New bookshop dog
What a charmer!
Joining the team at Foggie Toddle is Bhreagh (Scots Gaelic for beautiful) though on her first day we wondered if her name should be Houdini. We’re hoping she’ll settle down to be a bookshop dog but on her first day she worked out (by lunchtime) how to get out of the puppy playpen!
Luckily my daughter Floraidh visited for a few days and helped to settle her into the office at the back of the shop – but it’s early days. If you visit the shop and I’m nowhere to be seen just have a browse while I deal with whatever puppy related crisis is happening in the back! She’s a Bedlington Whippet cross so she’s already grown from these pictures taken about three days ago.
On the dog theme, our wonderful book Wheesht! by Susi Briggs and William Gorman, was launched at the beginning of April. Unfortunately I had COVID at the time and wasn’t able to attend. So frustrating when you’ve spent months working on a book and watching it develop only to miss the big day. Thankfully Susi is an experienced storyteller, musician, writer and poet so was well able to ensure the book had a great launch as part of her Oor Wee Podcast live at the Big DoG festival in Dumfries, organised by the Wigtown Festival Company. Wheesht is now available through Lomond Books, Bookspeed and Gardners Books so do support your local indie bookshop and order a copy (if they don’t have it in stock). You can, of course, order direct from us through the shop on this website.
Our next project isn’t about a dog – it’s about a centipede! During the first lockdown I managed to connect with the family of the late Matt McGinn, a famous Scottish folk singer songwriter who wrote the popular song – The Wee Kirkcudbright Centipede. I’d discovered that no one had ever turned this lovely song (which has a great message) into a picture book. I was thrilled to get permission from the family to use the lyrics to create a book – the next challenge was to find an illustrator. I had hoped to work with the very wonderful Ruthie Redden, who had been familiar with the song for many years, but unfortunately she had to withdraw from the project due to personal reasons. Thankfully I then approached Fran Raw who creates fabulous lino cut images and her cards sell really well in Foggie Toddle. It was important to me that the centipede did not look cartoony, but also needed to look friendly. Fran came up with some initial sketches that were just perfect. Fran has been working on creating the lino cuts ready to print and then put together the final images. We hope to be launching the book during the summer and will keep you posted.
In the shop we have lots of lovely new stock including dinosaurs and baby toys from Best Years, cards by Caroline Smith, lovely wooden toys by Bee Smart and we finally managed to get the recycled plastic buckets and spades ready for summer fun.
Great wooden toys from Bee Smart