Meet Illustrator Erin Stead

                 This year, National Library Week is April 10-16.  The theme is :  "Create your own story @ your library."
                 In celebration of this week, The newspaper talked with this year's winners of the Caldecott and Newbery book awards.
Getting started
                 Erin Stead remembers : "In school, art class was my favorite class.  I picked the high school I attended because it had a really nice art room."
                 She said her parents were very encouraging.  She also has an older sister and an older brother.  "I had a lot of people who believed in me more than I did."
                 While she was in college studying art, she worked at a bookstore in New York City.  She later was an assistant at a children's book publishing company, learning to become a designer.
                  Her husband, Philip Stead, is also a children's book illustrator and writer.  When he got a book deal, she quit her job to illustrate full-time.
Her workspace
                 Erin and Philip work in the same room.  They used to be in such a small space that their desks were right next to eaach other.  they have recently moved to a larger apartment, so now they have bigger desks, and there is space between them.  They talk to each other constantly, she said.
Some favorites
                Color: green or blue, depending on the day
             Music: Motown, although she listens to many types of music
             Books for kids: all the Roald Dahl books, and "Maniac Magee" by Jerry Spinelli
Advice for kids
                "I read as many books as I could, and I looked around as much as I could.  I advise kids to do the same. Go outside and take a walk."
Loving her work
                "A Sick Day for Amos McGee" is the first book Erin has illustrated.  Heer husband wrote the text.  She is working on two others.
                She says: "I never grew out of picture books.  I have a really nice godmother who was a teacher, and she still gives me picture books every year."