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RACINE
— Creating the concept for its main character was a family affair,
but the book “Flippy the Scientist Dreams Big!” was penned by
8-year-old Mya Gillis.
Gillis
is in third grade at St. Lucy Parish School, 3035 Drexel Ave., part
of Siena Catholic Schools of Racine.
Her
book follows the adventures of Flippy, a unicorn scientist princess
working to create a robot bug to cure all the animals in her kingdom
so they will never be hurt or sick again.
Together,
the Gillis family — dad Parker, mom Heather, Mya and her sisters
Savannah, 6, and Gianna, 4 — created the character of Flippy to
decorate a blanket they designed to sell online.
Then
Mya set to work writing a book about Flippy to sell along with the
blanket. With the help of her mother, Mya wrote the entire book in
two weekends.
“She
had the whole story figured out in 15 minutes,” Heather said. “I
just couldn’t even keep up with her.”
Although
Heather worked with her to perfect the book, “It was all Mya’s
ideas,” Heather said.
The
blanket that features Flippy in reverse sequins is sold on Amazon and
the e-book comes with it as a free bonus. The family began selling
the blanket and book in mid-November. A soft cover book is in the
works.
The
sisters and their mother worked together to form the princess
scientist character for the blanket before Mya wrote the story.
“We
wanted something empowering and fun,” Heather said. “Because we
have three girls, I kind of am really big on having empowerment and
independent females.”
The family business
The
family has been selling on eBay, Poshmark and Mercari for years, but
the Flippy book and blanket are the Gillises’ first attempt at
manufacturing and selling their own brand of merchandise, called
Exclusive Elegance.
The
Gillises had been selling on eBay as a side business for a while, but
started getting serious about it in 2013. At that time, Parker was
training to be a police officer but with Heather working as a
physician assistant they decided those schedules would not work for
their family.
Parker
decided to stay at home with their daughters instead of pursuing a
career in law enforcement and he and Heather turned their eBay work
into a six-figure business. Then, about a year ago, they decided to
create their own brand and began working on the Flippy character and
blanket. They plan to continue making new products with different
characters and for Mya to write a book about each of them.
The
Gillises are not sure when they will begin selling their next
product, but the character that will be featured on it, Pugsley, was
introduced in the Flippy book.
Mya
started asking to use her mother’s computer to write short stories
a few months before they began working on the blanket and book
concept. Since she wrote the Flippy book, Mya has been spending hours
at a time writing short stories.
“Then
she’ll print them out for her sisters and they’ll read them,”
Heather said.
Modest about success
Mya
is not much of a talker at school, so she hasn’t told many of her
classmates that she’s a published author.
“I
felt happy,” Mya said, of when she saw the book finished.
Parker
and Heather agreed that their decision to ramp up their online sales
was all about the kids.
“Honestly,
the whole business and eBay has always been inspired by having my
girls,” Heather said.
Even
though she has a master’s degree and would like to continue her
work as a physician’s assistant, Heather said she ultimately plans
to shift to part-time work to spend as much time a possible with her
kids.
“I’d
much rather build something for them and some kind of business and
then work with my family,” Heather said.
From: https://journaltimes.com/news/local/education/st-lucy-student-publishes-book-about-unicorn-princess-scientist/article_603bfaf9-3bbe-5abd-a835-2542b9343f9a.html
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