Making Friends is an Art

Julia Cook

Written by

Illustrated by

Julia Cook

Bridget A. Barnes

To Joy – EGTBOK

~Love, Julia

Thank you Terri!

Boys Town, Nebraska

Making Friends Is an Art!

Text and Illustrations Copyright © 2012, by Father Flanagan’s Boys’ Home
ISBN 978-1-934490-30-3

Published by the Boys Town Press
14100 Crawford St.
Boys Town, NE 68010

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Unless otherwise
noted, no part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any
form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without express
written permission of the publisher, except for brief quotations or critical reviews.

Thanks
Anne

Page Design: Anne Hughes

Cook, Julia, 1964-

Making friends is an art! / written by Julia Cook ; illustrated by Bridget A. Barnes. --
Boys Town, NE : Boys Town Press, c2012.

p. ; cm.
(Building relationships ; 1st)

ISBN: 978-1-934490-30-3

Audience: grades 3-8.

Summary: Meet Brown, the least used pencil in the box. He discovers that in order to have
friends, he needs to be a good friend. If Brown learns to use all of the friendship skills the
other pencils have, he can make friends and have fun, too.

1. Friendship--Juvenile fiction. 2. Interpersonal relations in children--Juvenile fiction.
3. Children--Life skills guides--Juvenile fiction. 4. [Friendship--Fiction. 5. Interpersonal
relations--Fiction.] I. Barnes, Bridget A. II. Title. III. Series: Building relationships ; no. 1.

PZ7.C76984 M35 2012

E1202

Printed in the United States

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3

Boys Town Press is the publishing division of Boys Town,
a national organization serving children and families.

For a Boys Town Press catalog, call 1-800-282-6657

or visit our website: BoysTownPress.org

Publisher’s Cataloging-in-Publication Data

My name is Brown.

I spend a lot
of my time in a
pencil box with
a bunch of
other colors.

We are all different. Some of us are sharper than others.
Some of us are long and others are short.

And then there’s Red. Everybody loves Red.
She’s been sharpened so much that now she’s stubby.

We are all supposed to be friends,
but I don’t feel like I fit in very well.

First of all, I’m Brown … not exactly a favorite color.
I don’t get to color a lot like some of the others.

I’m the tallest pencil in the box
because I rarely need
to get sharpened.

I don’t have much to smile about.
I’m Brown, tall, and all by myself
… that’s me!

I wish I could be like the
other colors: