Rise and shine, my little chickens!
It’s time for Week #3 of the 2023 Mix ‘n’ Match Mini Writing Challenge!
Yee-haw!!!
Mix ‘n’ Match Mini is a writing challenge for anyone who needs a little boost or a little encouragement to get writing….or maybe just a little fun!
You get to write your own story, enjoy and be entertained by everyone else’s stories, and get yourself in the running for some awesome prizes (please see the end of the blog post for a list of all the prize goodies…which keeps getting added to!)
For a full description of the challenge or to enter your Week #1 entry (or read other people’s entries 😊), please go HERE.
To enter your Week #2 entry (or read other people’s entries), please go HERE.
Now let’s have a peek at Week #3!
Mix ‘n’ Match Mini Writing Prompt #3 for Week 3
This week we’re going to start with an image! Please join me in thanking the incredibly talented and generous Julie Rowan-Zoch, author and/or illustrator extraordinaire of I’M A HARE, SO THERE! (Clarion Books, March 16, 2021), LOUIS (Clarions Books, October 6, 2020), and NOT ALL SHEEP ARE BORING (G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books For Young Readers, September 20, 2022) who is kindly allowing us to use two of her fantastically fun character sketches. Thank you, Julie! ❤️
Choose Image #1 or Image #2 (or, if you want a real challenge you can use them both!) and write a 100 word story for kids where the character from your chosen image finds him/herself in one of the situations below:
Image copyright Julie Rowan-Zoch 2023, used with permission and gratitude!
| Situation |
| Has a new sibling |
| First day of school |
| Fight with a friend |
| Forgot something important |
| Mistook someone’s identity |
| Has secret information |
- Stories can rhyme or not – totally up to you!
- You can go under or over 100 words if you want to – also totally up to you! – 100 is just a guideline
- If you’re deeply inspired by another situation, go for it! – the purpose here is inspiration and to get you writing! Just tell us what situation you’re using!
- For simplicity’s sake (and to aid skimming readers who might be interested in a particular thing) please say which Image and which situation you’re using at the top of your entry along with your name, title, and word count.
For example:
The Ninja Carrot Thief
by Marcia Writer
107 words
Image #2, forgot something important
So come join the fun! Get some writing done! Encourage your kids (or students) to give it a try! Or just have a good time together reading what other folks have written!
Post your Week #3 story in the comment section below, or, if you have trouble for any reason and can’t post yourself you may email it to me using the Contact Form and I will post it for you.
Ready, set, WRITE! 😊
(And remember, for full details on the 7 week challenge you can check HERE.)
Check out the Week #3 stories!
Big Brother Bertie – Elyse Trevers
Better Together – Katie McEnaney
Always Count to 10 – Stephanie Maksymiw
Stella Skunk’s First Day – Kelly Clasen
The Carrot Crook – Bri Lawyer
The Ninja Carrot Thief – Tomi Rues
Mr. McGregor’s Secret – Sara Kruger
Cat Forgot – Ellie Langford
Ninja Bunny – Leslie Degnan
A Little Stinker – Lauren N. Simmons
Hop Secret – B. Holland Paley
Carrot Head – Patricia Nozell
Shadow’s First Day of School – Susan E. Schipper
Little Lion Raises a Stink – Jill Lambert
My Best Friend, Carrot! – Ryann Jones
Harry Hare’s Mistake: A Story in Haiku – Lyn Jekowsky
I’m Late, I’m Late – Elizabeth Thoms Charles
The Sweetest, Stinkiest Skunk – Julie Hauswirth
Carrot Soup – Haley Hendrickson
Show and Tell – Angel Gantnier
A Smelly Situation – Tiffany Hanson
Rabbit’s Secret Carrot – Michelle S. Kennedy
Blue Stew Friend – Bev Schellenberg
Inky’s Best Secret – Dawn Renee Young
Bunny/First Day of School – Kelly Kates
A Bunny Thing Happened On The Way To School – Jenna Elyse Johnson
Croquet Every Day in May With Lulamae – Sarah Meade
Quick Thinking – Elizabeth Meyer zu Heringdorf
This Is Not My Carrot – Colleen Murphy
Baby Bunny’s Bite – Marie Prins
Skunk Wants to Be First – Ashley Sierra
The Carrot Runners – Anjali Amit
Anger Management – Debbie J. Arnn
Tiger Forgot Something Important – Krithika Santhanam
One Word- Sorry – Penny Taub
Benjamin Bunny’s Mad Dash – Marta Cutler
First Day of School – Dianne Borowski
Sniff! Sniff! – Isabel C. Rodriguez
The Party – Beth Volkmann
Skunk’s Secret – Elizabeth Muster
Ice Cream Caper – Ben Jeder
Brave Bunny – Lauri Meyers
Rabbit Hood – Julie Kurtz
Just Forgetting Myself… – Sally Yorke-Viney
The Ninja Carrot Thief – Sara Petersohn
What To Do About Lina? – Linda Schueler
Black Rabbit And The Secret – Deb Buschman
The Vanishing Lettuce Of Wisteria Lane – Royal Baysinger
When it comes time for prizes, names of all those who completed the challenge will be drawn randomly and matched with prizes drawn randomly until we run out! 😊
⭐️ Picture Book Manuscript Critique from Penny Parker Klostermann, talented author of THERE WAS AN OLD DRAGON WHO SWALLOWED A KNIGHT (Random House 2015) and A COOKED-UP FAIRY TALE (Random House 2017) as well as the forthcoming SPIDER LADY: Nan Songer and Her Arachnid WWII Army (Astra/Calkins Creek 2025) and another as yet unannounced 😊
⭐️ Mary Munson and Kate Talbot are offering a “Love Bundle”. They are the author and illustrator of LOVE WILL TURN YOU AROUND. Mary will sign the book and send swag (US only), and Kate will offer a critique (picture book manuscript OR art, winner’s choice!)
⭐️ Picture Book Manuscript Critique OR Ask-Me-Anything Chat OR a signed copy of SCIENCE, MATTER AND THE BASEBALL PARK (winner’s choice!) from author Catherine Ciocchi. Catherine is a multi-published author and a teacher with a knack for STEM-themed rhyming texts. Her books include SCIENCE, MATTER AND THE BASEBALL PARK (Gnome Road Publishing, March 28, 2023) and THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND (Arbordale Publishing, May 2015)
⭐️ a 20 minute Zoom or phone Ask Me Anything with Jilanne Hoffman, author of 2 board books, THE HONEY BEAR HIVE (Mudpuppy January 2023), HAPPY CAMPER (Mudpuppy January 2022), and the forthcoming picture book A RIVER OF DUST
⭐️ Copy Editing/Proofreading Of Up To 5 Picture Book Texts (All Types and Lengths) from Elizabeth Meyer zu Heringdorf, professional technical writer and copy editor.
Elizabeth Meyer zu Heringdorf
⭐️ a first read-through recording package from children’s author and poet Sarah Meade, contributor to HOP TO IT: POEMS TO GET YOU MOVING (Pomelo Books, 2020!) where she will read aloud and record up to five PB manuscripts for one author (1,000 words or less each, fiction or nonfiction, rhyming or non-rhyming) so you can hear how your stories sound to someone who is unfamiliar with them on a first read-through! Very helpful and emlightening!
⭐️ Ask Infowoman: A Library Consult Regardless of where you are in your writing career – brand new or seasoned author – Kathy Halsey has a wealth of information to help you! From insight into what books school librarians need/want in their collections (which can help you target your writing for success) to helping you create an engaging school visit and all kinds of things between…and beyond… check out her website to see what this fantastic prize can offer you!
Kathy Halsey currently serves on the State Library of Ohio’s “Choose to Read Ohio” program and writes curricular toolkits for SLO’s award-winning children’s books. She is a former K-12 school librarian, seventh grade English teacher, and bookseller for a children’s independent bookstore. Her first work for hire board book releases fall, 2023.
2019 PBChat Mentorship
SCBWI Ohio Central-South Co-Assistant Regional Advisor
Former Community Manager, Storyteller Academy
Ohio Educational Library Media Association Past President
⭐️ a signed copy of ANIMALS IN SURPRISING SHADES: POEMS ABOUT EARTH’S COLORFUL CREATURES (Gnome Road Publishing, March 28, 2023)from author Susan Johnston Taylor! This book is great for classrooms and recommended by SLJ!
⭐️ a copy of Becky Scharnhorst‘s brand new picture book – just coming out tomorrow! – HOW TO GET YOUR OCTOPUS TO SCHOOL (Flamingo Books, May 16, 2023)
⭐️ A signed copy of Susanna Leonard Hill’s ALPHABEDTIME (Nancy Paulsen Books/PRH, October 25, 2022), generously sponsored by a very kind anonymous donor! Thank you so much for your donation, You Know Who You Are 😊
⭐️ A copy of Mary Kole’s Writing Irresistible Kidlit: The Ultimate Guide to Crafting Fiction for Young Adult and Middle Grade Writers
⭐️ A copy of Making A Living Writing Books For Kids by Laura Purdie Salas
⭐️ Making Picture Book Magic Self Study Class (any month)
⭐️ Magnetic Poetry – Little Box of Happiness
Susanna Leonard Hill 
Rabbit Hood
By Julie Kurtz
Image#2
Secret Information
62 words
Rabbit Hood
“Stop, thief!”
WHo? Me?
Oh no, no!
I’m not a thief.
I’m Rabbit Hood!
Secretly trying to feed the poor one carrot at a time!
What?
You don’t believe me?
Well! I never!! Sob! Sob!
Boo Hoo hooooo!
What? Just take it and don’t come back?
Chomp! Chomp!
Poor ME!
On to the next garden, works every time!
Just Forgetting Myself…
By Sally Yorke-Viney
Based on Graphic #1 & Forgotten Something Important
WC 124
How am I supposed to remember what I am supposed to do when that plant has suddenly sprouted a very
new suspicious leaf?
Just look at it… it’s black and white, not green and bright. I don’t trust it a bit.
I am just going to plop right down and think.
Don’t try to stop me!
Wait! That leaf has moved. I don’t feel any wind!
What am I supposed to remember?
Ahhh! I think I am going to be sick!
Wait that leaf is wiggling…?
What’s wrong with my brain?
WHAT HAVE I FORGOTTEN???
“That we were playing hide and seek.” said Skunk.
“Oh pardon me for being such a stinker!” I said,
“Your turn to count Skunk. Now what were we playing?”
The Ninja Carrot Thief
by Sara Petersohn
176 words
Image #2
mistaken identity
Mama Bunny-Brown
looked around her garden and frowned.
“Someone’s been picking our peas!”
she said to her daughter LaRosa .
“It must be the ninja next door.”
But LaRosa shook her head.
“Braxton wouldn’t do that,” she said.
The next morning, Mama Bunny-Brown
looked over her garden and frowned.
“Someone’s been plucking our plums!”
she said to her daughter LaRosa.
“It must be the ninja next door.”
But LaRosa shook her head.
“Braxton wouldn’t do that,” she said.
The next morning, Mama Bunny-Brown
slipped into her garden and found…
a ninja digging up a giant carrot!
“Aha!” she said,
pulling the mask from the ninja’s head.
“LaRosa!” she cried. “What are you up to?”
And where have you put all that food?”
“Come with me, Mama.”
LaRosa led her mama
to a fluffy nest on the forest floor.
Five baby raccoons huddled there.
“Mama Raccoon was sick,
and her babies were hungry,” said LaRosa.
“Why didn’t you say so?”
said Mama Bunny-Brown.
She rolled up her sleeves.
“Let’s get picking!
We’ve got new neighbors to feed!”
Love it!
What to do about Lina?
by Linda Schueler
111 words
image#1, has a new sibling
Lola had a new sibling, Lina.
Everywhere Lola went, Lina followed.
To school
To the hunt
To the napping circle
Sometimes when Lina napped, Lola could slip away to her secret hiding spot, her thinking bush.
One day she told her thinking bush her troubles with Lina. “I know you can’t help me, but…”
The bush started to move. Lola jumped up.
One leaf looked odd, fuzzy and a different colour. The leaf walked out of the bush. A skunk!
Lola had a thought. “Can you spray me?” she asked the skunk.
Whoosh, went the skunk.
Lola smelled herself. Pe-yew!
Deb Buschman
Week # 3
Image #2
Has Secret Information
82 words
BLACK RABBIT AND THE SECRET
By Deb Buschman
“Pssst, you with the carrot.”
“Me?”
“Yeah, you. I don’t see anyone else running with a carrot.”
“But I’m the Black Rabbit and no one can stop me.”
Zip, Zip, Zoom!
“Okay, but then you won’t hear my secret.”
Screeeech!
“What secret?”
“Sorry, but it will cost you.”
“How much?”
“One carrot.”
“But then I won’t have a carrot.”
“No carrot, no secret.”
“Alright, here’s my carrot. What’s the secret?”
“I don’t like carrots but I love black rabbit.”
Zip Zip Zoom!
THE VANISHING LETTUCE OF WISTERIA LANE
By Royal Baysinger
338 words
Image #2 / Has Secret Information
Mrs. McGinty lived alone on a very successful lettuce farm on Wisteria Lane.
Every day she ate heaps of lettuce. But what she really craved was carrots. Year after year, she tried to grow them, but every carrot she ever pulled up was scraggly and just plain awful.
One day, Mrs. McGinty was pushing her empty handcart home from another profitable day at the farmers market, when she noticed a glorious carrot patch she had never seen before. The tufty green heads were so healthy and full, it made her stomach rumble.
“There are so many! Surely, they won’t miss just a few,” she thought, as she bent low to help herself.
She meant to take just one or two, she really did. But each new carrot she pulled was more spectacular than the last.
A cheerful yellow carrot. The chubbiest little baby carrots. Even vibrant purple ones.
Soon her cart was filled with carrots of every shape and size and color. She took them home and devoured every last one.
She went to bed smiling. Her belly happy to be full with something other than lettuce for the first time in months.
But then, something mysterious happened.
Her lettuce began to disappear overnight. She would go to bed with thirty-eight rows of lettuce, and wake up with only thirty-seven.
During the day, she would weed around three healthy heads of lettuce, then turn around and only see two.
Even the cart she piled high with lettuce each week would be only half full by the time she got it to market.
And soon, her very successful lettuce farm became such a burden, that she decided to sell it and move to be closer to her grandkids in the city.
What Mrs. McGinty had failed to realize was that the carrot patch at the end of Wisteria Lane was actually owned by a very large family of rabbits. And what they had really longed for these many years, was lettuce. They just never knew where to find any.