No Pea in the Pool follows a sweet little pea who is ready for a day of swimming with her friends when she realizes she forgot one very important thing before leaving home: going potty! What was the inspiration for your story?

It took me over a decade to write this book, get it illustrated, publish it, and put it out into the world… and it all started when I was on tour as a songwriter and decided to go swimming at a hotel we were staying at while on the road.

As I was walking toward the chairs to set my towel down, I noticed a sign that read:

“Welcome to our OOL. Please leave the P out of it!”

It’s a good thing no one else was on the pool deck because I burst out laughing. It was hilarious!

Afterward, I was telling my husband about the sign, but just thinking about it cracked me up again, and he couldn’t understand a word I was saying. In between giggles, I finally got it out: “The sign says OOL, so there’s no P in the Pool.”

That’s when it hit me. I saw the character so clearly in my mind.

What if it hadn’t been the letter P… but an adorable little pea who wanted to go swimming? What if there was some reason this pea couldn’t go in the pool?

That was the moment NO PEA IN THE POOL was born.

When I started working on it, I used my songwriting background to create my children’s book in a lyrical, rhyming style.

What do you think makes humor such an effective way to introduce practical lessons to young children?

When stories are fun to read, kids revisit those books again and again… and repetition is an incredible teacher. 

When I was little, I re-read my favorite bedtime stories so often that I had them all memorized. Decades later, I can still recite many of them to this day.

But there’s something even deeper than that….

As a reader myself (and as a novelist), I gravitate toward books where the lesson is a natural, inevitable result of the journey the characters went on. Story is my number one focus, always!

For my children’s books, I want the experience to feel like: “Hey, we just had a lot of fun and made new friends… and wow, we learned something, too!” 

The illustrations contain jokes and details beyond the words themselves. How did you approach making the pictures another part of the humor?

My illustrator and I had a blast with all the tiny details! One of my favorite moments is when Pea sees the Dalmatian peeing on the hydrant and realizes that isn’t an option for her. Also, the onion crying! I knew I wanted a character to slip and fall with Rule #1: No Running. That background character could have been anything –  a banana could have been cute… but the idea of an onion crying felt like the more unique, funny visual choice.

The fun is in the details, quite literally! Look at the sunscreen bottle, it says S-PEA-F! And on the back cover above the barcode, it says MSR-PEA. 

One visual joke also solved a practical problem: in a world of fruit and veggie houses, what structure is a public restroom? I knew that making it another fruit or veggie just didn’t feel right. When I came up with the concept for a watering can, I felt that was both funny and perfect for the setting. And my illustrator executed it perfectly!!

It’s not just humor, there’s foreshadowing in the illustrations, too. Notice the picture on the easel in Sweet Pea’s room? She drew a Dalmatian! Then we meet the dog a few pages later. It’s such a tiny detail you could easily miss, but it adds to the richness of the world. The family photos in her living room are another clue: we’ll meet all of those characters in stories to come.

Could Sweet Pea, the Spelling Bee, or the other characters return for another adventure?

Absolutely! My illustrator and I are currently finishing book #2 in the series, THE PRINCESS IS THE PEA, which stars Sweet Pea as Princess Pea. After that, we’ll release PEA-B-J, featuring Sweet Pea’s twin brother, Pete Pea. (Look closely at Sweet Pea’s bedroom in NO PEA IN THE POOL… she drew a picture of her brother there, too!)

Right now on my website, PlanetPea.com, you can meet several of the characters, find out their hobbies, and discover which books each will appear in. And best of all… the experience is interactive!

Play a spelling game with the Spelling Bee. Complete a maze to help Pea, Carrot, and Apple find their way to a pool, or download printable pictures of your favorite characters to color at home. All of it is 100% free and promotes learning and creativity through fun!

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