Dear Milkwood,

Creating a children's book character that people remember into adulthood has always been my truest dream. But only in the last two years did I give myself permission to pursue it.

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In a picture book class with the wonderful Claudia Rueda, I workshopped a story about a wombat named Wally, cripplingly embarrassed that he poops spheres rather than cubes. (In case you missed it, wombats poop cubes.) The delight that Wally sparked in my classmates awakened a new sense of possibility—maybe, I thought, others might love Wally, too.

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Since conjuring up Wally, I've begun scribbling and sketching ideas for other stories, in between prototyping toys in my design MFA and running a small creative studio. It would be such a joy to attend Milkwood—whether this summer or 10 summers into the future. More than anything, I'm grateful that Milkwood and its magic exists.

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Yours in perpetual play,
Tao Tao