Something About
All By Myself
by Anna Grossnickle Hines

Following is an excerpt from a talk presented at the Eastern Pennsylvania SCBWI Pocono Retreat, April 1998
Voice of the Picture Book

I made another common mistake in the first version of ALL BY MYSELF.  It also started with one of my children.  I won't say which one, but she has an older sister who was inspiring her to be a "big girl".  When this child was two and half she was doing well with her daytime potty training, but she'd never had a dry night so I didn't even think about not using the night diaper, until she insisted that was a big girl and didn't need diapers anymore.  I told her she'd have to wake up.  "I will," she said, and for a few nights she did. Then one night she didn't and, of course, her bed was wet in the morning.  I offered the diapers again, but she refused.  That night and for the next few nights she woke up every hour and got me up to take her to the bathroom.  I was a single mother at the time, taking classes and student teaching. A few nights of that and I was a zombie. We lived in an old house. The bathroom had been added on, and you had go out onto the back porch to get to it.  It was not something a two year old could do on her own, so I got a nightlight and a potty chair and put them in her room.