publishing process.

Okay, terrific.

Like we were talking about before, on your website, you have a teaser.

Just like I tease people at the beginning of the show, you have a teaser of a typewriter saying, your next book is coming.

So talk to us about your writing process.

So share some insights into your development and the writing process of your children's books.

Okay.

With this next book that I'm writing, I started at the beginning and then I skipped to the end because my emphasis, the ending is always the best part.

Right.

It's where ties in and the moral of the story is made clear.

And it's just the gem.

So can I just pick up on that for one second?

Because when I was telling you I did the school reading and then I got to actually take the students through lessons about how to write a children's book, the first thing I said to them was, begin with the end in mind.

Yes.

Yes.

So I just wanted to say that it seems to me, following up on what you're talking about, and you and I have exactly the same thought, is begin with the end in mind.

It really helps.

The end is everything, in my opinion.

And yeah, so then I'll.

I started with the beginning, jumped to the end, wrote that because I didn't want that to just be tied up really quickly.

And I wanted to give it the emphasis and the amount of pages and wording that it deserved.

Then I worked in the middle, and now I'm still working on the middle of it and I'm trying to tie it up.

And it's funny because I've heard from several sources that you should write it all in a rough draft.

They're like, don't edit as you go.

That's advice that people give.

But I've always been the writer who edits as I go when my brain works.

And I have to do that.

I don't know why I cannot pull my.

And maybe my stories would benefit from me not editing as I go.

I haven't tried it, so maybe I need to try it.

But for me and the way my brain works, I have to just edit as I go.

And I feel like that for me, that produces my best work is when I edit as I go.

Good for you.

So I know you talked about drawing from your own personal experience in your writing process.

Did you conduct any additional research when you were writing your book?

So this book, the Chickadee who knew, didn't have a lot of research to be done.

My sister.

Some of the inspiration came from my sister, who lives in a very mountainous area.

She shows us videos and pictures of all these cool birds that come into her yard.

And one of them is the chickadee.

And we all just kind of.

She fell in love with the chickadee was telling us about it and showing us.

And I thought, oh, that is such a cute bird.

And it's call I love.

It's called the Chickadee is actually an onomatopoeia because it's call sounds what it like its name, right?

It sounds.

The Chickadee's call sounds like Chickadee.

Dee Dee Dee.

It's really fun.

So I just love that.

I thought that is just so whimsical.

And so the only research I did with that was based off of her word.

And then I googled a little bit more to find a little bit more out about that and did realize indeed, the chickadee is named the chickadee because of its call.

And that's.

This is what it sounds like.

And so that I did that research, I also researched a little bit about.

I wanted the antagonist of my book to be an undesirable bird.

And so I looked up what birds are, I guess trash birds, so to speak.

And a pigeon happened to be one of them.

That was just a nuisance.

And I thought that's perfect.

That'll be the villain of the story is the pigeon.

Thank you for sharing that.

I want to talk to you a little bit about success.

So obviously you're not coming to this for fame and fortune.

We talked about your book business plan earlier.

But let's delve into what was your original goal and how are you measuring what success looked like to you for the book?

I feel like that one can be a little bit tricky because really measuring success is hard.

We have to jump in and get our feet wet before we can determine what it's going to look like for us.

But for me, there's two different sides to it.

There's obviously the business side of it.

And I feel like for me, in order to continue writing, I have to be earning, not just breaking even, but earning enough money to then be able to do another book.

And so there is that, that success of aspect of okay, this does have to have some monetary gain.

Not for like you say, not for reasons of fame or fortune, but just to be able to continue doing it.

So your habit.

Yes, to feed my habit.

Exactly.

And then the other side of it is the inspirational side.

And so I felt my throat me success in that aspect is if I can just inspire or delight even one child, then it's successful to me.

I want to pick up on that a little bit because you talked about you'd like to continue to write and bring more children's books into the world.

How do you see being a children's book author in the grand scheme of your life?

I don't know.

That's a tough one.

I feel like I.

And it's hard for me.

The hard thing for me is balancing right.

Because I am a mom, I'm primarily a stay at home parent.

I stay at home with my, my kids and that's my main focus in the grand scheme of my life.

If I look 30 years down the road, I would love to have written a good handful more of books.

I would love to, again, be able to somehow be signed on with a traditional publisher so I can just focus on the writing and not the marketing.

So that's where I'm viewing it in the grand scheme.

I want to make this a career, but at the same time, balancing that with home life and making sure that my kids get the time and attention from me that they deserve.

How do you set some time aside for writing?

Tell us that process, especially with four young boys.

Wow.

Yeah, I.

And I had to get to the point where I let some other things go a little bit.

I feel like I'm always.

I've always wanted a very neat, clean house.

And I got to the point with kids where I realized, you know what?

I'm going in literally insane here because I'm trying to clean something, and then five minutes later, it gets messed up.

And so it's like the literal definition of insanity.

Right.

And so I had to realize, okay, I can let go of some of those things, the housework, and make a little more time for something that I enjoy in my heart, like writing.

And so I actually.

I listen to some music.

I do music therapy to help with anxiety and depression.

And so while I do that, I write.

It's just classical music and classical and rhythmic music.

And so I will listen to that.

And that's my time.

I set aside.

It's about 30 minutes a day, five days a week.

That's pretty good.

So I just.

And I would like to share this tip, if that's okay, that I found.

Oh, absolutely.

I took a time management course.

There's a.

It's called BBC Maestro, and I wish I could remember the name of the man who taught this course, but he did a phenomenal job.

And he talked about how writers, some of the most successful writers he's found, only dedicate a small chunk of time to writing each day.

He said, not more than.

I can't remember the exact numbers, but they don't write for hours and hours every day.

He said they write maybe 40 minutes a day.

And he said that keeps it fresh in their mind, but it also allows them to not become bogged down and lose their spark.

And so I took that to heart and I thought, okay, five days a week while I do my music, I can write.

Good for you.

That's fantastic.

Thank you for sharing that.

And I have to agree with you, too.

Like, it's doing a little bit every day.

That adds up to a lot over a year.

Because if you think if you wrote 200, the length of a children's book is between 500 and a thousand words.

And if you wrote 200 words a day over your five days, you'd have your next children's book.

I know it's not that simple, but really, if you just do the math, five times 200 is a thousand.

It adds up.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It makes it more.

More doable.

I want to have you talk to aspiring authors.

What advice would you give to aspiring children's book authors who are just starting out?

They don't even have any words down.

They just have this great children's book floating around in their brain.

What would you say to them?

So one of the pieces.

Pieces of advice that the publishing company gave me was.

Gave all of us, was to come up with a why for our writing and so purpose to have a purpose behind it.

Mine was again, to be able to inspire children in ways that maybe the world is lacking, to inspire them in positivity.

And so I come up with that why and then let that fuel you and motivate you to take just one step forward at a time.

And I think passion, having a passion for that can really help, again, fuel that motivation and give us kind of that impetus to just move forward.

And I would also say be flexible and open to changes from both yourself and your editor, because it can be really easy to want to just throw in the towel when you realize this isn't working and I'm going to have to start over or I'm going to wiggle my manuscript around a little bit because this isn't making sense or.

And you're going to get a lot of feedback from your editor, too, on what's not working.

And that can be really a really tough pill to swallow and obviously grateful for it.

It's.

It needs to.

We need to have that advice from a third party.

And so it's essential, but it's also one of those things we have to be flexible to.

You have to be flexible to know that here's my story, and I feel like it's finished, but I need to know it's not finished and I'm going to have to change it.

Thank you for that.

And I always leave this towards the end, but I'd like to talk about encouragement for readers.

So why should readers purchase your book?

I feel.

Because I feel like it's a relatable theme to both parents and children.

We may think that we've found gratitude and we're set, but there will always be bumps in the road that arise and continue to arise, and we're almost constantly tempted to see negative and dwell on negative rather than see the good.

I think it's an important lesson that we have to consistently learn and relearn throughout life to open our eyes to gratitude.

And I think instilling that in children from a young age is very important.

And it's also a good reminder for the parents and those reading the story to the children.

Absolutely.

Thank you for sharing that.

So where can people purchase your book?

On Amazon.

But that is where I would recommend purchasing it is on Amazon.

And just so everyone knows, I live in Canada and this book came to me within less than two days and it was printed right here in Alberta about 15 minutes from my house.

Oh, okay, cool.

So that's what I try to get state to everybody, is that it's amazing.

Amazon has printing facilities all over the world, especially North America.

So it's nice when you can order it and it's almost instantaneously coming to your house.

Amazon makes it very accessible.

So that's nice.

Absolutely.

So, final thoughts?

Is there something you are thinking, Oh, I wish Rick would ask me that question.

Or I've got something burning inside me that I'd like to share with the audience.

No, the only thing I would say is just the power of writing is phenomenal.

I love what it can do for those writing and for those that are being gifted the final work.

And I don't think sometimes we give pen and paper enough credit.

I think there's so much power.

And when we talk with people verbally, in person, that's great.

That communication is great.

But the thing with writing that's beautiful is there's so much more premeditation that goes into it and so much more thought.

And it's a wonderful industry to be a part of.

Absolutely.

Amber, thank you so much for being a guest on the Adventures in the Heart of Children's Book Authors podcast.

I really appreciate that your generosity of time and your insights, they'll benefit aspiring authors and readers.

You have something very magical and so cool with using a puppet as your main character.

I promise the audience to make sure that Amber mentioned a lot of different websites and we'll make sure the links are in the show notes.

If you really enjoyed this episode, please hit the subscribe button to listen to future episodes and feel free to share this whole episode and talk about Amber's book, the Chickadee who Knew thank you, Amber.

Thank you, Rick.

I appreciate it so much.