I love the creative process! I never set out to write a book about seahorses, never mind one for children. I started sewing tiny replicas of these mesmerizing creatures to complement my stable of little fabric art decorations. I had hearts, stars, moons, and clouds. I needed a fifth! Meanwhile, one day, while bored—which often breeds curiosity—I started a list of all the words I could think of that describe seahorses. It organized itself naturally alphabetically…and so down the letters I went.
I skipped over X because nothing came to mind. I checked the dictionary, of course. Nada. I gave up, looked at the list and the phrase, “Except for X” popped into mind. “Hey,” I thought. “That has a nice ring to it. Actually, it sounds like a great title for something.”
Sometime later, I have no idea when, I was sitting in front of a fire at home (so obviously winter) and thought about that list, and the catchy phrase. I reached for pen and paper and started writing. “A is for Alluring…. Their Beauty so fine…” and then the poem wrote itself. The best kind!
When finished, I looked it over and went ping, “this poem needs a reason for being,” I mean, really, how could this make any sense otherwise? (As if I needed to make any sense out of it! And for who?)
Still, I like logical explanations for things and so I made one, which then became an introduction to the poem. And the final blast of pixie dust: “hey, this seems to be turning into a book about seahorses, obviously geared towards kids.”
So it did! And here it is. You can buy it on etsy: https://www.etsy.com/ca/shop/ErinScullion
But I can’t fill any orders until the end of February. Going to Australia!
