About Rebekah Strecker Trusty

One reason that Rebekah Strecker Trusty enjoyed illustrating the revised edition of Mommy! I Have to Go Potty! was that she knew the original edition page by page.

"It was informative and encouraging," remembers Trusty, who had used it with her daughter. "It was also quick to read and made it easy to implement the recommended steps."

The illustrations, for which Trusty's preschooler served as a model, are among the enhancements in the second edition of Mommy! Author Helen F. Neville has also added chapters on training the special needs child, working with child care providers on the training process, and early training, which is common in many cultures.

It's also common among Trusty's friends, the artist discovered.

"As I worked on the book, I talked to friends who are having second or third babies, and I was amazed to learn that most of them plan to train these next children as babies."

A graduate of Seattle Pacific University, Trusty has illustrated several Parenting Press books, including the Decision Is Yours series, with such titles as Bully on the Bus and Under Whose Influence?, and two titles from the Tools for Everyday Parenting series, Magic Tools for Raising Kids and Peekaboo . . . and Other Games to Play with Your Baby. Today she lives not far from Nashville, where most of her work is done after her preschooler's bedtime.

"Pen and ink, which you'll see in Mommy!, is an ideal medium for a parent because I could start and stop as needed," she explains. The cover, however, was painted in "water color and hair—because Dewdrop the cat walked across the illustration while the paint was still wet!"