Interview: Cynthia Mackey— If A Bumblebee Lands On Your Toe
Thanks for coming to check out my brand new blog!
I’m excited for this to be a space for updates, musings, lists, travelogues, and more.
I’m especially keen to chat with and help boost writers and others in the publishing community.
So, grab a cup of tea, get comfy…and let’s dig in!
I’m honored to kick off the blog with an interview of author Cynthia Mackey, whose book, If A Bumblebee Lands On Your Toe, illustrated by Vikki Zhang, will be released on May 20, 2025!
Cynthia Mackey’s poetry appears in The Toy, The Dirigible Balloon and Little Thoughts Press. Her debut picture book, If a Bumblebee Lands on Your Toe, will be published by Yeehoo Press and illustrated by Vikki Zhang. Her second picture book, Butterfly Sea, is set for release with Tielmour Press in December 2025. Cynthia lives with her husband in Victoria, Canada.
SR: Welcome, Cindy! Thank you so much for being the debut interview on my blog. I’m honored and thrilled to feature you here.
CM: Stacey, thank you for interviewing me. I appreciate the opportunity to chat about my debut picture book and writing for children in general.
SR: Let’s jump in and start with your book. Please tell us about If A Bumblebee Lands On Your Toe!
CM: If A Bumblebee Lands On Your Toe offers readers mindfulness and nature connections as a way to overcome anxiety. It’s published by Yeehoo Press with a release date of May 20, 2025.
I’d like to talk a little about the mindfulness aspect of the book. I was working on this book during the pandemic, which was a difficult time for everyone, and yet we all had our own unique struggles. Looking back, I’m grateful for the daily yoga practice that I had established the year before. It served me well through all the things that flew into my life that year and in the years following. It was an especially difficult time for young people – my children were in their late teens/early twenties. I had other challenges to face as well at work and in my personal life. I took that life experience of daily yoga practice, the feeling of being calm and centered, and tried to give it to readers so that whatever flies into their lives, they come away feeling confident in their own coping abilities. At least, that’s my hope.
SR: I’m so glad to hear about the origins of the story. Learning how to find your calm and center in difficult times is so important for people of all ages.
In addition to your yoga practice, your experience as a nature-based educator of young children ties directly to this book. How does being a nature-based educator influence your work as a children’s writer? And vice-versa?
CM: In my role with young children at nature school, a big part of my work is documentation. We create something called ‘pedagogical narrations’ that is basically a story of the children’s learning. We do this by close observation, taking notes, audio recordings, photos or sometimes video. Then we share these learning moments with families. I find many of these moments are inspiring for story creation. Young children are so creative!
When I get excited about something connected with nature, like volunteering as a citizen scientist to document butterflies, I will write a manuscript about it, and the children pick up on my excitement about that topic. As a result, one of the children from my class last year told her mom, “Cindy is a butterfly teacher.” I loved that. Seeing the nature up close makes me more curious to research a topic for narrative non-fiction manuscripts like BUTTERFLY SEA, which, I’m happy to say, will be published by Tielmour Press and illustrated by Marie-Laure Couet in December 2025!
SR: TWO books out in 2025! Congratulations! I hope you’ll come back and talk to us about Butterfly Sea.
Could you describe a day-in-your-life as an educator and a writer? Where do nature, teaching, and books intersect during your day, and where you have to carve out time for each?
CM: That’s the most challenging part. As manager of our nature preschool program, I also supervise a small staff and practicum students so it’s a full-time job and during the week, it takes a fair bit of my energy. But my brain craves challenges and needs complex topics to think about so on weekends and mornings/evenings when I can, I’m happy to put on my writing hat and get to work. I’m also a workshop presenter for Early Years educators and it’s satisfying to be able to give back now that I’ve been an educator in the Early Years field for so many years. I’m lucky in that our nature preschool follows all the school holidays so I get regular breaks from teaching throughout the year to devote more time to writing.
SR: In If A Bumblebee Lands On Your Toe, you beautifully layer respect for nature, mindfulness, courage, and grace. From a teacher’s perspective, how can a book like this be important for teaching those values to children?
CM: Thank you, Stacey. I believe books are wonderful starting points for discussion and If A Bumblebee Lands On Your Toe can be an opportunity to talk about times when something unexpected comes into your life that makes you feel anxious, or about times when you’ve had courage and been able to act in spite of your fears. When I reflect on those times I’ve had courage, I feel proud of myself for facing something that felt difficult or maybe even insurmountable.
The book is also a jumping off point to talk about things we have in common with animals. Have you ever watched a bunny that’s afraid? It can freeze perfectly still so that it is motionless. They have an incredible skill and it serves them well because combined with camouflage, they can stay hidden from predators. And human beings freeze too when we’re afraid sometimes. I think it’s incredible that we share this trait with animals. It makes me feel more connected to them.
Vikki’s illustrations added another layer to the mindfulness aspect of the book in such a brilliant way. I feel like she has blended ideas – the ‘monkey-mind’ with the idea of stage fright, for example; and through the detail in her illustration, she shows how by spending time, slowing down, and focusing, you can find new things. It’s the same for slowing down and looking closely at the nature that surrounds us. I hope readers will spend some time looking more closely at each illustration to see what they might discover that they may not have noticed at first glance. The snail under the daisy spread is an incredible example.
All of these ideas provide further jumping off points for discussion. I think there’s enough layers here to fuel several lessons if a teacher chooses to go deeper with any of these topics: theatre, dance, mindfulness, looking closely at nature, things we have in common with birds or animals, pollinators and how essential they are to our food chain, camouflage, the monkey mind, breathing techniques, and yoga!
SR: Now let’s talk a little bit about the writing process itself. We often talk about finding critique partners and community as an essential part of the writing journey. How did you find your community?
CM: I’ve found community and writing partners in a host of different ways. I’d like to tell one example with the story of how I met one of my critique partner, Sue Macartney. Sue is author/illustrator of Benjamin’s Blue Feet. When we first met we were both pre-published. We had joined Julie Hedlund’s 12x12 Picture Book challenge – I joined in 2017 after attending a meeting of Victoria’s Children’s Literature Round Table and a member suggested it to me as a way of finding out if picture books were a good fit for my writing skills/style. My 2017 critique group hadn’t worked out as well as I’d hoped so in 2018, I was looking for a new group. There was an introductions 12x12 page where we could mention where we live and that’s how Sue and I found each other. We were surprised to find we were both from Victoria! After that, we met up for coffee in person and joined an online group with a few authors we met through 12x12, Tasha Hilderman (Canada), Tara J Hannon (US), Emma Wood (NZ), and Akilah Picoh (US). We’ve all stayed in touch (and published our first books since then), though we exchange work less frequently now. Sue and I, however, because we live in the same city, have been able to see each other regularly through another group we are both members of – Vancouver Island Children’s Writers and Illustrators. We meet three or four times/year to discuss and share our collective knowledge of what’s happening in the world of children’s writing and publishing, and to encourage each other’s writing/illustration pursuits. And in 2024, Sue and I both attended the ABLA Big Sur Writing Workshop in Monterey, California. It was super fun to experience that together!
Other ways I’ve found community – SCBWI, CANSCAIP, CWILL, Twitter, #PBChat (now on Bluesky). Hannah W. Holt offered an opportunity through a Google form critique partner match up that helped me meet my current group, Cheetah Force, which has been active since 2021!
SR: What is your favorite part about being a writer? What is the biggest challenge?
CM: Writing allows me to connect and feel more alive. I can connect with my deeper self, with other writers, and with editors who believe in the manuscript and want to see it published.
But most importantly, I love to connect with the readers through my books and hopefully, help them to make connections with their adults who read to them, AND to make connections with others and with the world. I hope my books will help children think more critically and deeply about the world around them. I hope readers will feel more connected to the natural world.
My biggest challenge is finding homes for the manuscripts I’ve poured my heart into, as I am still very new in the writing world and do not have an agent to submit work on my behalf. My time for sending submissions is limited because of my teaching position. I’ve got a few projects in the works I’m excited about. Some of my work is localized to the Pacific Northwest, and other manuscripts have a wider appeal. Many writers do work without agents and I’m okay to be un-agented, as long as I’m able to sell books on my own. Still, if I could find the right person to represent my work, I would go for it!
SR: Your experience is a great example that there are many paths to being published! We’re grateful that your beautiful work will be out in the world.
Cindy, thank you so much for spending time with us! Where else can readers connect with you?
CM: They can find me on my website: booksbycindy.com,
or on social media:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/books.by.cindy/ AND https://www.instagram.com/mackey_cynthia/
Cindy is delighted to give our readers either
a digital teachers’ guide for If a Bumblebee Lands on Your Toe
OR
a picture book critique (max 500 words, no rhyming please)
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