A Father's Plea

Last night, along with 700 others, I braved the rain and the cold to go to RMIT's Storey Hall to hear Dr Izzeldin Abuelaish interviewed by Jon Faine. Dr Abuelaish is a Palestinian doctor who was living in Gaza and practicing in a hospital in Israel treating both Israelis and Palestinians. In January 2009, three of his daughters were killed when Israeli tanks shelled their upstairs bedroom. (Click here to read more).

Despite his personal tragedy, Dr Abuelaish is a passionate advocate of peace. Listening to his heart-breaking story, this is the part that was the most profoundly moving. As my sister and I made our way out of Storey Hall to our tramstops in the cold wind and the drizzle, we agreed the most important message we could take away from Dr Abuelaish's powerful address was that the wish for peace wasn't a naive one. Despite feeling overwhelmed and powerless in the face of war and all the hate that rages throughout the world, Dr Abuelaish called on every one of us in that hall to hope for peace and to spread this message, to educate ourselves and our children and to make our votes count.

As Dr Abuelaish signed my book, wanting to find some small way to connect with this awe-inspiring man, I asked him if he would manage to squeeze in a little bit of a holiday while he was here. He looked up at me with weary eyes and said no, all he wanted was to get back to his children. Back home, walking quietly through my sleeping house, I lingered longer in the doorways of my own.

Billie, Blondie and Birthdays - or how to survive a party with a hundred and one six-year-olds.

Who would have thought when I woke up last Sunday morning that later that very day I would be dancing to Blondie in The Victorian State Library with a sea of six-year-olds?

As part of the Wheeler Centre and State Library's inaugural Children's Book Festival, last Sunday we celebrated twelve months of Billie B Brown with a one year birthday party.

I was hoping for a good turn-out but had completely underestimated just how many excited little Billie fans I would encounter. It was a wonderful, if not slightly daunting, surprise. Immediately I began to worry about how on earth I was going to run all the party games I had planned when even getting all those dozens of kids to sit in one big circle nearly required a sheep-dog. But, we managed, and before long all the kids were sitting in an almost circle ready for the first game.

First up was pass-the parcel. But it was so noisy in that great big echoey Experimedia room jam-packed with excited children and parents that nobody could hear when the music stopped or started. The children were fabulous though and I am frankly quite amazed that the whole thing didn't end in tears.

Next, we played musical statues. But with so many more kids than I had anticipated, all of them grimly determined to win the prize, it took forever to eliminate the 'not winners'. Poor Jen, my publicist, was almost in tears herself after having to pull out kids each time the music stopped. Being a mother, I am made of tougher stuff. Having said that, we did actually end up with three winners but that was mainly because we ran out of time to play all the other games I had planned. Fortunately, I still managed to squeeze in a reading of The Birthday Mix-Up, though I think a 'shouting' would be a better description of what I did, and I'm still not sure that the kids in the back heard everything I said. Next time I will definitely request a mike!

It was a great day and hugely successful according to this article in The Age.

I finished up by signing what felt like hundreds of Billie books and meeting some adorable girls (and the odd boy) and their families.

So, thank you all so much for coming.

And hopefully see you all again next year when Billie turns two!

Ten more sleeps!

Only ten more sleeps! Hope you can come. Click here for more information about the Children's Book Festival.