I finally received my copy of the Pizza Math game with the packaging that I illustrated. It’s actually a clever concept: It’s similar to a deck of cards, but instead of rectangles the cards are shaped like triangle pizza slices and instead of suits you have a variety of pizza toppings (i.e. diamonds become pepporoni’s, clubs become sausages bits, etc.). From there you can create some fun children’s card games that help kids grasp the concept of fractions.

My wife and I played a couple of games just to be silly. We were each dealt six “slices”, which is enough to make a full pizza. You take turns drawing a slice and then discarding one, looking for matches or combinations depending on the object of the game. For the first game, the goal was to build a pizza with a exactly ten toppings (my wife won that one). For the second game, the goal was to build a pizza that is half one topping and half another (I won that time). Pretty simple concept but I’m sure it would be a lot of fun for little kids.

I’m told the game is being sold at Target stores in the educational section, but my wife and I couldn’t find any at our local Target. You can also buy it at educational stores (Creative Kidstuff, Lakeshore Learning, etc.) or you can order it online here.

A book I illustrated earlier this year has just been published. Day of the Field Trip Zombies was a project I did for Stone Arch Books. It’s a 32-page graphic novel designed to help elementary-aged boys improve their reading skills. It’s got everything a boy could want: action, humor, and zombie penguins!

I’ve illustrated seven children’s books, but until now the closest I’d come to comic books was inking two issues of Opposite Forces (a fun comic book mini-series created by Tom Bancroft), and illustrating a cartoon gospel tract. This was my first time actually pencilling and inking a full comic book on my own.

This project gave me a new appreciation for the work real comic book artists do. It’s one thing to illustrate a children’s book with just one image per page; it’s quite another thing to organize several images on the same page. Not only does each panel have to be well-composed, but you also have to think about the composition of the page as a whole and how the visual flow affects the pacing of the story. It’s a lot of work! Honestly I have to say I pulled it off with mixed results, but I sure learned a lot in the process.