7-Imp’s 7 Kicks #394: Featuring Julie Morstad
August 24th, 2014 by jules
And she especially loved to cook it.”
(Click to enlarge)
I think this is the first time I’ve featured the illustrations of Julie Morstad here at 7-Imp (oh wait, I have some of her art here from back in 2012). I always like to see her artwork, and her latest illustrated picture book is Kyo Maclear’s Julia, Child, released by Tundra Books in July.
The book is pure fiction. As Maclear writes in an opening note:
While the story contains no true knowledge of (the real) Julia Child and should be taken with a grain of salt and perhaps even a generous pat of butter, we hope that you will find something here to savor.
It tells the story of Julia and her friend Simca. Simca would be French cookbook and author Simone Beck, who once worked and wrote with Child (Mastering the Art of French Cooking).
This book imagines a childhood friendship and two girls who work to bring cheer and imagination into the lives of the adults around them with their cooking. Noting that “too many grown-ups … did not know how to have a marvelous time,” they set out to create recipes for them. It works for the poor, tired, harried adults — until they begin to argue. The girls then decide to make smaller portions for the grown-ups, “just enough to feed the sensible children from whom these senseless grown-ups grew.” The cookbook they create here? Mastering the Art of Childhood.
Morstad used gouache, ink, and Photoshop to create the illustrations. Oh! And don’t miss Jama Rattigan’s July chat with author Kyo Maclear here at her site, Jama’s Alphabet Soup.
Here’s a bit more art. Enjoy.
and gather new ideas and recipes.”
(Click to enlarge)
(Click to enlarge)
JULIA, CHILD. Text copyright © 2014 by Kyo Maclear. Illustrations copyright © 2014 by Julie Morstad. Illustrations used by permission of the publisher, Tundra Books, Toronto, Ontario.
Note for any new readers: 7-Imp’s 7 Kicks is a weekly meeting ground for taking some time to reflect on Seven(ish) Exceptionally Fabulous, Beautiful, Interesting, Hilarious, or Otherwise Positive Noteworthy Things from the past week, whether book-related or not, that happened to you. New kickers are always welcome.
1) Julie Morstad illustrated one of my favorite CDs EVER.
2) My husband’s been working hard, doing some much-needed maintenance on 7-Imp. Whew. It’s still here, and thank goodness he knows his tech stuff.
3) As I’m typing, I’m listening to All Songs 24/7, and they are currently playing a wonderful Broken Bells song I’ve never heard.
4) Sam Phillips sent her fans a new song this week. Well, it was created last year, but anyway, it’s downloadable here now. Only Sam could make a song about a rock beautiful.
5) Visiting Little Willow’s site!
6) Getting to hear Jon Scieszka speak in Nashville this week. Also this this this this this this. Every word of this. YES. I wish every teacher and librarian in the country would read that.
7) This write-up about Sonya Hartnett, one of my favorite writers.
What are YOUR kicks this week?
So glad 7-Imp is back in the pink! Hooray for Mr. Jules the Tech Wizard!
Love Julie Morstad’s art, and really enjoyed the interview at LW’s :)!
Kicks:
1. Receiving a nice welcome back from my blog readers after a summer hiatus.
2. Making and eating paletas de melon.
3. Receiving a genuine-for-real handwritten snail mail card and letter.
4. Hungry foxes who come when called for dinner.
5. New Fall books.
6. Reading a Colin Firth biography.
7. The poems of Diane DeCillis.
Happy Sunday, All!
Julia Morstad’s art is really fun. I love the two girls cooking in the kitchen. What a relief to have the blog issues resolved.
Jules, what a week you’ve had! Am going to forward the Scieszka article to my schools and library folk. The Broken Bells, aren’t they great?
Jama, welcome back. I am excited for the fall books too.
My kicks:
1. A week filled with grand girls. Our two younger ones were up for a week. So, so fun. We shared with their other grandmother so we hand the older for a time and the younger for a time. Our oldest was able to,spent separate times with both. So. Much. Fun.
2. Peanut butter cookies. That’s what you make when you don’t have cinnamon to bake snicker doodles. Oops. But we were all reminded how we love peanut butter cookies.
3. A tweet response from Deborah Wiles author of Revolution, regarding my review of the book.
4. CYBILS…application window is open to be a panelist or judge.
5. Water fountain parks. The place to take kids on hot days.
6. Participating in an online writing group with Google chat.
7. Driving. I finally got to drive, first time since surgery. It was great to have a driver but I am thankful to be able to drive myself.
Have a great week.
Good Morning Imps!
Sorry I haven’t been around much this summer. It has been a whirlwind one but a good one.
Thanks for sharing Julie’s lovely work. Charming.
Jules – Thanks for all the links. I might just put that All-Songs one to work in the studio today. Cheers to your husband for working out the bugs.
Jama – Are you talking about real foxes and are you feeding them paletas de melon?
LW – Great blog post with Jules and Elizabeth. I can’t wait to get my hands on that book!
kicks
1. My wonderful husband took the kids to Six Flags which means I get a bonus studio day.
2. Camp next week also means more studio time. My kids don’t go back to school until Sept.4th.
3. I’m still running (slowly) and getting close to my goal of running a 5k.
4. A bunch of my friends got into the Society of Illustrator’s Original Art Show http://www.societyillustrators.org/The-Museum/2014/OA/The-Original-Art.aspx
5. My son’s excitement for Rick Riordan’s new book.
6. Watching Project Runway with my daughter.
7. Having the time and quiet to read and post here at Seven Imp.
Have a great week everyone.
Love the art, idea for the story, and especially the punctuation in the title (brilliant).
kicks
1. Four weeks of guests – family and friends – made our summer.
2. Whale watching – 5 pods of orcas – in the San Juans with our friends.
3. Getting back into a groove with some much-needed editing.
4. Seeing the results of a lot of summer planting.
5. the opportunity to reread “Okay For Now” (L-O-V-E) because I gave it as a gift to my friend’s daughter and want to be ready to chat about Doug, Lil, Mr. Powell, and all the other wonderful characters.
6. Listening to my son laugh while reading Pseudonymous Bosch’s series.
7. a glorious Seattle summer (most beautiful we’ve ever experienced).
Hope everyone has a wonderful, healthy, productive week.
Back shortly, but for now… your first Julie Morstad mention might’ve been Eisha’s: this one… in 2006. Look at those postage-stamp images!
Good morning, Imps! For those of you having relaxing, stay-at-home Sundays, check out the show RECTIFY on Sundance Channel, and some Leverage reruns on the ION channel. Though they are quite different in tone and style, both shows are about justice; both will make you think.
Jules: Congratulations again on the release of Wild Things! So proud of you and happy for you. Thanks to you and Betsy for chatting with me for the interview for my blog.
Welcome back, Julie Morstad! I like the sound of the disclaimer in the book – appropriate and sweet – and the perfection of the title, punctuation and all. 🙂
Jama: I love real mail. Happy post-hiatus to you. I know very little about Colin Firth’s personal life, but I enjoy his acting. Hugs to the foxes.
Jone: Glad you are recovering, recuperating, and revving safely on the road.
Moira: Good to see you here! I enjoy your artwork. Has your Riordan reader also read John Bellairs and Zilpha Keatley Snyder?
Samantha: Oh, whale watching sounds so lovely and peaceful. Yay for a laughing, happy reader.
My kicks for the past week:
1) Performances
2) Writing
3) Something I wrote had a reading
4) I also acted in a reading of a new musical
5) Wishes for others
6) Meeting
7) Audition today – Wish me luck!
Hello, Kickers!
Thanks for the Julie Morstad art, Jules — those are some happy little girls! (And the cover of Julia, Child makes me wish I could reach into the screen and pluck that wooden spoon right out to hold between thumb and fingertip.)
I LOVED LW’S INTERVIEW with you guys! Especially the way you fielded those nasty “Would you rather A or B?” questions at the end, where A and B are equally tempting morsels of possibility — live in Narnia or Neverland? eat something Alice would hand you, or something Willy Wonka would offer? Sheesh: diabolical!
And Sam P’s new song is wonderful.
Kicks here…
1. I second LW’s ongoing recommendation of ‘Leverage’ — and it’s a FUN watch, as well as thought-provoking.
2. Prepping for a five-day Labor Day road trip. It’s the only thing like a “vacation” we’ll have been able to take this year… the hardest part is not to give it too much expectation to live up to! (For the record, we’re not going anyplace terribly exciting, but that’s part of the appeal. It’s a kind of combination resort community and nature preserve in the N. Georgia mountains.)
3. The Stepson relocated this week, driving to Las Vegas to start a new job tomorrow. (He’d been living with us since Nov.) I’ve never been to Vegas, and if I had been I probably would’ve flown. So I found armchair-traveler pleasure in constructing a day-by-day Google Maps view of his trip, so I could see Oh, the Places He’d Go.
4. Any ‘West Wing’ junkies here? If so, I think you might like this (fairly long, but rewarding) sort of oral history of the show, by the cast and creators.
5. And — one more link — this cleverly sewn-together slapfest anthology, assembled from classic Hollywood films.
6. Jules’s, Betsy’s, and Peter’s book is great — exactly what I thought it might be, and that’s saying a lot.
7. Very glad that the strong Napa quake this morning does not appear to have been the outright disaster I’d feared when I first read of it.
Have a great week, everyone!
Mrs. B, we’re so glad you’re back. Always!
Glad you’re healing (and now driving), Jone, after surgery. … Peanut butter cookies are under-appreciated around here. I’m the only one who likes them enough to want to bake them. PITY ME. (Not really. First-World Problem, as they say.)
Moira: All Songs 24/7 never disappoints … I love Riordan’s new book too, especially the art.
Samantha, do you know I’ve never read Okay for Now? I really wanna fix that.
LW: Break a leg, as always. It was truly an honor to visit your site.
John, I’m also glad the earthquake wasn’t disastrous. Whew. So many people I know and lurv out there. I’m flattered you like our book. Wow. Thanks! Good luck to your stepson, and have fun on your trip!
LW- I’ll have to check those out since he goes through withdrawal between books.
Jules- I was referring to the new novel but we’re going to have to get a hold of that one too.