Mabel and Friends

Mabel and Friends Book 1: Pickle’s Too-Big Boots

Prairie Junction virtue series — Perseverance


Fully illustrated review copy — all 12 spreads + cover illustrated · Jeremy approved story & style Oct 13, 2026
📖 Flip through it like a real book →
Cover proof: Pickle the armadillo mid-stomp in his enormous red boots on the county-fair stage, one boot raised high, the fiddle band playing behind him under string lights.
Cover (final art) — Pickle mid-stomp at the county fair, fiddle band behind him, string lights overhead, and a crowd of prairie animals at his boots.

Approved — thank you!

  1. The story text — exactly as written below, spread by spread.
  2. The watercolor style — soft digital watercolor, paper grain, warm Kansas light, as seen in the two proof images.
  3. Pickle’s look — the gray-violet shell with cream bands, the tall question-mark ears, and the enormous red boots. Once you approve him, his design is locked for the whole series.

Production notes — full art pass (Oct 13, 2026)

  • Every spread now has its picture — cover + all 12 spreads illustrated in the approved watercolor style.
  • Jeremy’s barrel catch is fixed: on Spread 3 the rain barrel stays upright (Pickle only bumps it) and the water sloshes out of its open top only. The rule is now written into the style guide for every future book: check the physics of props.
  • Cover corrected: the final cover gives the boots their cream top rims and swaps the human crowd silhouettes for prairie animals.
  • One honest residual: across all generated art — including the two approved proofs — Pickle’s dome reads ~4 wide cream bands in most poses, despite the design lock’s five and repeated retries. It is flagged for a possible illustrator touch-up at layout time rather than hidden.

1Meet Pickle

Illustration for Spread 1 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 1 — Meet Pickle: his burrow, the water tower, and the finest boots in the county.

Pickle the armadillo lived in a cozy burrow at the edge of Prairie Junction, where the sidewalk ends and the tall grass begins.

Pickle had stripes on his shell, ears like two question marks, and the finest pair of rain boots in the whole county.

They were red. They were shiny.

They were also… a little bit too big.

2The Poster

Illustration for Spread 2 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 2 — the poster on the library door, and Mabel reading over his shoulder (well, under it).

On Saturday, a poster went up on the library door:

COUNTY FAIR!
BOOT-STOMP DANCE CONTEST!
EVERYONE WELCOME!

Pickle read it twice. He read it three times.

His friend Mabel — a field mouse — read it too, from under his shoulder.

“A dance,” he whispered, “where the whole point… is STOMPING?”

His boots went thump-thump all by themselves.

3First Practice

Interior style proof for Spread 3: Pickle upside down mid-roll in the backyard, red boots in the air, grinning beside the upright, wobbling rain barrel.
Spread 3 — the first flop. Barrel physics fixed per Jeremy’s catches: the barrel stays upright and wobbling, and the water sloshes out of the open top only.

Pickle practiced in the backyard.

Step. Step. STOMP—

FLOP.

The boots kept going. Pickle did not.

He rolled twice, bumped the rain barrel, and landed upside down like a striped bowling ball with ears.

“Up again!” said Pickle. “Dust off! Try again!”

4Worse and Worse

Illustration for Spread 4 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 4 — worse and worse: slow flop, fast flop, and the laundry-line ghost.

He tried slow. Flop. He tried fast. Thump-flop. He tried with a running start, and rolled clean through Grandma’s laundry line.

By supper, Pickle had flopped eleven times.

“Maybe,” he said to his boots, “you are just TOO big.”

5The Almost-Quit

Illustration for Spread 5 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 5 — the almost-quit. The boots face the poster. Pickle faces away.

That night, Pickle lined his boots up by the door.

He looked at them a long time.

“Real dancers don’t fall down eleven times,” he said.

His boots said nothing. Boots are good at that.

But his ears drooped… and so, somehow, did the boots.

6Grandma

Illustration for Spread 6 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 6 — Grandma, cocoa, and the part before you get up. (This is THE boot — the very same little red boot is hiding in every picture in this book.)

Grandma set down two cups of cocoa.

“Your grandpa wore boots like those,” she said. “Fell in the creek his first dance. Came up smiling, full of minnows.”

Pickle giggled in spite of himself.

“Falling isn’t the end of the dance, Pickle. It’s just the part before—”

She waited.

“…before you get up?” said Pickle.

“Before you get up.”

7One Step

Illustration for Spread 7 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 7 — one step. Chalk numbers on the fence; Mabel keeps score.

So Pickle practiced differently.

Not the whole dance. Just one step.

Step. …Stayed up! Step, step. …Stayed up! Step, step, STOMP—

FLOP.

“Up again!” laughed Pickle. “Dust off! Try again!”

8Six Steps and a Whistle

Illustration for Spread 8 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 8 — six steps and a whistle. The whole prairie is listening.

By Tuesday, Pickle could do six steps and a stomp.

By Thursday — six steps, a stomp, AND a turn.

The turn was mostly falling.

But it was falling ON PURPOSE.

Across the prairie, everyone could hear him practicing:

Step-step-stomp, step-step-stomp—

“He’s still at it,” said the neighbors.

He was still at it.

9Fair Day Rain

Illustration for Spread 9 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 9 — fair day rain. Everyone shelters. Pickle splashes.

Fair day dawned bright and golden.

And then — because Kansas — it rained.

It rained on the Ferris wheel. It rained on the watermelon stand. It rained, most of all, on the beautiful wooden dance stage…

…until the stage wasn’t wood-colored anymore.

It was MUD-colored.

10The Contest

Illustration for Spread 10 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 10 — the contest. The held breath before the last dancer.

The fiddlers tuned up. The crowd leaned in.

The first dancer slipped. The second dancer slid. The third dancer did a very impressive spin that she did not mean to do at all.

Then the fiddler called out:

“Last dancer! Pickle the armadillo!”

Every eye turned to the little armadillo in the enormous red boots.

11STOMP

Illustration for Spread 11 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 11 — STOMP. Five hundred stomps and one very happy armadillo.

Pickle stepped onto the stage.

Step. (The mud went squelch — but the boot stayed PUT.) Step. (Deeper. Solid.) STOMP!

And something wonderful happened: where Pickle’s big boots landed, the mud packed DOWN. Firm. Flat. DANCEABLE.

“Up again!” shouted Pickle — though he’d never gone down. “Dust off! Try again!”

He stomped the whole stage into a dance floor, one red boot at a time, and then — right in the middle of it, with the fiddles flying —

Pickle danced his dance.

Six steps. A stomp. And a turn.

12Just Right

Illustration for Spread 12 of Pickle’s Too-Big Boots.
Spread 12 — just right: the last dance, then one polished boot by lamplight.

Pickle did not win the trophy for fanciest dancer.

He won something better: the last dance, leading the whole fair — every animal in Prairie Junction stomping behind him in a line, mud and all.

That night, Pickle polished his boots and lined them up by the door.

“Not too big,” he said.

And he danced one more step before bed — step, step, stomp — just to be sure.

(He stayed up.)

Back matter (printed at the end of the book)

Find the boot! The very same little red boot is hiding in every picture in this book. Can you find all twelve?

For grown-ups: Pickle’s story is about perseverance — getting up one more time than you fall down.