Mush-A-Roo Dog Sledding Kangaroo Children’s Book

I loved illustrating this unique story! This book is about a kangaroo with extra large feet who travels to Alaska to become a sled dog!

This book is titled, Mush-A-Roo: The Adventures of Seven The “Dog Sledding” Kangaroo. The name of the Kangaroo is Seven and she’s so cute! And with any story I illustrate, I always begin the process by some style sketches of the main character…

My client/author fell in love with sketch #1. I was leaning toward that variation myself! It’s always nice when that happens. He did ask for her feet to be drawn a little larger, since that’s part of the plot of the story.

After my client’s approval of a main character sketch, I proceeded to finalize the kangaroo in color with the final visual look for what the illustration style would be for the book.

After the main character was approved in color, then I worked on the sketches and finals for the other main characters found throughout the book. I always like to do character designs for the most important characters in a book- the ones that show up on more than 1-2 pages. These were those characters:

• The best friend of Seven, a parrot named Scratch. I decided to do an Eastern Rosella, since that’s a parrot actually found in Australia.
• The main sled dog, Chester, who doesn’t like Seven the Kangaroo at first.
• And the sled musher, Pete, a loving man who takes great care of his dogs and gives Seven and Scratch a home.

After the characters are complete, then I can begin my art file preparation and start sketching the actual interior pages. I like to begin each book by sketching the interiors, then save the cover art for last. In the sketch above, we see Seven the Kangaroo and Scratch the Parrot playing (near the beginning of the story).

And then with this next children’s book interior sketch example, we see Seven having tripped on her big feet and fallen into a muddy puddle. Her family is laughing at her misfortune.

Here’s that page sketch finalized for the kid’s book. Normally, I complete the entire book’s sketches before I start finalizing any illustrations with color and shading.

And again, Seven here having fallen into the mud, with her buddy trying to console her. Poor Seven! What will she do?

As you probably guessed, the cute kangaroo and her parrot friend decide to fly to Alaska for a change. I really had fun illustrating this map page!

I’m not sharing all of the pages within this book, but here’s a particularly fun one. You can’t have a children’s book about Alaska without showing the Northern Lights! This was a tricky page to illustrate, to capture the vibrant sky.

Without giving too much away, our kangaroo friend joins a dog sledding team and after training, set off to win the race. In an unexpected twist, Chester the lead dog falls in the ice!

But Seven the Kangaroo thinks quickly and act fast! She helps get Chester out of the water since her feet displaced her weight better than the other dogs. Chester is saved! As far as what happens next, well, I’ll leave that a mystery… You’ll have to pick up the book to find out how it ends!

You can click on the cover image above if you want to check out the book on Amazon and pick up a copy for yourself! It’s an adorable story and a great message about not judging others and working as a team. I’m sure you’ll love it!

And lastly, if you are a publisher or author and would like me to illustrate your book, feel free to reach out through my contact page. I would love to talk with you more and read your story!