Too many ideas!

Clearly, having too many ideas is not a rare occurrence on this blog - when I started typing it in, it remembered me from before!

Although January is usually a pleasantly quiet month for us, this year has got off to a roaring demanding start, and I am already upto my nose in ideas. And yes, I AM standing up, thanks.

I've been playing about with some ideas for Frog as superhero; kids love the picture of him as the Cake Crusader, so now he's gone off and found himself the full superhero outfit.

"Faster than a speeding bullet, is it a bird? is it a plane? NO! I'ts Super Book Dog!"

"As soon as Frog walks into a book shop or library, he becomes... SUPER BOOK DOG!"

I think SuperBook Dog will be part of the revamped "Frog's Five a Day" initiative. It seems that asking parents to spend ten minutes a day reading a story can be too much for some people, so I have decided to restyle with only FIVE minutes. I will be writing a series of stories that can be read in five minutes or less, to encourage the less determined to have a go, presenting them in a bedtime story style book. It's hard for me to understand how a ten minute story can be too long at bedtime, but I've heard enough parents say it to know it's a problem, so I shall address it.

I'm also going to be emphasising how Frog the Dog books bridge the gap between picture books with minimal text for under 5's, and the "young readers" books that have very few line drawings. Children in this critical stage of reading need every encouragement to keep reading, so lots of colour pictures are still important.

"Feed your brain with Frog's Five a Day!" There, you heard it here first.

I have to go now, as Frog would say, it's time to cool down my brain.