International Zine Month

Today is the first day of international zine month. Yay! The writer of Stolen Sharpie Revolution (Alex Wrekk) kindly posted this follow-along list of activities for each day of July.

Today's task was to sign up for We Make Zines on the ning, which I did. However, many zinester's on facebook are posting about their first experience with a zine today. So, that is exactly how I will start this post. I found my first zine when I came to Portland in March of 2011. It was at Reading Frenzy. I believe it was called Heart, though I'm not sure because it is packed in a box in Colorado, waiting to be moved back to its homeland. It's a large zine in that it is 11 X 15 inches, which is uncommon for a zine (at least from what I've seen). It was filled with poems and color photographs portraying love in all it's complexities and nuances. I barely understood the poetry but I loved it anyway. So, thank you, Reading Frenzy, for popping my zine cherry! I know I wasn't the first and I certainly won't be the last for you, but I'm ok with that since I'm pretty sure I got the better end of the deal here. Also zine-related, I told Helena (the precocious 6-year-old with whom I live) about the zines I have been writing and that the Independent Publisher's Resource Center (IPRC) actually hosts teen and child zine workshops on Sundays. She got really excited so I asked her if she would like to make a zine with me and she emphatically replied "Yes!" She even scheduled today as our zine day. She came up with entire concept herself, we planned it together, she planned the drawings and I did the writer (since she is learning to read and write right now). We're not yet finished with the illustrations, but it turned out to be this amazing experience for me. Here are some of the pictures of our process together:

This was our plan

This is how the zine is prepped.

Helena's plan for the drawings on each page.

This is the first page.

Helena's author bio

My bio and our last page

This is my plan for a submission to the zine Rad Dad (which is a zine about radical parenting and the second zine I ever read) that was inspired by the incredible process of helping Helena make her zine. More pictures to come as we complete the zine!