Stories and Slime reading!

This past Thursday, I celebrated the end of the fall session of Stories and Slime with my two students, Nora and Ivan. They both wrote awesome stories: "Father and Daughter Renegade" about Mr. Lenovich the spy, and "Danger at Heart" about Victoria Phelps, who doesn't know she's a vampire. After the reading, I gave away a copy of Next to Mexico to my lucky new pal, Jacob! He was the first to shout out "Barak Obama" when I asked the trivia question: "Who's going to win the 2012 election?"

Please visit www.ywindsorterrace.org for info on my upcoming writing classes at the Windsor Terrace Y in Brooklyn.

Also visit www.jennails.com for more Next to Mexico updates.

Happy holidays!

Receiving the gift of slime.

On most weeks, I brought some kind of slime to start off class. We either squirted each other with it (oh, yeah, and there was the time I brought loaded water squirters when it was unseasonably warm in October, and the time I brought play dough and we made Thanksgiving salads and blood donuts), or we followed weird directions and concocted it and then globbed around with it, or rubbed it all over the table. But wait! We didn't JUST make a mess. We talked through ideas. We plotted things out. We slimed and we brainstormed. Then we wrote.

Ivan's reading was riveting!

Myself, the incredible writer/illustrator/wizardress Nora (age 8) and Ivan the brilliant physicist/author/sixth grader (age 11).

Wine and Books at Mini Max

I was thrilled to join awesome author Judy Palaferro (Color Bears, Horace's Big Hat) for a great "Wine and Books" bash this past Friday evening at the amazing Mini Max Toys and Cuts in Brooklyn. Not to diss my own or fellow author Judy's extraordinariness, but my husband, Mike Gold, was kind of the hit of the party. Check out these great photos of kids of all ages in jet packs. Many thanks to Matt Kaplan and all from Mini Max for having me there to help celebrate their new and improved children's book section! Happy December to all.

Ballooniaction

Matt and Frank Zappa

Balloon action