Fun Facts About Glitter Bird

The Creation of Glitter Bird

When I first wrote the poem, that the book is based on, it did not contain any reference to Glitter Bird. My inspiration for the character came from a few places.

One of my favorite song lyrics is from a song by Pink, Glitter in the Air. The lyric says...

Have you ever thrown a fist full of glitter in the air?

In the timeframe between writing the poem and creating the published version of the book I went through a difficult divorce. During the process, I decided to go back to my maiden name of Bird. That period of time changed a lot in my thought process about my life and my view of myself.

The character Glitter Bird, is a reminder that I want to add more sparkle to my life and remember to always be me.

When I started trying to figure out how to create illustrations for the book, I looked through different children's books that I love. I remembered a character named Goldbug from the Richard Scarry books. (If you haven't read them before, check them out.) The illustrations in his book are detailed and in some of them there is a character named Goldbug that is hidden in the pages. A secondary activity of reading the book is searching for Goldbug. Like the Where's Waldo books, if you are familiar with those.

In comes Lillian's ideas...

I decided to work with Lillian Jones on the illustrations and mentioned to her the idea of hiding Glitter Bird on the pages. She suggested another idea and took it to the next level. For which I'm forever grateful and absolutely turned the book into even a more meaningful experience, than I imagined. Thank you Lillian.

Her idea was to not hide Glitter Bird, but to show her on every page trying to be like the bird featured on that page. Then at the end she would drop all her masks and became herself.

It truly fit perfectly and brought tears to my eyes for the significance to the meaning of the book and to my own life.

Fun Facts About Glitter Bird

• She is based on a dove. Doves bring peace and hope to hurting hearts. Doves belong to those whose gentle compassion heal the world. My hope is she contributes in healing for my daughter, for myself, for anyone suffering from bullying and for readers of the book.

• Glitter Bird is born in the beginning of the book, when she hatches from an egg. It is her mother with her in the nest. I love the meaning of that, since the book came from love of my daughter.

• She has one blue eye and one green eye. In honor of my children. One for each of their birthstones.