Local shop owner writes children's book

ARCADIA — Lynn Nye is well known in this tiny town as the owner and operator of the Arcadia Superette for 26 years.She had an itch to scratch as a writer, however. And with "Kinsley's Snowflake Dance," a children's book based on her 5-year-old granddaughter's journey as a clubfoot patient, she has become a published author.Nye commissioned local artist Jennifer Sowders to illustrate the book, paid a designer and had the book published through Amazon KDP. With all proceeds going to Clubfoot C.A.R.E.S., a United States-based non-profit that raises awareness of clubfoot and assists families affected by the condition, "Kinsley's Snowflake Dance" has become available for $12.99 both on Amazon.com and at the Arcadia Superette."It took a lot of research and time and effort, but it happened," Nye said."I think it's great for my daughter," Trevor Nye, Lynn's son, who lives in Alvada with Kinsley, wife Tailor and 2-year-old son, Layne. "She loves it. She's excited to see herself in a book. It's a story we can read to her that's about her."Clubfoot C.A.R.E.S appreciates her work as well."A beautiful story to remind us all that our differences help us grow into the resilient dancers we were meant to be," Nicole Bytnerowicz, co-founder and director of Clubfoot C.A.R.E.S. is quoted as saying in the back of the book.Clubfoot is a condition in which a child is born with one or both feet bent inward and downward. Kinsley's right foot was affected, and she's spent a good part of her life in a brace. The bubbly little youngster also has undergone a pair of surgeries, the most recent coming in June, and she currently has a brace on her lower leg.Kinsley, however, has also enjoyed taking dance lessons and does not complain about her situation. She is a kindergartener at New Riegel School."She really hasn't (complained) because she hasn't known any different," Trevor Nye said. "I really don't think she knows the difference. I've never experienced her complaining about it at all. The only times I'd say are hard on her are, like when she's had a surgery, it's painful a month after for her. But other than that, she doesn't complain about wearing the braces and the boots and that stuff. She's so used to doing it ever since she was a baby that she doesn't know any different."The path to having "Kinsley's Snowflake Dance" started with Lynn Nye wanting to create a unique Christmas gift for her granddaughter."It was Christmas a year and a half ago," Lynn Nye said. "I was trying to come up with something special, to give her a gift that came straight from my heart. I love to write, and I came up with this idea to do a children's book. I'd never wanted to write a kids book. I just wanted to write and I was like, 'I don't really know how to do this.' "It was all sing-songy at first and I was trying to make all these rhymes, but I was not happy with it. Then I sat down and I thought, 'Scrap it. Just completely start over and write from your heart.' So I did and I had it written within a night. Then I went and found some pictures in photo albums. I hand-made it for her and used actual pictures."Lynn asked her son and daughter-in-law to read it to Kinsley when she gave them the homemade book."Before it was over, they were both in tears," Lynn said. "After I wrote it, I already knew I wanted to publish it. I just knew. I thought, 'This is something that takes Kinsley's experience, and it's kind of a crappy thing that she's had to go through, but it can help others.' She can inspire other people with her story and something beautiful can come from it. I kind of had it in my head that I want to publish this and somehow, maybe, find a charity that I can donate to in her honor to help other people."Lynn contacted Sowders, an award-winning artist, to illustrate the project. Though Sowders has been doing fine art for a long time, she studied illustration in college. And it turned out she had once dated a man who'd had clubfoot.Sowders immediately asked for many photos of Kinsley from which she could work."I told her, 'Give me everything you have," Sowders said. "There were some portions of the book where I needed her face and I needed it at a certain age. That's the whole thing — throughout the book, she's growing up, so it's very important that I have the age match. I can have another child in a brace, but I need to have her likeness at that age and different angles and a face just so that it really nails it."Lynn's analogy to a snowflake for Kinsley related to the uniqueness of both. And Sowders ran with it while doing the illustration work, which was done in watercolor and, including research, required about 100 hours of work."On every page, there is a snowflake, whether it's minor or major," Sowders said. "That's just one of those illustration things you do. You read a children's book over and over and over again, and a way to keep it exciting is to have other things for the kids to look at. So, eventually, they might notice, 'Hey, where's the snowflake? Where's the snowflake?' That's just one of those illustration tricks." Lynn Nye had the book ready for release by the spring, but the uprising of the coronavirus pandemic put that on hold."I was like, 'This isn't the time to put this book out. Who's going to be able to afford this book right now, with all these people without jobs?'" she said. "I put it off and just had to trust this wasn't the right time and I'll know when it is."That time came after Kinsley's surgery in June, which resulted in her being in a cast the length of her leg throughout the summer. "When she had this surgery, I saw her at 5 years old handling this like a champ," Lynn said. "When she was a baby — you don't know how a baby is handling it, necessarily. This little girl was so independent. She did not need help. She'd scoot herself everywhere, across the floor on her butt. Up the stairs — 'I don't need help.' ... She would just scoot herself all over the place with minimal help. And I was like, 'This is the time I need to get this book going. She was living out what I wrote in this book about her determination. So, we rolled it out.'"As she markets the book, she's scheduled to talk to elementary students at Arcadia School about it in the near future."It's exciting that I'm able to bring this conversation up with kids because kids are curious," Nye said. "She's in school now and they're going to notice that she has a brace. Kids can bully and whatnot. So, it brings this whole conversation about 'she's not perfect — none of us are. There's something different about her, but she's still beautiful. And that's the whole concept of the book."The Nyes said hopes are that Kinsley's had her last procedure done and her right foot is now corrected despite being slightly smaller than her left, which is common under such circumstances."They never tell you 100 percent, but that should be her last surgery," Trevor Nye said. "She's pretty much healed up. You never really know that you're completely done because something could always happen, but at this point her foot's looking good, her doctor's happy, we're happy. It seems to be corrected now."