Perfect Picture Book Friday: HAPPY OWL-OWEEN Plus Giveaway

Happy Perfect Picture Book Friday, dear friends. The days are getting shorter, the temps are getting colder…and we are getting closer to a holiday that used to be a huge favorite with my kids: HALLOWEEN. They loved dressing up, they loved staying up later, and most of all, they loved the – CANDY! Of course, I always tried to make healthy snacks to give out when kids came trick-or-treating…but that stopped when we had that scare in the fall of 1982 and we were checking our kid’s candy and only giving out stuff that was sealed. And I cannot tell a lie…even before that I would confiscate their trick-or-treat bags and dole out one piece a day…first of all because I didn’t want them eating too much…and second of all, because I was a lover of candy and would pull out the York Peppermint Patties (remember those?) which were my favorite. These days, I love Twix and KitKats – my grandson is a sweetheart and always shares those with me. And now, finally, let’s meet our Perfect Picture Book, HAPPY OWL-OWEEN! A Halloween Story by the lovely Laura Gehl who is offering a giveaway of a brand new copy…please make sure you leave a comment. Maybe you can tell us what your favorite candy is. Or maybe you can share what character you had the most fun dressing up as.

HAPPY OWL-OWEEN: A Halloween Story

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Perfect Picture Book Friday: BEFORE MUSIC Plus Giveaway

What makes a perfect picture book? It’s probably a different set of parameters for each person…but for me, it’s a book that is entertaining, engaging, and educational…a book that provides information and inspiration to the child reader. And a book with awesome pictures! Today’s feature, BEFORE MUSIC, checks all those boxes!!! The illustrations are glorious (I can’t imagine how much research the artist, Madison Safer had to do) and the text gives us a world view of instruments and the people who play them (ditto on the research that author Annette Bay Pimentel ‘conducted’ in order to write this book!)

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Perfect Picture Book Friday: DEAR RAINBOW BABY Plus Critique & Zoom Chat Giveaway

Hello dear friends! Happy Perfect Picture Book Friday. Today’s featured book is beautiful…but more than that, the message it carries will touch many hearts. The author, the lovely Samantha Gassman, is an amazing person…she shared how she came to write this story:


This book is very precious to me, as the first draft was written in the days following my miscarriage in Nov. 2019. Writing was a way of healing and recovering after the tragedy and forced me to look forward with hope. I learned of the offer of publication a week before my rainbow baby, Kayla, was born in Aug. 2020. She shares her birthday with the book, and coincidentally, National Rainbow Baby Day.

Dear friends, not only did Samantha open her heart and share her sorrow to help others with theirs, she is also offering an incredible giveaway: a Picture Book Critique PLUS a 30-minute Zoom chat. The winner is going to be one very lucky writer, that’s for sure. Please leave a comment at the end of this post to be entered in the giveaway. And if you help make this book’s launch a success by pre-ordering a copy of DEAR RAINBOW BABY via her Linktree link: https://linktr.ee/sgassmanbooks – Samantha is going to send you a signed bookplate

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