by April Graney
I never thought I’d write a children’s book.
My high school friend told me after graduation that she wanted to write children’s books. I thought that was weird. I’d never heard of anyone who wanted to do that. I wasn’t sure what I was going to pursue, but it sure wasn’t writing for sticky-faced little kids!
I thought I’d be a journalist, or a novelist, or write for magazines. But for job security, I pursued a degree in English Education. After college and marriage, we moved to Dallas Seminary, where I fell in love with studying the Bible. After graduating in 1999, we moved back to Oklahoma to serve at the camp where I grew up going to, and to my surprise, I found myself pregnant!
I decided that my child better become a reader, so I read the Bible to her in the womb. Once she was born,
I read her children’s books like Where the Wild Things Are, Seven Silly Eaters, and Ken Taylor Bible storybooks.
And we kept having more kids.
We had 5 kids in 7 years! I was a busy mama, and to my surprise….loving it!
When my oldest daughter, Anna, turned 13, I began wondering if I would ever become a “real writer.” I’d put off writing for so long, raising babies and homeschooling them, that I wondered if I’d ever get that parenting book written that I was now dreaming of.
I began asking God to give me a story to tell.
I prayed this prayer silently in my heart, asking God to give me a story to write.
Later that year, our family of 7 traveled to Kenya to visit my brother’s family. There, we met a mother and her son, George. Upon our return home, our kids decided to sponsor George to go to school.
After our trip, in the middle of one night, I couldn’t sleep and got up and wrote the first draft of a children’s book, The Marvelous Mud House.
The Lord miraculously opened doors for it to be published by B&H Kids in 2017! Our trip and this book changed our lives, and the life of George, our friend in Kenya, as well!
This summer, my third children’s book was released.
In If Jesus Came to My School, a little girl imagines what it might be like if Jesus came to her school as a boy her age. She imagines how he would treat his classmates with love and kindness. She realizes Jesus wants to live through her, and she can shine his light and love at school. This book has the potential to inspire thousands of Christian kids in schools to shine Jesus’ love and light across our nation and the world!
Available on Amazon – https://a.co/d/jbwHK9H
My perspective has changed. Writing for children isn’t too small a goal.
In children’s books, important messages are boiled down to a precise, potent 1,200 words. Children’s books change the world…one small, sticky-faced reader (or listener on mom’s lap) at a time.
Today, I don’t think I’ll write anything but.
April Graney
April Graney is a speaker and author of:
The Marvelous Mud House: A Story of Finding Fullness and Joy
The Marvelous Maker: A Creation and Redemption Parable
If Jesus Came To My School.
April is a teacher at Cookson Hills, a children’s home and school for at-risk students. A graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary, April loves studying and teaching the Bible. Her greatest joy has been raising five children with her husband, Tom, in their crazy, loud, happy house at New Life Ranch, a summer camp and retreat center where they have served for
over twenty-two years.
