KidLitCon is Done and Gone....

As I always have in the past, I had a great time at this year's KidLitCon. From a publisher's preview at Little, Brown (boy do they have a lot of good books a-coming) to a dinner gathering with the fabulous Grace Lin speaking to the conference and to KidLit Drinks night at the end of it all, there was nary a dull or bad moment from my perspective.

A big part of that, of course, is the wonderful people you meet when you hang out with bloggers in the kidlitosphere. I mean, really, these are my peeps! Too many great people to list them all, though it's always fantastic to see Mother Reader and Liz Burns again. And Maureen (attendee of all six kidlitcons!). And... and... and!

And this year... oh my... I met Leila from Bookshelves of Doom! Oh, and Alex from The Children's War. And... you get the idea.

I had a fabulous lunch with Kellie Celia of Walden Pond Press, Mary Ann Scheuer of Great Kid Books (whose children's app knowledge is fantastic, too), and blogger/librarian Brenda Kahn. These be some mighty smart people!

I saw great presentations, of course, and enjoyed Maureen Johnson and Robin Wasserman giving the oddest "keynote speech" I've ever seen... yet one perfectly in keeping with KidLitCon's very essence.

I also gave a presentation called Avoiding the Echo Chamber: Bringing the World of Children's Literature to the World. You can read my own recap of it on the Happy Accident, and if that's not enough (or even if it is!), you can check out School Library Journal's take on it, too.

Good times, and huge thanks to Betsy Bird (who wrote a fab recap), Monica Edinger, and Liz Burns for putting the whole thing together. I can't wait til next year, wherever KidLitCon might be!