BY HEJIRA CONVERY, KINDICARE

JUNE 7, 2024

Where is the Green Sheep? is one of Mem Fox’s best stories, and if you have a toddler, they’ll love this book from their very first look! 

The fun rhymes, dramatic pacing, colourful pictures and crazy busy sheep have instant appeal for little people; and whether your child knows the story word-for-word, or is yet to meet that elusive sheep, they’ll be super keen for you to enter our Where is the Green Sheep? giveaway below. 

First, though, we’re excited to be sharing a Mem Fox Q&A with you.  

Mem is busy celebrating the 20th anniversary of Where is the Green Sheep?, but she’s kindly taken time out to explain how the book came into being, and recommend some fun reads for under-fives.  

Hip, hip and hooray!   

Mem Fox photo credit: Sam Oster 

FIVE MINUTES WITH MEM FOX 

KINDICARE:  Where is the Green Sheep? is such an ingenious story. How did you come up with the idea to hide a green sheep in all that woolly mayhem?  

MEM FOX:  Well, in 2002, when I was trying to avoid writing a children’s book, I browsed the website of Judy Horacek, the cartoonist who had illustrated my parent book, Reading Magic.  

She has new cartoons on her website every month, and sometimes gorgeous, diminutive watercolour paintings, which she sells.  

In June 2002, I found on her website a little watercolour painting of a sheep: a heavenly, pale green, woolly sheep standing in a dark green field. I fell in love with it. 

Judy had always wanted to write and illustrate a picture book, and I felt immediately that this divine green sheep would be a great main character, so on June 2nd I wrote to her. 

Dear Judy, 

The Green Sheep is a brilliant starting character for the kids’ book that you are going to write one day if I have any influence on you whatsoever. 

Why is it green? Where does it live, and does it live all alone? Does it perhaps have hopes of being a red sheep instead? Does it set out on a quest to change its colour? Is it thwarted in its quest: at one point becoming unbecoming stripes, for example, by accident? Does it find a new colour and happiness, or does it decide that after all being green is what it loves best? 

There: you have the first draft. It’s yours. 

With love, 
Mem xxx 

Judy was excited. She sent back a long answer in which she said, among other things, ‘Write a children’s book yourself for me to illustrate, I’d love that.’  

I was wild with excitement! And that excitement has travelled into the pages of the book, especially the last page, which seems to send kids into a paroxysm of surprise and delight every time.  

KINDICARE:  Over the years, the Green Sheep has popped up in lots of different places, including kids’ craft projects, birthday cakes and Book Week costumes.  What are some of your favourite ways that people have celebrated your little green sheep?  

MEM FOX:  The Green Sheep seems to have overtaken the world!  

There are too many examples of its appearance for me to mention a single one, in case I leave out another one that’s particularly important. But perhaps Children’s Book Week should now be called Green Sheep Week as there are SO many amazing Green Sheep costumes in every school parade, every year.  

I’m wildly impressed by what parents come up with. It’s really humbling for a person who can’t draw or sew AT ALL.  

KINDICARE:  You’ve written more than 40 books for children, including Possum Magic and Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes. Do you have any special memories or fun facts about your books that we can share with our children? 

MEM FOX:  A memory that springs to mind was when I was signing books for parents one day, in America, and many of them had babies in their arms.  

The parents were from many countries, so all the fingers and toes were lovely differing colours. And they were all cute! It made me realise yet again that we are all the same, all over the world. 

And the title of my book Wilfrid Gordon McDonald Partridge, which is 40-years-old this year, is actually my dad’s full name. 

KINDICARE:  As a best-selling author and retired Associate Professor of Literacy Studies, what kinds of books do you recommend for young children, and can you give us a Top Five for Under-fives?  

MEM FOX:  The books I recommend are short, rhythmic, repetitive and child orientated. The word choice is great. The pictures divine. Sometimes there’s rhyme, but not always. And if there is rhyme, the syllable count is always perfect, so you never have to sort of squeeze words together to make it work.  

There are so many books I could recommend, but if it’s five, then these books are perfect for pre-schoolers: 

• Where is the Green Sheep? (Mine!) 
• Hairy Maclary by Lynley Dodd 
• Ten Little Fingers and Ten Little Toes (Mine!) 
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle 
• The Gruffalo by Julia Donaldson 

 
KINDICARE:  Thank you for these top tips, and happy birthday, Green Sheep!  

WIN • WIN • WIN • WIN • WIN 

Twenty years of toddler-ific hide-and-sheep is definitely worth celebrating; and thanks to Penguin Kids Australia, we have four brilliant Where is the Green Sheep? prize packs to give away, each containing a:  

• Where is the Green Sheep? Celebration Book, complete with a luxe gold cover, and 
• Where is the Green Sheep? Sticker Activity Book, which is available for a limited time only. 
  
  

For your chance to win one of these party packs, trot on over to KindiCare’s Instagram or Facebook page and follow the entry instructions. 

You can also get busy with this free Where is the Green Sheep? Activity Pack. 

And if your little one is very little, it’s great to know that the Where is the Green Sheep? Cuddly Cloth Book will be available from 30 July, to ensure that every under-five can celebrate this story!