My six year old asked if he’s a teenager yet and I laughed. Then he asked if he’s halfway to a teenager and I almost cried.

Was going to repost without a quote, but then realized I did want to add something for my audience specifically: KidLit folks, I know many of you are there. I can't stress enough, I will not read your Substack or share it. We are frontline defense for children. Get out of the Nazi bar, *please*.

New book deals on the way from @bitchinville.bsky.social @jimcampbellart.bsky.social @1010lilfoot.bsky.social @devyndouvier.bsky.social + more buff.ly/cHFLuDT

I can’t think of a better time than #BannedBooksWeek to share this announcement . What started as a poem about LGBTQIA+ book bans back in 2023, will now be a picture book illustrated by Evan Turk! So grateful to @agentstefanie.bsky.social and Millie Von Platen for believing in this book!

The nine picture books cited in Mahmoud v. Taylor are not pornography. Nor are they obscene. "What is obscene is a Supreme Court decision that denies the basic humanity and equality of LGBTQIA+ people."

“The children are always ours, every single one of them, all over the globe; and I am beginning to suspect that whoever is incapable of recognizing this may be incapable of morality.” Baldwin said it best.

In a culture where the leaders proclaim empathy a sin, kindness becomes punk rock.

If you think anyone deserves to suffer or die because they live in the South, please block me.

It’s every parent’s nightmare, isn’t it? you check your child’s bulletproof backpack and find a picture book about gay penguins

i am BEGGING you before you pop off about paywalls to go to your local library's website and scroll through their digital resources. mine gives me access to NYT, WSJ, WaPo and if its linked with PressReader or a similar app, all the news magazines, sports, fashion, hobby etc. FOR FREE.

With alt text for our comrades who use screen readers ❤️

I absolutely adore this book! And the author is pretty great too. ❤️ @sabrinashahauthor.bsky.social

#Kidlit friends 💔 Please share this far and wide Our dear friend, Trenise Sabin, was the victim of a major burglary over the weekend. She and her husband Travis have lost everything— from clothing and appliances to irreplaceable items from their recent wedding and the urn gofund.me/ce50d993

Now is a good time to support your favorite small, indie, BIPOC-owned, queer-owned, disable-owned businesses & mutual aid groups! Here's a list of local St. Louis groups I made a while back. Please share your fave businesses & mutual aid groups. sarajschmidt.wordpress.com/st-louis-mut...

The kids on Tumblr know what's what

I don't 'refuse to use' AI, I just don't use AI; in the same way that I don't shoplift, or plagiarise other people's books - it requires no effort of will, it's just not something I would think of doing

CALLING ALL #kidlit #edusky #schoolvisit #booksky #kidlitsky #skybrarian peeps! Please join this incredible lineup of authors in our first ever FREEDOM READ-IN on MAY 9! 📕Free 📙All day (10-3 EST) 📘Virtual 📗All ages Morning: crowdcast.io/c/z2e4i7i652g1 Afternoon: crowdcast.io/c/ky2m562xhkso

Today’s backpack contents are WAY better than yesterday’s. 🥰

I’ve officially reached my grossest parenting milestone yet. The school sent a letter home informing us there has been a case of pinworms. If you don’t know, I do not recommend googling. 🤮

RFK Jr says that your autistic child will never write a poem. That their existence is a tragedy. I’m autistic. I wrote and illustrated this picture book to show that your autistic child is a celebration. Which message do you want your child to hear? www.steveasbell.com#/flap-your-h...

Defining someone’s humanity by their ability to pay taxes is absolutely inhumane.

Autism is not an "epidemic" because it's not a disease. Saying we don't know what "causes" it is absurd. It's genetic and, what's more, NORMAL FOR HUMAN BRAINS TO BE DIFFERENT FROM ONE ANOTHER.

These are the Democrats who voted for the SAVE act which will disenfranchise tens of millions of people, including married women who changed their maiden name: Jared Golden (Maine), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Wash.), Henry Cuellar (Texas) Ed Case (Hawaii).

can't normalize without normies. make your peace with this now

Maddow spends the first 6 min laying groundwork before JAW DROPPING SMACK YOUR HEAD connection of dots in Trump's moronic mind. youtu.be/MJbZCbBLqkk MSNBC: The ridiculous real story behind the tariff plan that turned Donald Trump into a global disaster

Quick vocabulary lesson for those who get caught up in acronyms and forget... Diversity means welcoming & valuing people from all different backgrounds. Equity means fairness. Inclusion means not leaving kids out. And providing for those with special needs.

Borrowed this from someone...

Zuck said Meta is in a "partnership" with White House; Google is following suit. They are all that stand between you and Trump admin data grabs. Here's a resource collection of non-US services to replace email, search, docs, music, video, backups, and more: www.wired.com/story/trump-...

Coming from @barefootbooks.bsky.social MUSIC OF THE MOUNTAINS youtu.be/3uK4VzQCWOA

Mahmoud Khalil is a legal, permanent U.S. resident and is granted protection under the First Amendment. He is currently being detained without being charged with a crime. The reason for his arrest was due to his political speech. This is a violation of the First Amendment.

ONE parent. And in Florida, ONE man is responsible for 40% of all book challenges in the state. The book banners are a tiny minority. Make that clear by speaking up in favor of the freedom to read. (Email your school board!)

The five year old woke up at 1am and proceeded to tell me about the sunrise and sunset times on all the cities on Mars the Kepler planets for three hours. Love the content, but I do have a slight complaint about the timing of these conversations.

Since we all should be currently boycotting Amazon, a reminder that Bezos owns Goodreads and there is a great, Black woman owned, alternative that you can easily migrate to. Highly recommend. www.theguardian.com/books/2025/f...

if you find yourself reluctant to support the guy at Columbia because you find some of the politics he espoused distasteful or even abhorrent, you should know that this is exactly the reaction that they hoped for in choosing him as a target for unlawful detention based on political speech.

can't believe it's 2025 and i'm stressed about tariffs and measles, like am i a character in an american girl book

New (FREE) Portfolio Chats for underrepresented communities are coming up this Friday, March 7. Booking is open! Check out Owen Davey's Instagram (at owendaveydraws) for all the information. portfoliochats.appointlet.com/s/free-30-mi... #kidlit #kidlitart #illustration #portfolioreviews

ANYWAY, did you know there's an extension you can put on Chrome that will connect with your local library system and when you go look at a book, say on AMZ, it will tell you if that book exists in the library system and if it's available? It's literally called Library Extension.

I love this idea!

Costco, which has come out saying it supports DEI, will make no changes to its existing programs, AND pays workers a minimum of $30/hour, is up 15% YTD. Target, which announced it is ending all DEI programs and has a minimum wage of $15-$24/hour, is down over 4%. Keep voting with your wallet.

This bill in OK is exactly what Project 2025 threatened: to make all pornography illegal, and criminalize the people who make it, using a WILDLY broad definition of pornography, which would include any book with sex in it. We're talking jail time for romance authors. oksenate.gov/press-releas...

Sorry I'm just in a really bad place right now (United States)

If you are the parent of a transgender person under 19 and you're worried Trump's order restricting gender-affirming care may impact you, one helpful step you can take is joining PFLAG National. Trust me when I say their is safety in numbers. pflag.org/become-a-mem...

Just an FYI for people who may be new to the book banning stuff, when your books are banned it does not mean you’re on “the right side.” It means that your art (and probably you too) is being targeted by right wing extremists for erasure. It means you are being silenced. It’s NOT GOOD.

I accidentally deleted my entire tbr tag on Libby, so I guess it’s a clean slate for 2025?

“In order to shoot off one email per week for a year, ChatGPT would use up 27 liters of water, or about one-and-a-half jugs… that means if one in 10 U.S. residents—16 million people—asked ChatGPT to write an email a week, it’d cost more than 435 million liters of water.”

Seen a few folks astonished by my lack of support for ChatGPT and similar. Because AI, right? Yeah, no. What we have right now is glorified autocorrect. Glorified autocorrect that takes the energy of an entire city to do what it does, plus half of Lake Erie to cool down while it's doing it.

Some of you may know that since leaving the business side of publishing, I've focused on my writing and I'm blessed today to reveal the cover of my debut picture book MUSIC OF THE MOUNTAINS, out with Barefoot Books in May 2025, illustrations by Manal Mirza.