• I flew down from Glasgow to Birmingham and then on to Leicester for Wednesday morning, where I met hundreds of children from lots of school at the Whatever it takes to get Leicester reading – meet the author week.

    This took place at the Leicester Tigers rugby ground – very swish surroundings! I told the children all about Axel Storm and then they went off to large tables, where there were quizzes and word searches and sheets on which to write and draw about why your parents are as famous as Axels!

    It was a great day, again run with military precision as so many coaches had to be organised and parked and picked up again.

    Thanks for a great day everyone!

  • What a busy time of year. I’ve been up to Glasgow this week, to the Aye Write book festival, where I saw millions of P1s and P2s (or reception and year 1s). I read them stories and got them to draw absolutely fantastic drawings. I love seeing how children do their own versions of the drawings I show them. Every one is different and quite unique.

    The Mitchell Library is enormous and appears to be held up by the Zeus or Atlas, in the photograph, who stands by the main entrance. I love the way he is covered in anti-pigeon spikes. It makes him look as though his godly powers are radiating in all directions – enough to scare off any pigeon!

    The are millions of children arriving at the library at the same time, all heading off to different sessions, so the event is run like a highly efficient military operation, with librarians calling each other up on walkie talkies. Everything went very smoothly.

    Thanks to my minders Lindsey and Lucy and everyone involved for a wonderful couple of days. Hope to see you again!

  • I had a great day on Thursday at Copthorne Preparatory School, mostly with the pre-prep department.

    We had a load of fun with stories and drawing and I tried the dry-wipe boards for drawing running cats again. It was quite a cold day and some of the boards were really cold and had condensation on them, which made them quite hard to draw on! We had Reception and Nursery together for that session, so some of the children were only four, but they did wonderful drawings all the same. In all the excitement, I forgot to take any pictures!

    I spoke to years 3 and 4 in what must be one of the cutest theatres ever. The raked seating at the back has ancient cast iron seats. The backs fold over to create desks – how brilliant is that? Shame the paint wasn’t completely dry!

    I have to say that so far, in my vast experience of these things, the school dinner I was had there was the best I’ve ever had – chicken and mushroom pie, with green beans followed by Rice pudding (I didn’t have the optional chocolate drops!) My compliments to the chef.

    Thanks for a great day everyone. I got home quite late and very tired. I have no idea where Friday went – it must have occurred! Anyway, It’s Saturday now and I’m off to the Aye Write! Festival in Glasgow tomorrow. This is going to be one busy month!