Tonight I had the opportunity to meet the amazing, spectacular, brilliant, spiffy, one and only – Mo Willems. For those of you who don’t have a child under the age of 12, Mo Willems is the author and illustrator of several wonderful children’s picture books. He is most known for three very popular book series; The Pigeon, Knuffle Bunny and the Elephant & Piggie.
This evening, he spoke at a Vancouver school gymnasium filled with hundreds of adoring fans. Although there were probably equal amounts of children and adults in the audience, I think most of the excited giggles were coming from the adults – the parents that happily read his stories over and over again. Mr. Willems read his latest (and final) Elephant & Piggie book “The Thank You Book“.
He then gave us a sneak preview of his new book Nanette’s Baguette that is coming out in October 2016. Initially I thought that a story about a baguette could not stack up to the lovable Trixie and her knuffle bunny – I love bread and everything but I was sceptical. Well, I was wrong. From the first page he had me. I would say this is a rhyming book but not in the typical sense. Each line doesn’t end in a rhyme but there are rhyming words throughout each sentence. This style is fresh and of course has Mo Willems’ typical wit thrown in.
I then had a chance to meet Mo (I’ll just use his first name as we are practically friends now that I’ve met him). I have to admit I was a little nervous. I was star struck and I think I rambled on to him about how my family does noodle doodle dinner nights inspired by him. And then he gave me the idea that we should have strudel on our noodle doodle dinner nights (Krack! – mind blow). I wanted to stay and chat with him, to invite him for doodle dinner or offer to show him around the city and trails. But there was a huge line up behind me, the poor guy must have been exhausted and quite frankly I froze at his brilliant suggestion about strudel.