Ellen Yates

About: Ellen Yates

Website:

http://www.growingtreetoys.com

Profile:

I never expected to find such an awesome job in my very own home town! As the Growing Tree Toys Copywriter, I get to spend everyday thinking and writing about innovative toys. When I’m not writing for work, I like read, write fiction and paint watercolor pictures that feature silly rainbow dogs. But out of everything in the world, my very favorite is to laugh and hang out with my friends.

When I was a kid the coolest thing that ever happened to me in elementary school was... the Bubble Room! In Fifth grade my teacher made a room out of clear plastic and a fan. It filled up with air to fit the whole class inside! On special occasions or as a reward for good behavior we would all crawl in and listen to stories. That’s actually the coolest thing that happened to me during my whole life. Not because my life has been uneventful, but because the Bubble Room cannot be topped. Not even by time travel, which would also be pretty cool.

When I was a kid my very best friend and I used to… pretend that the squirrels in our town were involved in a large, evil conspiracy to kill us. Every trashcan downtown had a name, such as “Tuna-surprise,” and would protect us from the squirrels if we fed it trash. I’m very pleased to say that she is still my best friend.

When I was a kid the movie/TV show that I would watch over and over again was… the animated version of 101 Dalmatians. But my little sister was weirder. Every day after I left for kindergarten, she would beg my mom to play the tape of me getting on the bus for my first day of school. On the tape she was crying because she missed me. And every day when she watched it, she would cry herself to sleep. Thinking about that makes me love her very much.

When I was a kid I used to dream that I would be… the proprietor of an “Irish Bar.” This was around sixth grade. My grandmother had a painting of an old Irish woman drinking a dark beer in a wood paneled room, which must have inspired this dream. It’s strange that she had the painting, because she’s never had a single drink in her life. She wasn’t pleased that my life’s goal amounted to serving alcohol to picturesque old ladies.