Julia Cook, HERMAN JIGGLE, JUST BE YOU!
[0:02]Hi, I'm Zippy Owens, and you're listening to moms don't have time to read books.
[0:06]This 30-minute podcast features a new author interviewed by me every single day, 365 days
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[0:22]Our books are already out now.
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[0:57]Enjoy.
[1:03]Julia Cook is the author of Hermit Jiggle, Just for You, which is a children's book.
[1:09]One of dozens and dozens that she has written that health kids do all sorts of different
[1:15]challenges from anxiety, depression, fidgeting, all sorts of things that are amazing.
[1:22]So if your child is having any kind of an issue, Julia Cook has written a funny, rhyming,
[1:26]awesome, well illustrated book that will help you deal with that issue with your child.
[1:31]And I am really excited to be interreeling here today because I reread and reread and reread
[1:35]so many of her books to my kids as they have all grown up.
[1:39]Here's a little more about her.
[1:40]Julia Cook is an award winning author and highly sought after speaker, a former teacher
[1:44]and school counselor.
[1:45]Her captivating story books help young readers learn to use social skills and develop
[1:49]healthy relationships.
[1:51]She has received the Association for Educational Publishers Distinguished Achievement Award
[1:55]and her books have been honored by the National Parenting Center and Moms Choice Awards.
[1:59]She is the author of multiple story book series, including the leader I'll be building
[2:03]relationships, communicate with confidence, best me I can be and responsible me.
[2:09]Welcome, Julia.
[2:10]Thank you so much for coming on momstone out time to read books.
[2:13]Today we're talking about Herman Jiggle just for you, but really we're talking about
[2:17]you being just being you because I've been reading your books with my kids for so long
[2:22]and I think it's really exciting to have you on the show.
[2:25]So there you go.
[2:26]Thank you.
[2:27]I'm very excited to be here.
[2:28]I'm a follower and I've seen you on GMA and pretty impressive.
[2:33]You've got it going on.
[2:35]Thank you.
[2:37]How many books have you written?
[2:38]I've written 140 and there are nine languages and I believe there's over three million
[2:44]souls.
[2:45]So it's kind of a freak way that I got into it.
[2:48]I was a school counselor, former middle school teacher, turned school counselor for elementary
[2:53]age, could not figure out how to teach my kids to Halloween.
[2:56]And we have like this much to teach our kids and we have this much time to do it.
[2:59]And so if we can find a really cool book, we can take about seven minutes and read it
[3:05]to them.
[3:06]And if the book has great stuff in it, that great stuff will stick with them forever.
[3:11]And many rainbow fish and you know, I love you forever and the giving tree and all of
[3:17]those amazing messages are disguised in a children's book.
[3:20]And you know, this one is to wave our wand and solve their problems.
[3:25]And if we do that, they might live with us when they're 30.
[3:29]And the goal is to raise them to live in an amazing world where they do well and they have
[3:33]to solve their own problems.
[3:35]So the book started at the beginning of Halloween, she went to the kids head and it worked.
[3:43]And a teacher came in my office one day and said, you should try doing something with this.
[3:48]So I called a publisher on the inside of the book and they said, send it in.
[3:53]And then they said, we're going to publish your book.
[3:55]You have more.
[3:56]I said, how much do I have to pay you?
[3:58]They said, we'll pay you.
[3:59]And I dropped the phone.
[4:00]I never planned on that.
[4:01]That was about 17 years ago.
[4:03]So it's been a ride.
[4:05]It's been a ride.
[4:07]So.
[4:08]Oh my gosh.
[4:09]What a great story.
[4:10]I don't know.
[4:11]Well, I do.
[4:12]I do feel like each of your books has such a clear message.
[4:14]And yet it's fun.
[4:15]I was trying to analyze what it is about your books.
[4:18]And I'm sure people have dissected them and their popularity.
[4:21]It's the great illustrations too.
[4:24]But it's also just it's like it's like the rhyming and the words and and how you just
[4:31]totally get inside someone's brain and then repeat the same message over and over so that
[4:36]by the end of it, like you get it and it improves out.
[4:40]I don't know.
[4:41]What do you think about that?
[4:42]I mean, they kind of also there's pretty much the same format the kid has an issue and
[4:46]then they're presented with solutions and they try the solutions and they work in order
[4:50]to write a children's book.
[4:53]You have to be that kid.
[4:54]They're all first person, which is huge, I think, in the children's book world because
[5:00]it allows kids to become that character.
[5:05]And if a kid doesn't say it, I don't put it in a book.
[5:07]So it has to be kid-friendly wording-wise.
[5:09]So you have to think like you're 58 and write like you're eight.
[5:14]Are you still around kids all the time first?
[5:16]Very much.
[5:17]Yeah.
[5:18]A few years ago they said, why don't you just speak at conference?
[5:20]And I said, if I take my foot out of that trench, I lose all of my, you know, so I've
[5:27]done over 3,000 school visits.
[5:30]This is my first week off since January 1st.
[5:32]I've been in the road all the time.
[5:34]Do a lot of parent talks, a lot of teachers staff development on, you know, kids, they're
[5:41]missing some of the skills that they need to be great people.
[5:46]And maybe they're not getting at home, maybe they are, but they're not practicing it.
[5:50]COVID didn't help us.
[5:52]So kids came back and I noticed that when kids came back from school, when you're talking
[5:57]to them, they're talking to you at the same time.
[6:00]And so I show kids if these are your words and these are your teachers' words and they
[6:04]happen at the same time, they crash in midair and nothing goes in your head because this
[6:09]is a one-way street, things are either coming out or going in.
[6:13]But you can't talk, make noise, narrate anything by someone's talking to you or it doesn't
[6:19]get in their head.
[6:20]Which book is that?
[6:21]Which book was that in?
[6:22]Let's see, I'm trying to think, yeah, it's in one of them.
[6:27]I have ants in my pants trying hard not to speak when others are talking.
[6:32]If you do, you won't hear what they say, words can't go in when others come out because
[6:36]your brain doesn't work that way.
[6:38]Wow.
[6:39]A whole quote from it and everything is impressive.
[6:43]So some of the books that we really loved, a bad case of title time was one of them.
[6:48]So talk about that and I know it was one of the first, but it was one of the first and
[6:52]it was giving kids four simple rules about tiling and the kids have so much.
[6:58]His mom says, if you don't stop tiling, you're going to get to have a time and he says,
[7:02]what's that?
[7:03]And she's scratchy, scratchy, twitchy, twitchy, catchy, purple spots to start to grow up upon
[7:08]your tongue and then you'll know that tiling is what you have and tiling is very bad.
[7:13]And so he goes to sleep.
[7:15]He taddles all day and he goes to sleep and the title prints it as it's him.
[7:19]And he looks in the mirror and he has taddles on him and he's freaking out.
[7:23]So the title prints teaches him the rules and waves his magic, septor and glitter falls
[7:29]from his wand and in the morning, Josh sees yellow and purple glitter and his teacher has
[7:38]the title, um, septor.
[7:40]So he's thinking that he's the teachers that had a friend.
[7:43]So it's kind of fun.
[7:45]That's awesome.
[7:46]We loved it.
[7:47]I don't know.
[7:48]I think I have four kids and they're always all fighting and there's always stuff going
[7:51]on and taddling on this and that now I have to read it to my younger kids more, I think.
[7:55]But yeah, what about be where your feet are?
[7:58]So many times we are in an attempt to do more than one thing at a time.
[8:04]We like to multitask and people think, oh, I can get more done because I can, but actually
[8:08]the research shows that your brain has to stop doing one thing and do something else and
[8:13]you only allow, you know, 50 or 33 or 25% to that task.
[8:19]And they say that if you do one thing and do it really well and then move on to the next
[8:24]task, you're a lot more efficient.
[8:26]But in our society, we just don't, we walk in texts and drive in texts and, you know what
[8:32]I mean, it's just, so we miss out on so much in our world because we're always thinking
[8:39]about this or what's going on online or what's going on with our neighbors and sometimes
[8:48]you just have to take a deep breath and be where your feet are.
[8:51]Love it.
[8:52]Good advice.
[8:53]These are, by the way, all great advice books for parents, which of course is the other
[8:56]benefit you get when reading them to your kids.
[8:59]Right?
[9:00]Research based.
[9:01]So it's that, if it says something in the book and according to research, that's what we
[9:05]should be telling kids.
[9:06]So, you know, there are safe bet for parents in that world.
[9:11]And the thing that's cool is that every year when they go to print, we update them because
[9:16]our kids change every, every year.
[9:19]And like volcano mouth has been at my mouth as a volcano has been out for 17 years.
[9:25]And, you know, we don't send kids the time out anymore.
[9:28]We say, go sit on the Zenden chair and think about it.
[9:31]Things have evolved.
[9:33]We don't keep them in from recess because teachers need kids to have recess.
[9:37]And kids need recess.
[9:39]So as we grow as a society, you know, how you talk to children 17 years ago is not how
[9:44]you talk to children now.
[9:46]And so every time they go to Ruby plant, we look at those things and read the comments.
[9:51]And I like to say that every Julia cookbook is definitely a work in progress.
[9:57]It's not a once and down because.
[10:00]How do they stay fresh and how do they help all the time kids you know that the thing is to add to their life never take from it and made a quite a few mistakes in my in my lifetime and continue to make them every day but that's how you grow and that's how you learn so you know if they ever find anything in a book that they don't like let's talk about it let's figure out a way to make it better what's a mistake that you feel really badly about okay when sort of hot pad came out there goes lester watch him fester is your start to fizzy get
[10:30]man as a grace so he's turned right he's a sort of hot pad the kids in the book are teasing lester for having anger issues and that's shaming him in a way and that's changed greatly lately so now we have read on that book I am lester watch me fester I'm angry today you need to stay away you know so he's recognizing it instead of the kids laughing and pointing at him they're looking at him like whoa now it's kind of cool because when we do
[11:00]that page out a lot of teachers got very angry and said put it back in that's what we show kids not to do state we laugh at people when they're angry they're doing the wrong thing they use it as a teaching thing I've always kind of live by the rule that if you put it in a book it's what the kids should do not what they shouldn't do another one making friends is an art when it came out I started out with brown and all the things he didn't have and took a step you know it was offensive to
[11:30]I don't want to look at my brown skin and not love who I am and I mean I was I never wrote that book with color in mind at all brown is the brown crayon and when you mix all them together you get brown so he has every friendship trait he needs but a very wise woman case with told me why would you start with what brown doesn't have instead start with what brown does have and do you notice that your brown crayon has white arms and do you notice that
[12:00]real critical eye to things that would be offensive to people that I was ignorant of and boy we changed it we changed the art I'm brown and I'm the luckiest crayon in the box and let me tell you how and that book went from here to here and it's a book that every child can read a month and so you know I use that all the time with kids I'm like you know you don't put your name on it and just think it's awesome I said because we can always grow and we can always get better.
[12:30]and who we were yesterday is not who we are today or tomorrow so it was a very valuable learning experience very humbling learning experience but the intent is and always has been let's help kids get great people skills so that they can make the future better and these are the vehicle to do that so always listening and and opening to change so amazing Ricky sticky fingers was another one of our favorites oh yeah.
[13:00]you know kid every kid in the on the planet you included has temptation to take stuff once a while that is not theirs and he does not realize how bad that makes him feel until his mom hides his bike and makes him realize that maybe that's how they feel when he took his stuff and then he finds his bike at the end you know once kids still from stores the store owners get mad then the prices go up.
[13:27]feel bad you know when kids still think they know that it's wrong with the bad inside wins and the good plays a lot inside there thinking that thing could be mine and they're just not strong enough to say no to the guy.
[13:38]So when you're good inside wins same is like lying up a storm, you can tell a kid not to lie they're trying to lie to preserve themselves, but if they realize that they lie that they hurt themselves or a lot less likely to lie, but you have to find a way you know if you tell a lie you want to refine your insights on.
[13:56]And you know, so okay the last one that we read probably more than all the other ones was well machine the worry machine.
[14:04]I've had anxiety forever i'm sure all my kids are going to be plagued and it helps me it helps me to read the book and all the different worries are spilling out all the time.
[14:15]When we didn't the worry machine just had a facelift we had some input saying that the face or her was too scary for some kids and one of the things that I put in there that was wrong that has been changes my worries were easy to fix because.
[14:31]are not easy to fix so people didn't like that, so we fix that and what happens is the teacher teaches her to put her worries into the things I cannot control the things I can control and then you focus on the things that you can control.
[14:46]But anxiety is something with children that you don't say oh I know how you feel you know every child needs to be seen heard and validated so anxiety is something that you would say I can only imagine how you might be feeling.
[15:00]See the difference there, it's the same thing when you give a child a compliment oh and so pretty so proud of you to be because you're you know you're done this and you've done that and you have this amazing podcast.
[15:11]How about and that's a praise from me to you and it's about 16 miles long, how about I say wow I'm sure thinking you're amazing but I can only imagine how good you must be feeling on the inside to know that you're doing all this good for other people.
[15:27]I can only imagine how you must be feeling on the inside I bet you're doing a happy dance to size of Alaska what does it look like does it look like this and you actually reward kids from intrinsic means from the inside out versus outside in that's huge so basically.
[15:43]You know the will machine the worry machine everybody worries and you know you talk through those words I little boy who just worried about everything so he made a recipe box and if he had a worry he wrote it down and what he needed to do.
[15:58]So overcome that worry and he put that in the recipe box and he carried his recipe box around in his backpack so they weren't in his head they were on the recipe cards and he was always there and he always write another one if he had a different word.
[16:12]And he just wonders for kids because gave them an avenue to compartmentalize things and you know COVID through us for a loop because nothing was predictable and when kids worry when they have anxiety, the basic reason is they can't control what's going to happen and so they go to all the ifs and that can be overwhelmingly devastating for adults and kids.
[16:38]So you know so we talked through those ifs and we think about solutions and together we're pretty strong and you know and predictability power predictability is huge but when someone says oh I know how you feel they don't know how you feel because they're not you or someone says that's ridiculous you know that's not going to happen.
[16:59]How do they know that you know because to you it's real so a better way was I can only imagine how upset you must be feeling let's figure out a way to talk through this I'm writing this down.
[17:16]I like to think I'm empathetic with my kids and I say like I you know I totally know how you feel you know I'm scared about this or I'm scared of the darker I say like I know how you feel I used to be scared of ET I couldn't sleep for like a year you know I know how you.
[17:29]feel but it's going to be okay maybe I shouldn't be saying that you say I can only imagine how you must feel versus I know how you feel because you're not them.
[17:38]You know that one of the coolest ways of dealing with anxiety and stresses you make a list of all the things that stress you out on piece of paper.
[17:47]And then you take a saucer something and draw a circle on another piece of paper and then you look at your list and if your list is an anxiety that you can control you put it inside the circle, but if it's not you have to write it outside of the circle.
[18:01]And then you only allow yourself to give that energy to the things inside the circle that you can control because so many things happen in our world that we can't control and we we use up all our eggs on that and there's nothing to go around.
[18:15]And that's that's actually an amazing stay in your hula hoop is an amazing tactic from Alan on of all places that is just a amazing program to teach people how to compartmentalize and how to own what's theirs and just own what is not.
[18:33]And then the biggest I think the biggest contributor to anxiety these days is sleep deprivation.
[18:40]I mean our kids you know suicide rates in our country are on the rise for little and so you have to ask yourself why that is.
[18:48]And I think it's two reasons number one when they play a video game. This is the size of their footprint. So to win they have to take two steps and they win and everything's amazing.
[18:59]But to win in real life their size of their footprint is this big and it's five times the work to get a win in real life like a home run to be based baseball game on video game versus real life.
[19:11]Now when they do work hard to win the amount of dopamine that goes in their brain is five times greater.
[19:18]So as long as they balance off screen highs and on screen highs are falling, but if the only time they feel like they're good at anything is when they're in front of a screen real life is very difficult.
[19:27]I tried, I tried take two steps. I tried as tried as I hard as I can. I quit. I can't do it no matter how hard I try. So it actually messes up their level of try.
[19:37]And then the same contributing factor to increased ideation of suicide in my opinion is sleep deprivation because we spend an incredible amount of time on our screens and yet get everything else done.
[19:50]And when a human being loads of sleep, the first symptom they feel is irritability. The second symptom they start to feel is increased levels of anxiety. They worry about
[20:00]things they didn't worry about before, and the third thing that starts to happen is they get
[20:04]depressed. Why try? I can't do it anyway. I quit. And those are all chemical things that have
[20:10]to do with sleep deprivation. So you have that combination of kids gaming at night and parents on
[20:17]their phone at night and looking and seeing what the weather's doing and constantly worrying
[20:23]of assessing about others and what's going on. And it's almost like you get the whole
[20:30]world in your face when you look at Twitter, when you look at Facebook, and sometimes you
[20:37]just take a step back and breathe and be where you're feet are because it spreads us out so much.
[20:44]Wow. And we're obviously asleep. I'm taking this is my own personal therapy session today.
[20:49]I'll have you now. You should send me a bill at the end of today because I feel like I'm getting
[20:54]that only parenting tips, but my own stuff from my own sanity. But anyway, when did you start
[21:01]the activity books? When did that become a component? Or was that in the plans all a lot?
[21:06]A lot of the teachers bought the books. And so they said you have any activity books. So
[21:13]I started doing those probably third year in. And then I think there's 21 activity books
[21:19]but then I've been putting a lot of stuff on tpt, teachers pay teachers, Julia cook on court.
[21:25]There's a lot of stuff on Julia cookbooks on tpt and that's very honorable too. But I kind of started
[21:31]doing that a little bit. And then there's more need for books and content right now than the
[21:37]activity books themselves. So because everybody's creating those. So both publishers are a little
[21:43]bit leaning toward that right now is more content and more. Like the Hermann Jiggle just be you
[21:50]book is so. Yes, sorry. We should talk about that. Okay. Hermann Jiggle just be you. So Hermann has
[21:55]a couple ways that he's feeling. Well, he and his friends have waves there. Everybody's feeling
[22:00]inferior less than whether I'm the only one in my school that has porcupine hair. And I need to
[22:07]glue down my hair because they tease him. And and then she says, I like your hair Hermann. I think
[22:13]it looks great. And then she says, what are you doing? He goes, I'm trying to get my teeth so get loose.
[22:18]I'm the only kid that doesn't have any holes. Well, I like your teeth Hermann. They're going to come
[22:22]out when they're ready. And then she's but I need money. Why do you need money? So I can buy
[22:27]nitro flyer shoes like everybody else. So the mom says, let me get this straight. You want to
[22:33]glue down your hair. Pull out your teeth and buy new shoes just so you could be like everybody
[22:37]else. Yes. Hermann Jiggle, you are wonderfully made of valuable. You don't have to change your insights
[22:43]to match other people's outsides. Everybody's different. And that's a good thing. And he says,
[22:48]well, sometimes I don't fit in. And she says, well, you know, if you're happy, you know,
[22:54]you'll always find a way to fit in. So and if you're yourself, you can be happy. So it's just kind
[23:00]of one of those things that we always try to be like everybody else so that we can fit in.
[23:05]But everyone is different. And that's a good thing. Because if we were all the same, we'd be really boring.
[23:12]No, it's it's so true. And I think, you know, just be yourself is that's what my mom always used
[23:18]to say to me when I was a little like, oh, don't worry. You don't have to worry. Just go be yourself.
[23:22]And I was always like, well, who is that? Like, I'm not exactly sure who I am right now. I'm,
[23:25]you know, I'm 11. And so that would put me down a big spiral. But I think that with Herman Jiggled
[23:32]just for you, what you do so well is say, okay, well, the things about you are the way they are.
[23:38]And everyone is attracted to people who are confident about themselves, which is the,
[23:42]which is true. And if he's just owns it and owns who he is, then people will be attracted to
[23:48]it. And it's funny because he's Harris broken up. So they call him, he has porcupine hair. But then
[23:52]the next day goes to school. And everybody's made their hair poke up so that they have porcupine
[23:56]hair too, because I think it's cool. So that's a really fun story. I'll give you a little free
[24:01]curse or January 2nd, we have blue Monday. And that's the day after Christmas where everybody spends
[24:07]all their money. And I have a book called I am Money and I don't grow on trees all about financial
[24:14]literacy through the eyes of money. You know, these are my old school jackets. I love how shiny
[24:19]they are. Sometimes I like to dress up in my Venmo and crypto clothes. And these are my credit card
[24:26]codes. Once in a while, when I'm wearing them, they like to sneak out on buy stuff that I can't afford.
[24:31]This makes people happy at first, but then when they get the bill, they get stressed out and
[24:35]worried. And it's different ways. You can earn me saving me, spend me and give me away.
[24:41]And then he says, there's different ways to earn money. You can move on and you can make
[24:45]a lemonade stand and then you can sing for people. You can even let a banker or an investor
[24:50]use a part of me and then lend it to others. You work hard to earn me. And if you're careful
[24:55]on smart about it, I can end up working for you. Now that's interesting. It talks about saving,
[25:01]it talks about, and then it ends. The thing that I love the best is that if you become really good at
[25:07]what you love to do, you can make more of me than you will ever need. And then you can do the
[25:11]coolest thing ever. You can share. I am, you don't grow on trees. So I am very, very excited about
[25:19]that. That's source books publishing. It's a random penguin company. Should hit precells. You can
[25:26]look on my website. I'm sure you'll see links for precells, but it hits everywhere on the second
[25:32]of January. That sounds great. I will be preordering that for sure. Julia, thank you. I'm so impressed.
[25:40]Thank you for all the advice. All the kids you've helped. I mean, you've left such a footprint
[25:45]on the world with what you're doing. It's amazing and so helpful and fun as well. So thank you.
[25:54]Thank you. Thanks for having me on your show. Love you. My pleasure. Thank you.
[25:59]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Don't forget to
[26:03]follow me on Instagram at zibioens and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Also sign up for my
[26:09]newsletter at zibioens.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on zoom
[26:14]every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound for the Sound Editing.
[26:19]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music.