The Yellow Rose

Some time ago, I wrote a children's story titled "The Yellow Rose." My daughter's kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Gilliand, knows I am a writer, and has asked to read something of mine in the past. When I needed some beta readers for the first book in my MG series, I thought about asking Mrs. G. if she'd be interested. However, after I printed the manuscript, it seemed to be too long in case she might want to read it to the class. So I went through some other manuscripts, specifically stories I've written for children. I came across one manuscript I've been shopping around: A story called "The Yellow Rose." It's a story about a farmer who receives a gift from the Earth: A beautiful yellow rose that can never die.

After Mrs. G. read it to the class, she told me the children were going to draw pictures for it. I thought that might be interesting to see what sort of pictures my story inspired. I thought that meant they'd draw pictures to go with the story, but that isn't exactly how it went. (And as for how they liked the story? I guess they liked it, because they clapped at the end!)
On Thursday, May 15th, I attended a family barbecue at the school. After we ate and had recess, I returned to the classroom with everyone. Mrs. G. was whispering to Jennifer about something and I started to wonder about what was going on. I was really surprised to be presented with a book the teacher made, showing off the pictures the children had drawn for my story! Oh, wow!! I was so touched and moved. It even brought tears to my eyes as Mrs. G. went through the book and showed it to the class. What a wonderful gift!

You can see the cover of the book here:
http://picturepixies.blogspot.com/2008/05/they-made-this-for-me.html


I started reading some of the pages but, because my voice was not 100% restored (read about how I lost and got some of my voice back here: http://palmstopines.blogspot.com/2008/05/god-answers-prayers.html), Jennifer and Mrs. G. helped with the reading. Every single picture was a brand new surprise and I was just so touched and deeply moved by how they'd done this project for my story.


I am uploading the PDF file of this book to my web site, at http://dmcwriter.tripod.com/ Right now, my computer isn't cooperating with uploading files to the site, but I'll be putting it there, on the homepage, as soon as possible. I just want to show off the great artwork the children did for this story!


Here is a picture of Mrs. Gilliand and her kindergarten class:







Thank you, Mrs. Gilliand! And thank you, children, for such a wonderful gift! It will be treasured forever!