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Amy Krouse Rosenthal’s work is woven throughout my family. I used The Belly Book for my second pregnancy. Each of my kids have Your Birthday Book. We regularly read her Cookies: Bite-Size Life Lessons whenever we need a little reminder about how to treat each other. Her memoir Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life is currently in my Amazon shopping cart, and one of her latest published books, Plant a Kiss, is one of my new children’s book favorites. It’s safe to say…we are big fans.

So, I was excited to catch Amy in between video shoots, writing books, and her contributions to TED and NPR to answer a few questions about motherhood, her new book, and what comfort means to her…take a look.

Do you have any children?

Yep.   Justin is almost 19.  Miles is 17.  And daughter Paris is 14.

 

What was one of your favorite books as a child?

Fortunately, by Remy Charlip

 

When did you start writing children’s books?

With pen and paper.  :)

My first books that were published were all grown-up books, but I was writing children’s books all along; it just took me longer to break into that end of the market.   My first children’s book was published in 2005 but I had been at it for quite a few years at that point, waiting for that ephemeral “yes.”

 

What was the best piece of advice you received as a mom and as a writer?

As a mom:  make sure to take care of yourself so you can in turn take care of your family.

As a writer:  don’t worry so much about being the “best” at what you do; think about being the *only one* who does what you do.   Something about that spoke to me.  I mean, I work super hard and give everything my absolute best effort but I’m not focused on being “the best” because what does that even mean?  There’s room for all of us to do our thing.  And the more I focus on my individual work, the more distinct my work becomes.

 

What inspired your children’s book Plant a Kiss?

I think I’m always attune to word play and one day a few years ago someone said that expression and I immediately had this flash of “what if they *literally* planted a kiss.   It just went from there, imagining what would come of the act of planting a kiss.   And I think somewhere in the back of my mind was the memory of my son who, many years ago, wanted to grow a meatball tree so we (of course) planted a meatball in our backyard.  :)

And as for the unusual text of the book, the ultra sparse rhyming text… I’d never written anything like that before.  But somehow when I started to write/tell this story, that’s how it came out…. The character of Little Miss led me right to it… “It goes like this… Little Miss planted a kiss…Planted a kiss?  Planted a Kiss…”

 

For someone who hasn’t read the book yet, what is the message?

The story is about hope, kindness and sharing… and how one tiny act can have enormous sparkly results.

 

After we have fallen in love with your children’s books, which of your grown-up books would you recommend we read first?

Absolutely this: Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life. It’s an alphabetized memoir of sorts. And was named a top memoir of the decade so…    :)

You use your creativity in so many interesting ways…video, radio, memoirs, children’s books…what is up next?

I’m real excited about this, just launched it: http://amykrouserosenthalspringcatalog.tumblr.com/

 

And one last thing…what does the word “comfort” mean to you?

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