Hooray for Hat! was my first book. I'd spent over ten years in the commercial arts, making ads for fancy shoes to diabetes meters to SIM cards. It was steady work, but I was itching to make something that felt like mine.

I remember struggling with how I even wanted to draw a tree or a feather. I knew exactly how to make it fit brand colors and keep stakeholders happy, but not how I wanted it to look for myself.

My son Charlie was three and obsessed with picture books. We'd come home from the library with fifteen at a time. One day he ran through the house yelling "Hooray for Hat!" after watching Blue's Clues. The real line was "Hooray for Hats," but his version stuck. What if there really was one long, shared super hat (the Voltron of hats)?

I was a tired dad in a horrible mood after the 2008 recession when I came across an article about how focusing on things outside yourself can lift you up, even for a moment. Turns out getting out of your own head and doing something for someone else is how to feel less blah. That's how a story about a bunch of grumpy animals cheering each other up came to life.