Lacy Moore shares her inspiring journey of becoming a children's book author, highlighting her debut work, "Scaly Feet in a Sound so Sweet," which presents a unique rhyming alphabet adventure. With over 15 years of teaching experience, Lacy emphasizes the importance of making learning fun and engaging for children, using her own sons as inspiration for her writing. She discusses the techniques she employed to help children learn the alphabet through rhythm and rhyme, making education feel less like a chore. Lacy's experience in the publishing world showcases her hybrid approach, utilizing both self-publishing and support from a community of authors. As she works on her second book, Lacy encourages aspiring writers to embrace their dreams and take the leap into authorship, emphasizing that the journey itself is just as valuable as the end product.

Exploring the intersection of education and creativity, Lacy Moore reveals her inspirations and aspirations as a children's book author in the engaging podcast. Her book, "Scaly Feet in a Sound so Sweet: A Rhyming Alphabet Adventure," reflects her journey as a teacher and a parent, as she recounts how her desire to teach her youngest son led her to create a playful, rhyming approach to learning the alphabet. Lacy discusses her unique methodology, which focuses on using rhymes and engaging characters to create a fun learning environment for children. This innovative approach not only makes literacy accessible but also encourages children to see learning as an exciting adventure rather than a chore.

The podcast goes deeper into Lacy's publishing journey, detailing her hybrid approach, which combines self-publishing with community support. She elaborates on the connections she fostered with editors and illustrators, emphasizing the collaborative nature of creating a book. As Lacy shares her experiences with school visits and her goals to get her book into classrooms, her passion for impacting early childhood education becomes evident. The discussion serves as a reminder of the importance of nurturing creativity and collaboration in the literary world, encouraging aspiring authors to seek out connections and embrace their unique voices.

Listeners gain insight into the practical aspects of publishing, including distribution through platforms like IngramSpark and the significance of independent bookstores. Lacy's determination to reach young readers and her commitment to making learning enjoyable resonate throughout the episode. Her reflections on success—rooted not just in sales but in the meaningful connections made through literature—offer an inspiring perspective for anyone considering a journey in writing. By the end of the episode, Lacy’s story leaves a lasting impact, motivating listeners to pursue their dreams and share their own stories with the world.

Takeaways:

• Lacy Moore emphasizes the importance of making learning fun for children through engaging rhymes.
• She believes that children's books should not feel like lessons but rather enjoyable experiences.
• Lacy's journey from writing notes for her son to publishing a book is inspirational.
• The unique larger size of her book allows for more detailed illustrations and engagement.
• She highlights the significance of teacher recommendations in promoting children's books effectively.
• Lacy encourages aspiring authors to pursue their dreams and not fear failure.

Links referenced in this episode:

• authorlaceymore.com
• walmart.com
• target.com

Companies mentioned in this episode:

• Amazon
• IngramSpark
• Walmart
• Target

Mentioned in this episode:

Midroll

I am Lacy Moore, and my book is Scaly Feet in a Sound so Sweet.

A Rhyming Alphabet Adventure.

Thanks, Lacey, for joining us on the Adventures in the Heart of Children's Book Authors.

Really excited about having you as a guest.

I am excited to be here.

Thank you so much for having me on.

Lacy has written, and I get to have fun because you know what?

I'm just a big kid at heart, I gotta tell you that.

So to actually, it's like taking my grandkids to one of those animated movies.

That's what I get to do.

I get to be a big kid.

They don't know it, but I'm having as much fun as they are.

And so it was really neat to get to interview you because Lacy written her book and she's put a new twist on learning the Alphabet, and I just love that.

The other thing that I love, Lacy, before we get into your story, is I loved how you took each letter and you used a handful of words beginning with the same letter.

I thought, this is such an excellent learning technique.

So we'll get into that, but thank you.

Really nice book.

If you could tell us about the inspiration behind your children's book and the origin story.

So how did this all start?

Yeah, sure.

So I've actually been a teacher for over 15 years.

I taught high school, so not quite teaching the Alphabet, but I taught high school English, and I have two sons of my own.

And when I decided that it was time to kind of hang up my teacher hat and stay home with my youngest, he was about a year and a half at the time, I thought, well, now that I've taken him out of daycare, he still needs to be learning.

And the teacher inside me couldn't just, you know, sit around with him all day.

So I thought, how can I teach him?

But in a way that is fun, and he doesn't feel like I'm making him learn.

And so I actually started writing notes in my phone of little rhymes that went with the letters.

And the more he started to talk and get engaged, the more he would ask for more.

And he was a little over two by the time we finished all of the letters and got all of the kind of rhymes together.

He would even ask for them one day.

He'd say, mom, can we.

Can we read the W rhymes?

And this was.

I didn't.

I was just doodling on, you know, pieces of notebook paper, pictures to go along with the words.

I didn't have an actual book yet, but, yeah, that's kind of how it, it all started and then I decided, you know what, maybe I could actually turn this into something because he's learning and you know, I would love for other toddlers and up get to learn from it as well.

The teacher and me just thought this needs to be written.

So cool.

That leads me to now you've got this book formulated, you're excited, your son's embraced it.

I always talk to people about their publishing approach.

So, you know, on the show we talk about traditionally published, we talk about self published, and we also talk about hybrid publish, which is like a combination of.

It's almost like a la carte.

You choose what services that you think you need to purchase and then some of the services you just take on and do it on your own.

Tell us your approach to the publishing.

Share us your story about how you brought your book to market from a publishing aspect.

I guess mine kind of is more of a hybrid I went through.

It's called self publish.com, but they are.

It's like a group or a team that kind of helps you of authors who have also published in the past.

And since my book was already written, I, I got to kind of skip the first steps of the people who help you rock.

I didn't help you storyboard, but since mine was already written, I did have.

She's also an author who was kind of helping me find editors, find the right editor.

She gave me a list of like contacts that she had and how to find the right illustrator.

So I didn't do it all on my own, but in the end it was just me, just my me publishing it on Amazon.

So a little bit of a hybrid of me getting it out there, but with some help from it.

Because of that, I just again, I, because I'm trying to share this with other aspiring authors is would you think that you, the editor that you got and the illustrator that you got, would you work with them again on your second book?

Oh, absolutely.

I've actually already used my editor again on my second book and my illustrator is going to start working on my second book here in the next month or two.

So yes, I love them both.

They were great recommendations, fantastic.

And that's, that's been my experience also.

Again, for anyone who's thinking about being, becoming a children's book author, there's a lot of children's book editors out there and illustrators and generally I'm finding that once you, once you as a children's book author find someone that you can work with you, you tend to stick with them.

Absolutely, yes.

Okay.

And now you of course self publish through Amazon.

Did you also use ingramsparks to reach other online book retailers?

I did, yes.

Because especially with it being a children's book and an early learner book, I wanted a hard copy and so I went through ingramspark to get the, the hard cover of my book.

And so yeah, it's on Walmart.com and Target.com you know anybody that can use IngramSpark?

So I am always curious.

I know.

Have you thought of doing or maybe you have a large run.

Have you printed a large run of books or are you just using print on demand?

Right now I'm just doing print on demand, but I think because I am going to start doing like author visits at schools and things like that, I have a few lined up for the Read Across America Week.

I'm probably going to have to do a large run just so I actually have books available at these events.

So I haven't done it yet, but it is.

Okay.

And I'm going to share a little, a little story with you, Lacey, is that two days ago.

So we're working on our second book like you're working on your second book.

And so what I did is I thought, you know what, I'm just going to get someone to quote me on doing large book runs if there is any cost saving.

I was actually surprised that after I calculated in the cost of shipping to myself that I needed to get in the thousands copies printed before there was any cost savings.

I would really suggest when you, when go to look, make sure you take all costs into consideration because you may find that print on demand in the beginning, even if you printed 500 books is still more economical.

I just want to share that with you because that I just had that happen to me and I thought, oh well, maybe this print on demand thing isn't such a bad thing.

Okay.

Well that's great to know, actually.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

The other thing that I noticed and I loved it and now just for our listening audience, I have Stacy's book in front of me.

It's such a beautiful book.

And we're going to.

We're.

I would definitely want to talk to you about a couple of things in your book.

But one thing I noticed is in the second page you have a free activities coloring pages and it says scan the QR code.

So just Stacy, just so you know, so I scanned the QR code and what happened from my experience, and I'm just sharing this with you is it came back and it said unsafe site.

Oh, no.

Okay, so maybe my QR code is broken or sensitive.

So I just want to share that with you because I'm not sure if anybody said that to you yet.

But.

Yeah, so I just.

I just scanned it on my.

I've got the latest and greatest Apple 16.

And I scanned it and it bounced back and it said unsafe site.

So I just want to share that with you because I know you're early in.

In getting your book out into the marketplace.

I don't want people saying.

Because unless you are able to.

Someone says that to you, you don't even know that.

Right?

Yeah, I had no idea, actually.

So thank you.

I will be checking on that today.

Coming back to that, because activity pages are really close to my heart, my co author's heart, who happens to be my granddaughter.

We actually added activity pages to our book.

So right at the end of our book, there's activity pages.

Ours are a little different than yours because you have coloring pages.

Ours are developed around storytelling and building your own story.

Tell us about these coloring activity pages that people can get as a value add when they purchase your book.

Sure.

So it will go through a few of the different letters.

Like in some of them, I actually took the big picture of the letter out and I just have.

Let's say it's the D page.

I just have the ducks and the digging in the dirt and the drip.

And it's a black and white page so that children can color it if they want to.

But it also asks a question like, which letter is missing from this page?

And they can tell that from the ducks and the drips and that it's the letter D, Things like that.

So it.

And on the first page it says, can you count the number of apples from the tree where the alligator is hanging out?

So just little activities where they can interact with it but also color it.

Fantastic.

I love that.

I love that.

The other thing that I noticed, and again, I'm going to show you is, yes, yesterday I had the opportunity to interview this author.

But if you.

What I wanted to show you is.

And again, for the listening audience, Lacy's book.

A lot of times what happens is a lot of children's books are eight and a half inches by eight and a half inches.

Now Lacy's book is actually eight and a half by 11 inches.

Again, something a little different.

I always like to make sure that aspiring authors and even book readers have a sense about your book.

Tell us the story behind not going with what seems to be a traditionally normal Size for a children's book of eight and a half by eight and a half.

Why did you go to a larger size?

Sure.

So on each of the pages, there are the four line rhymes that go with the letter.

And I just felt like there were so many elements.

Like, on the first page with the A, you have the alligator and adventure and all of the different.

The Alphabet.

And I wanted all of that to be illustrated.

And on the bee, the boats, and the bugs and the.

I just wanted the children to be able to see everything.

And my illustrator felt like with the shorter kind of parameters, that it was harder to fit everything in without it looking kind of muddled and messy.

So we decided to go with the bigger size so she would have more room to illustrate it all.

You know what?

She gave you great advice.

It's a beautiful book.

And I was thinking exactly the same thing as you.

Even though I'm not an illustrator or understand the four quarters or all of that, I looked at it and said, wow.

Yeah, absolutely.

I can understand why you went to this size of a book.

So everyone understands that.

I mean, just because you see a lot of children's books eight and a half by eight and a half, that doesn't mean you have to take that approach, especially if it doesn't suit what you're trying to accomplish through the children's book.

So thank you for sharing that.

Yeah, of course.

My second book actually will be kind of the traditional eight and a half by eight and a half, just because the.

The wording and the illustrations lend themselves to it.

But, you know, with this one, I went back and forth so, so many times.

But I.

I am.

I'm happy with the choice we made because I.

I love the way that illustrations came out.

Fantastic.

I want to give you a big compliment because when I interview a lot of children's book authors, especially if they've only written their first book, and I have to put that myself in the same boat.

And one of the things that I did was when we first brought our book to market, I didn't have what's called a book plate, but now I've been actually almost standing on a soapbox.

And I don't.

It's not like I want to give everybody a sermon here, but I.

You know, I've been standing on the.

On the soapbox, saying, you need to add a book plate to the front of your book.

And everybody goes, what's a book plate?

I've been explaining that we added a book plate to our book and what it is.

And in Our book, it's actually a heart that looks like, just like back here.

Looks like a.

Right.

So in our, our adventures in the heart of children's book authors, our logo, it's like a trunk of a tree in the form of a heart.

And so what we did is we put this book belongs to and then there's an area for messages.

And I noticed you did that in your book.

As a first time children's book author, I thought, wow, she's onto something here.

Good for her.

Tell us a little bit about how that all happened for you to cut.

Kind of took a jump over what a lot of first time book authors they don't do.

When I was kind of in the talks with my illustrator and what we wanted on each page, I have, we have a ton of books of children's books at my house.

My boys are both readers.

My almost 10 year old still loves like our nighttime reading.

And I've just seen so many children's books that have that in there and I think it's such a special little extra touch.

So I made sure to tell my illustrator that I wanted a page, you know, where they can write their name in there and they feel like they have ownership over the books.

Absolutely.

I keep saying to the audience that, remember one thing, most children don't have 20 bucks sitting in their pocket and they're going out and buying their own children's book.

So most children's books are given as gifts from their parents or grandparents or family friend.

And a lot of times you want to write a message but you think, oh, like I don't want to make the book messy, but where do I put my message?

So to actually give parents or grandparents or a friend permission in a, there's a little spot to write your message.

It's kind of neat.

The other thing is if a child and a parent or a grandparent are out with, at a, at a book signing with the children's book author, again, they are giving the children's book author permission to maybe write a message on the book plate.

So, so thank you.

That's.

I think that's just a really neat thing to do.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

I noticed you, you don't have a website currently.

I do, yes.

Oh, do you have a website?

Yes, I do.

Okay.

So my apologies.

So I must have missed your website.

It might not actually.

I don't know if I was fully finished with it until after the book was out.

It might not be in there.

Remember now, you know what?

Because I even went to the back, very backward.

It's a copyright portion.

Yes.

I need to get that included, I guess, in my book.

I do have one now.

Okay.

So no problem, no problem.

I, I always talk to children's book authors and I always tell the story that when we first brought our book to market, we were so excited to just get it published and into the world.

And then about a month before we brought it out, somebody said, oh, so what's your, what's your website address?

I said, website address?

Yeah, like, like how do I find out about more about your book and where do I buy your book?

It took us about six months before we actually came and developed our own website to support our book.

Tell everybody the name of your.

We'll put this in the show notes, but tell us the name of your website.

It's authorlaceymore.com and then/en-us/.

I talk to children book authors about their website.

I generally find there's two things that happen.

Either like in our case, myself and my granddaughter, we decided to, we're writing a book series, what's called the Adventures of Caboose the Rocky Mountain Bear.

And we've written 38 stories in the series.

So, so our intention is that it'll be a book series.

And so we've named our, our website after the Rocky Mountain Bear in your case.

And I find this with a, with a lot of children's book authors is they actually use their name for their website.

So can you explain, so that people understand, explain to us why you chose to use your author's name for your website?

Sure, I think just because while I plan on writing many, many more books, hopefully they're not all like yours, going to be in one series.

So I didn't want to tie it down with just kind of one subject matter for the name of it.

So I thought if I go with my name, that is, you know, when people see my book, they can look me up by my name and hopefully find my way website that way.

And yeah, so I guess just because of the variety of different books I plan on writing, I didn't want to be kind of locked into one thing.

Okay, fantastic.

No, and, and, and you know what?

That's what I'm finding is that some people have a book series and they have multiple books.

So they of course name their website after their main theme or main character or in your case is that you're going to have multiple children's books.

However, you're going to have different themes and different characters.

As you take this children's book author journey.

Absolutely.

Okay.

I want to get into motivation for a moment.

And as a knit English teacher and a mother of two young boys, I'm curious, they might have been your motivation, but I, I never want to pigeonhole anybody that that was their main motivation.

But did you have a specific person or event happen to you and you say, ah, I want to write a children's book.

So tell us about your motivation.

I do.

So, of course, yes.

My sons are part of the motivation.

And like I said, my youngest, I was writing the rhymes to help him.

But once I put it all together, I actually sent, I'm in a group text with my mom and my sisters and I sent it to them and I said, hey, you know, this is what I've been doing with Lincoln and he's loving it.

And my oldest sister is a kindergarten teacher.

She has been for over 20 years.

And she said, I need to have this in my classroom.

And I said, what do you mean?

And she said, this needs to be a book in my classroom at the beginning of the year so that I can help my kindergarteners with their letter.

She said, you wouldn't believe how many come in that have no idea, you know, their letter sounds, which is fine.

And I thought, oh, my goodness, I've always wanted to write a book.

I've never, you know, with teaching.

That was my full time job.

It was always a, yeah, maybe one day kind of thing in the back of my mind.

And I thought, okay, today's the day.

It's one day.

Now my oldest sister is really the one who motivated me to actually turn it into a real tangible thing.

Fantastic.

That's why I always ask, because people never know exactly where your motivation comes from.

And you know, a lot of times they might think it's a child or a grandchild, but you, you're never quite sure how, how the motivation comes about.

So your, your sister must have been ecstatic to get your book.

She's already ordered one.

Some of her teacher friends have already ordered one so that they have it for next year when the school year starts.

So I guess it's something that teachers really feel like they can use, which was really, you know, the whole point was I want it to be able to help people teach children the Alphabet in a memorable way.

Well, you've done, you've done an excellent job.

Thank you very much.

You're more than welcome.

And I, I love it because I, I want to talk a little bit about character development.

When I look at your book, there's so Many characters.

I love the alligator right at the beginning.

Thank you.

He or she is so cute.

It's fantastic.

The neat thing about what your book is you've really got all kinds of different characters, like monkeys and, and humans and kangaroos and so jellyfish.

So many different characters.

So I'm not.

So obviously there's not one main character.

I guess we could call your alligator maybe the star or maybe not the star, and he's certainly not the main character.

But talk to us about the character development for each letter.

You don't have to be specific, but just tell us, how did you come up with all of these different characters?

Because there is Holy jumping.

Lots of characters.

I think it's very important that when children first start learning the Alphabet, that they learn the most basic sound that the letter makes.

That.

That makes sense.

I.

It's.

It's hard to get children to understand that, you know, a says A, but it also says ah and A, and, you know, it makes all these.

So I really tried to stick with words that just focus on the main sound, and that's kind of how it developed into the characters.

And the words I chose was sticking to those main basic sounds.

That.

Awesome job.

I loved it.

I, I, I.

Thank you.

It's.

It's such, it's just a great technique.

And, and again, sharing with everyone is that, you know, it's not only for young readers that will get the most a lot out of this book.

It's also for aspiring authors to realize there's different ways of doing things, and some of the skills that you bring.

Don't, don't leave them off the table.

Incorporate them into your book like Lacy did.

It's just incredible.

Thank you.

I know you dedicated the book to your two sons.

I think you said they're 9 and 3 or 9 and 4.

9 and 3.

9 and 3.

And are they reflected in any of the characters in the book?

My youngest son goes through, and he tells me, you know, which ones he feels like.

He'll say, mommy, this one's me, you know, and he.

All of the ones that have girls on the page that have blonde hair like me, Mommy, that's you.

And so he kind of goes through.

I don't know if I necessarily had her design any of them after them, but on the C page, where it says, come listen, if you're sad, it's okay to cry.

That is something that I say to both of my children all the time.

If they are crying and melting down and just having a moment, I tell them it's okay to cry, but after you take a deep breath, then you can tell me about what's going on.

You know, it's okay to cry, but.

So there were certain words that I chose.

Fantastic.

So I know, and I know we're talking about scaly feet and the sound.

So sweet.

But you also mentioned your next book.

Is your next book going to have a main character or is it again, something fairly broad like this book?

It's another early learning, except this time I'm going to focus on numbers and kind of the sequence of numbers, but still with the silly characters and the rhymes and the kind of interesting situations that these numbers are going to get themselves into.

But yes, still an early learning without just one character.

Good for you.

Sharing with everyone is that you, you don't have to have a, a formula, a set formula as a, as children's book authors, children are so creative and, and they have a huge imagination.

As a children's book author, you should have a huge imagination and be creative just like Lacy's being, and understand that you can have lots of characters and lots of fun like Lacy's done, or you can have a main character like we've done with Caboose, the Rocky Mountain Bear, and then bring in new characters as you go along.

There's no right or wrong way of doing this.

I just want everybody to understand that.

Talk to us about your theme.

So talk to us about the theme of a rhyming Alphabet.

I know that children learn better, especially younger children learn better or they can remember better when things rhyme.

So I knew right off the bat that I wanted them to rhyme even when I just started with just my son.

Because rhyming helps kind of.

It has a rhythm to it and kids really respond to that rhythm and that almost song like quality.

So I knew I wanted it to rhyme, but I wanted it and I wanted it to teach without feeling like teaching because I have so many books in my house that it's, you know, a is for apple, B is for ball.

And it just felt very, I don't know, kind of militant when I was in their queue and they have their place for sure.

But I just wanted something that was a little more whimsical, I guess, right.

What you've accomplished.

And again, like you said, by introducing.

I think you have.

What did you.

I think it's four.

Is it four?

Yes.

Four lines for each letter.

Yeah, four lines.

And so it's.

And it's four different words.

And of course for a.

The last word I love is A is for adventure.

Come with me.

That's, that's really cool.

I think everybody is getting a sense of what you're trying to do and, and, and why you went with a rhyming Alphabet.

So thank you for sharing that.

Yeah, of course.

Central teaching as a, as a, as a teacher, what's the central lesson or what are you trying to teach from your book?

I think a lot of parents and educators get very stressed out about, you know, my, my child's going into this grade and doesn't know this letter, doesn't know.

And I, I think that there needs to be some relief when it comes to that.

Even as a teacher.

I would feel it and I taught sen, they would come in thinking they already needed to know everything, which just isn't the case.

And I think it's important for parents to know that, that your child isn't, doesn't need to know everything before their first day of school.

But there are books and hopefully my book can be one of them that can at least introduce them and it gets them, you know, on the road to learning about these things.

And I, I don't know, I just wanted it to be a stress free experience that didn't feel like something that the child was being forced to do.

That's the neat thing about children's books is that a lot of people always think it's a children's book for it.

So it's for children, but I would say 99.99% of the time it's also for the parent and the grandparents.

Right.

Who's ever, who's ever reading the book with the child, it's for them also.

100% agree.

Yes.

Believe it or not.

I mean, how you, how you're describing the rhyming technique and, and the different sounds from each letter really is educational.

It's almost subliminal for parents or grandparents.

So Fantastic.

Thank you.

Thank you for sharing that.

Now that we know that you're working on your second book and.

Yes.

But I want you to take yourself back a bit though, to when you started writing your first book.

So can you explain, give us some insights into the development and your writing process for your children's book.

So, and kind of maybe take us on a journey.

So take us back to the very beginning when you first started writing your first book and how maybe that's evolved into writing your second book.

Sure.

So my first book, like I said, it started as just notes in my phone and I didn't actually know that I was going to be turning them into a Book.

So the process is definitely different from the first time to now my second book.

But, yeah, once I actually, you know, talked to my sister, and she said, turn these into a book.

I copied them over into a Word document, and I just went through line by line, and I figured out, okay, how can I.

I did obviously have to do some editing because these were just kind of sloppily written down for my son and I to have fun with.

But, yeah, and I just went through.

And I really paid attention to what words I was using and what kind of educational benefit they would have.

And I wanted it to be more than just, you know, objects and animals, because I think there's a lot of that out there.

Related.

I wanted them to also see the words like courage and things like that so that children could, you know, relate to things on more than just a.

An object kind of surface.

But, yeah, so I.

I went through line by line, and I kind of tweaked here and there where I needed to, and I probably spent, I don't know, months revising before I ever sent it to an editor, just because I wanted it to be just right and I wanted the rhythm to be just right.

Yeah, you've had this experience.

You've actually been through with an editor.

What's changed?

Is it.

Is there anything evolving or changing as you.

In your writing process, as you move forward to your second book?

I think my second book, I'm just a little more focused because now I know what the goal is.

I know that I'm.

I have a purpose and a goal at the end of this to actually turn it into a children's book.

So when I sit down to write, it's a lot more purposeful than just, you know, throwing some things into the notes in my phone.

I actually feel like I'm having a lot of fun with it, too, because I know the end goal will be a product in a book that, you know, I can share with the world.

So I'm just really enjoying it.

Fantastic.

Besides your own personal experience, I am interested in knowing, did you conduct any additional research?

And if you did, why was that important?

I don't know if it's research so much as I.

I mean, I.

Like I said, we have a lot of books.

I have been a very avid reader myself, but also my kids are.

And so I did go.

I went through many of the books that we have just to see kind of the way things are said.

And though I went through the books that my kids really love and the books that my kids don't love so much.

And I tried to figure out kind of the why.

Like I went through the ones that they don't ever kind of go back to and want to keep reading.

And I wanted to really figure out why.

What was keeping them from wanting to go back to those books and what made them want to read some books over and over and over again.

And I kind of use that as a guide when I was writing this one.

Good for you.

Because I, you know, it's interesting.

I mean, you use your own children, is that correct?

Yes.

Yes.

No.

And, and it's important because with my grandchildren, the, the biggest thing is, is that we've written 38 books.

But you know, I mean, we're self published.

It's a fairly big investment every time you bring a, a new book to market.

So I didn't want my grandchildren to end up being grandparents.

By the time I got around to finishing the last book, what we decided to do was we've got these stories, so we've turned most of them into audiobooks.

So the audiobook is coming before the actual print book because with audio, it doesn't cost us anything to do it in audio and to save it in audio.

And we also capture their younger voices.

The neat thing about it, and you might find this even with your children, and I'm just throwing this out for other aspiring book children book authors, is that I used, actually used my grandchildren as also editors because.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

Because if they were the narrator, well, if they had a tough time understanding the word or saying the word, well, then that was a pretty big clue that chosen the wrong word and we needed to do some editing.

I just throw that out to people is, don't forget, like Lacy's done and like I've done, is that you have a, a built in resource.

It's your children or grandchildren that can help you out.

Because at the end of the day, guess what?

They're your audience.

They're your readers.

Absolutely.

I actually think on.

I don't, I think it was the W page.

I had a rhyme about wheels, I believe, and my son actually what said mom, you had to have watermelon.

That's my favorite fruit.

And I was like, you want me to.

And watermelon was not one of my W words.

And I said, okay, well, I guess we'll have a watermelon now.

So I, I let them help me write it when they could.

Good for you.

Fantastic.

Fantastic.

Well, you know what, Lacy?

One of the things that I did is in our, our first book, we Actually created an audiobook and we use a QR code.

And I tell people about this because we.

We developed the whole thing through Canva and the free version of Canva and just attach the audio file, which is my middle granddaughter, who's the voice of Caboose reading our first book.

When they purchase our book, we give them the free audiobook in the form of a bookmark.

That is amazing.

I love that.

Yes.

Yeah.

So it's just a fun thing.

And again, I'm doing it with my grandchildren, just as you can do it with your children.

So it's neat.

This might be really fresh for you.

I want to talk to you about success and your success measurement.

Tell us about your original goal or goals regarding your book launch.

What did you have in mind?

What's success going to look like to you?

Honestly, I think success is going to be measured by how many in my.

I guess my book, because it's an early learner, how many schools I can get my book into.

Of course I want my book in every child's household that it can possibly be in.

But when schools are using it as kind of a tool to teach and also to engage and entertain, that is when I know, like, my book has done what I wanted it to do.

So do you have a specific strategy on how to get it into schools?

I mean, word of mouth, obviously, is going to be something.

And since I worked when I used to be a teacher, I worked in that district for, you know, over a decade.

So I will definitely use them as a resource.

But I actually, I have three author visits lined up that are coming up where I'm going to go and read to the kids.

So I'm just going to keep doing it that way until I find a better strategy.

But, yeah, I'm going to try and get myself and my book in the door as much as possible.

The reason I ask is something special happened today.

I'll tell you about that in a second.

But I also interviewed a children's book author.

Her name is Aaron Murphy.

Aaron flies 767s for United Airlines.

Oh, wow.

And she's written two children's books on rescue dogs.

And.

And it's because of her.

Her skill to be able to fly.

She volunteers for the SPCA and flies dogs and cats through the United states to different SPCAs to find them forever homes.

And.

Wow.

Yeah.

And one of her goals, because she travels a lot, is to actually have one book in at least one school library in every state.

And I thought, oh, that's a pretty cool idea that is a great idea.

Something concrete that you can work towards.

So good for you.

Good for you.

Obviously, I try and ensure that people know that.

I mean, it's great to launch a children's book, and we'd all like thousands and thousands of sales of our book, but it generally doesn't come down to that.

Right.

And so I always describe that to people.

But what you just described, is there anything else that you think of in, in terms of what you've seen so far that you say, oh, I didn't realize that.

That I feel so successful because of, like, someone said to me, like, your sister, for example, she must be so proud of you.

Yes.

To.

To actually turn something that she said, I need this in my, my classroom.

Yeah.

I mean, that was definitely my.

I feel like I didn't even have the book out yet.

And that was like, the greatest goal I could have accomplished was having a veteran teacher tell me I need to have this in my classroom.

So.

But my son, actually, my oldest son, he's in third grade, took my book to school with him one day, and he showed it to his librarian, and she said, I, I.

We need a copy of that for our younger kids.

So that too, I mean, that's.

If that's the only library it's ever.

And I still feel like our mixed success, so.

Wow.

This morning, just before we got on, my cousin from Phoenix, she sent me a message and she caught me totally off guard, and she said, we just purchased your book, and I'm sharing it with my grandchildren, and they love it so much that they want to donate it to their school library.

Oh, that's amazing.

I'm still so excited about that.

It's.

It's incredible.

Yeah, it's.

It's nice when that all happens.

I want to talk to you about your role of writing.

Can you tell us what your role as a children's book author means in the grand scheme of things?

You said you're.

You're not teaching right now, or, Or.

I'm actually teaching virtually.

So I teach from home for students who cannot go to a brick and mortar school for whatever reason.

So I am teaching virtually.

It's.

The time is very flexible, though, because I'm at home.

Okay, so tell us.

You're working part time as a teacher and you're also now working on your second book when you publish your first book.

You're a children's book author.

Sometimes people are surprised.

I was talking to someone, a children's book author, the other day, and I was looking at her Instagram and nowhere on there did she have children's book author.

And I said, you realize that you're a children's book author and why isn't it on your Instagram?

So she went, oh, and.

And actually within 15 minutes after we hung up, it was on her Instagram.

Tell us the about the role of writing in your life now.

I mean, it's become a part of my everyday life now.

I am trying to do something.

Even if I'm not actually writing like my next book or working, I am trying to do something every day that either promotes the book I have now or somehow helps the second book get out there.

I'm trying to at least do one thing every single day.

I would love for this to be, you know, I have a little bit of imposter syndrome.

Like when you say you're a children's book author, it is hard to wrap my mind around that.

But I, I would like to eventually.

So yeah, I'm trying to.

You are.

Throw myself.

I'm trying to throw myself into the role as soon as possible.

Good for you.

I love what you've said here.

So you're not defining the.

When it comes to your role of writing, you're not defining it as a specific amount of time.

You're defining it as at least doing one thing that is moving you forward as a writer.

Is that correct?

Yes.

I want to share that with the audience so that they understand that Lacy, I think is onto something big here, folks, is that don't think of it as the amount of time.

Sure.

It'd be nice to set Aside, you know, 15 minutes or a half an hour to your rule of writing.

But also think of like Lacy said, do one thing that's either promoting your current book and moving it forward and getting it into more readers hands or a little something towards your next book.

So that summarize how you the role of writing for you.

Absolutely, yes.

Terrific.

Terrific advice for its aspiring authors, people who have got this children's book in them.

And I've talked to different children's book authors, some who have had a book in them for over 30 years and it took them that amount of time to bring it to life.

And then someone like yourself who sounds like in a fairly short period of time brought your book to life.

So what advice would you give aspiring book authors?

I guess I would say I don't think you will ever regret trying and doing it, but I think you will regret if you don't.

So if it's been sitting in your heart you know, for a day, a year, 30 years, however long, I don't think there will ever be any regret of you trying and putting it out there.

Even if it's not successful in the traditional sense of, you know, the number of sales, but getting it out.

You're never going to regret actually doing it and putting it out there into the world.

And I think that that's the most important part.

And, you know, if I never sell another copy, I still won't regret this.

So.

Right.

And I talked to a children's book author yesterday, and he thought one and done.

He said, look at Rick.

I really thought when I started on this, it was going to be one and done.

And now he's going to launch in the next four weeks, he's going to launch his fourth book.

Oh, wow.

Okay.

So there was no one and done.

And it's obvious to me, okay, with Lacy, there's no one and done.

No one and done.

No.

Right.

Good for you.

Like you said, it really gets your blood flowing and gets you up in the morning, right?

It does.

Yes.

I will do this the rest of my life if I can.

Terrific.

Terrific encouragement for readers.

Why should children's book readers purchase your book?

I think, and I know I've kind of said this, but I think it's a way to learn, but in a way that you don't know that you're learning.

You know, it doesn't feel like a lesson plan, and it doesn't feel like something kind of stern and strict, but it's a way to learn and, you know, be introduced into the most basic part of learning your letters in a fun way, in a way that feels like it's exciting and not like you're being made to learn something.

Very, very, very good point.

And.

And like I said, rhyming the Alphabet and the.

And introducing at least four words per letter, I just found that fascinating.

And.

And your technique.

I didn't even know that.

That you were using a technique on me, but it was.

It was.

I was being sneaky.

Yeah, you were being sneaky.

I love it.

It's sneaky in S, but maybe in the next book.

Okay, and tell us.

Tell us where your book is available.

It's available on Amazon, but also if you want the hardcover copy, it is available on anywhere where you can get any from Spark Book, but so like Walmart.com, target.com, and right now, I think that's it.

I need to go check out Barnes and Noble and see if I can get it in there.

But okay.

And I would think that if it's through ingramsparks, it would be available on Barnes and Noble.

Yes, the online version.

Correct, correct.

Right on.

Good for you.

I'm just curious, what about independent bookstores?

Have you, have you reached out to any independent bookstores?

I haven't yet.

There aren't any super close to me.

But that is definitely on my list of things to do.

And I have.

I follow several other children's book authors who are self published who say, you know, that was, you know, one of the greatest things they did was get them into so that it's definitely in the works.

Okay, great.

And the reason I bring that up, and again, I.

Part of the episode and part of what I'm trying to do is help aspiring authors.

I was thinking, what other avenues would there be?

And so I actually went on the Internet the other day and put in independent bookstores and an organization popped up.

And then I was able to.

So you can probably find this in the US is it'll pop up and it'll actually show you a list of independent bookstores in each state.

Oh, okay.

I actually live in Canada, and so I actually pulled up all the independent bookstores in Alberta, which is the province I live in, and it's quite an extensive list.

One of the main motivations for me doing that is we have our book in.

In an independent bookstore and they've already or they just ordered their fourth order of our book.

Oh, that's fantastic.

And I thought, oh, my goodness, like, we're missing out on an opportunity.

So again, I've just, I'm trying to help other children's book authors make sure.

Don't be afraid.

It takes you about 30 seconds to actually go to the search bar and put in independent book stores in whatever state you're in.

Like, I think you're in Texas, right?

Yes.

Yeah, just put in Texas.

And I bet you'd be pleasantly surprised.

And do mind if I ask, so do they just order your book off of Amazon or IngramSpark or did you take income copies yourself or how did that work now?

Good, Good question.

Right now, with this independent bookstore that we're using, we actually purchase print on demand through Amazon and then take our markup with Amazon, of course, is you get your author's price versus write what people pay.

And so that's the nice thing about it.

Then we ship it out to them.

Is there as much margin in it?

No, but it certainly is.

You know, when we're up to our fourth order, we're pretty happy about that.

Yeah, absolutely.

So thank you for sharing that.

Yeah.

And, and again, so I wouldn't, I wouldn't run out lazy and, and buy a thousand copies.

I would look at your pricing on print, on demand.

You'll be pleasantly surprised that if you work out the economics, you're probably better off just to.

Even if you get into local bookstores, that, that might work in the beginning, you might take a little less margin, but at least you're getting some exposure until, until you can build big enough numbers that you could say, well, now it's worth me running an independent, large book run.

Yes.

That's great advice.

Thank you so much.

Oh, you're more than welcome.

Final thoughts Share with us, Eddie Final thoughts about you're learning because, you know, I probably haven't addressed everything that.

On your children's book author journey, but give us some final thoughts.

I guess my, my biggest takeaway is that this was.

Yes, it was something, like I said, that I've dreamed about kind of in the back of my head as a.

Yeah.

Maybe one day.

But I think realizing that I am making it come true has been the hardest part for me is that I'm actually doing this.

It is really hard to feel like this is reality and like it's, you know, because obviously I'm not doing huge numbers.

It's done great, but I'm not.

So it doesn't, it doesn't feel as real as I guess others would expect it to feel.

But for me, it does feel real.

And I guess just making sure that every day I am telling myself like, this is what we're doing.

You, you are a children's book author, like you said, and this is, this is your kind of reason in life.

This is why you were put here.

It's, it's to do this.

And I took me 37 years, but I found it, you know, so good for you.

And, you know, picking up on that, I think you have to look at it as, it's not a sprint, it's a marathon.

And from what I've gathered in talking to different children's book authors who have, you know, now they're into their third and fourth book.

It's certainly, you know, some people have been into this for five years.

Once they get hooked, it's, it's not about fame and fortune.

It's about the satisfaction you're getting and how you're affecting one person's life.

And your book will definitely affect more than one person life.

I, I know that.

And so helping you get the message out about a rhyming Alphabet.

That's so cool.

Thank you so much.

You're welcome.

I want to thank you for, for being a guest on the Adventures in the Heart of Children's Book Authors podcast.

Your generosity of time and insights again.

I know it's going to help other people in becoming a children's book author and there's definitely readers will get an understanding of why they should purchase your book.

Like I said before, it's.

It's not just for children.

It's for parents and grandparents to really have some fun with the Alphabet, with their, with their children.

We also promise and Lacy, I'll talk to you about this is the social links.

If you can send me all your social links, we'll make sure that they're in the show notes and we'll make sure your.

Your website is in the show notes.

The other thing I'd like to say to the audience, if you've enjoyed this episode, please hit the subscribe button to listen to future episodes.

I really appreciate Lacy being a guest on this show and for the listening audience.

Feel free to share this episode with anyone that'll be inspired by hearing about Lacey and her book.

Scaly Feet and a sound.

So sweet.

Thank you.

Thank you so, so much.