It’s the birthday of bestselling children’s book author/illustrator Mark Teague (b. 1963), perhaps best known for illustrating the rollicking How Do Dinosaurs…? series (author Jane Yolen), illustrating the beloved Poppleton series (author Cynthia Rylant), and writing and illustrating the wildly popular Dear Mrs. LaRue series.

(If you haven’t had the pleasure of reading a Teague book, borrow the nearest toddler and settle in with How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night?.)

Teague was raised in San Diego, California, and as a child would dictate stories to his mother and then illustrate them; frogs featured prominently in his work. Teague studied American history at UC Santa Cruz, but as an artist he is entirely self-taught. Teague has said this is both his greatest strength and his greatest weakness: “There is still a lot I don’t know, and some stuff that has taken me years to learn that I could have picked up in the first semester of art school… But it always looks like my stuff.”

After college, Teague moved to New York City and got a job arranging window displays at a Manhattan bookstore. The picture books for children inspired him to write his own, and his first book, The Trouble with the Johnsons, came out in 1989. He has gone on to illustrate over 40 more books and write more than a dozen of his own.

The first in his Mrs. LaRue series, Dear Mrs. LaRue: Letters from Obedience School, is about a dog, Ike, whose bad behavior has landed him in obedience school. Ike acts as if he’s in prison and writes letters to Mrs. LaRue describing how horribly he is mistreated—though these tales are exposed as untrue by the book’s illustrations. The inspiration for the character of Ike came from two dog’s in Teague’s own life: Earl, who was a “master food thief,” and Ali, who limped whenever he wanted attention.

Teague lives with his wife and two daughters in the Hudson River Valley, New York. Fun fact: while working, Teague’s face takes on the expression of the character he’s drawing, but he didn’t realize this until his wife pointed it out. (Spouses are useful that way.)

Have a good solid workhorse of a Monday, dripping and dreary but bolstered by multiple cups of tea with honey, and stay scrupulously honest to the data.