Learn Spooky ABCs with Miss Heather's Creepy Crypt

It is easy to recall childhood stories, such as Dr. Seuss' Cat in the Hat or Eric Carle's The Hungry Little Caterpillar. It is even easier, however, to look back and remember the illustrations that accompanied each story, such as the Cat's crazy striped hat or all of the different fruit that the hungry little caterpillar nibbled through.

Heather DeRobertis, an Aberdeen resident, and her sister Kelly Hashway, used to enjoy taking their love of stories and pictures into their own hands. As little girls, the two would make story books together. Hashway would write the story while DeRobertis would draw pictures to go along with it.

After nineteen years as a preschool teacher, DeRobertis has verified what she always knew made a great story for a young mind.

"Of course the writing is important, but that depends more on how that teacher is reading it. The children's attention is captured by the colorfulness of the pictures," she said.

As adults, Hashway pursued her love of writing, with children's stories like the Frightful Forest and The Purrfect Puppy. And just like when they were young, DeRobertis illustrated them.

"Art is my true passion," DeRobertis said. "My sister was always the writer in the family."

DeRobertis harnessed her love for art, combined it with her enjoyment of teaching and came up with the Halloween-themed ABC book titled Creepy Crypt of ABC. In Sept., the book was published by CreateSpace under her pseudonym Miss Heather and is now available for purchase on Amazon.com.

Even though DeRobertis had written and illustrated Creepy Crypt of ABC earlier for her preschool class, she didn't actually publish it until her sister encouraged her to.

"If my sister didn't say that to me, the book would probably still just be sitting on the shelf. When I got the first copy it was a feeling of pure amazement," she said. "I couldn't believe I had finally done it."

While A is for angry androids, DeRobertis said her favorite letter from the book is "W."

"W is for werewolf," she said. "I love that because the kids in my class, they were just obsessed with werewolves and they loved to play werewolf on the playground. I just had to include a werewolf for them."

DeRobertis plans to do more holiday-themed ABC books, because she believes a great way to engage a child and help them learn their ABCs without realizing they are learning.

"They don't realize when they are reading a fun story that they are learning.
It's fun for the teacher because you get to see the child interacting, and fun for the kids."