As parents, we all read a lot of children’s books,” says Eau Claire resident Chris Seelen, who has an 8-year-old daughter and 5-year-old son. “Some are good; some are bad; but we’re the ones that have to buy them.”

And some parents end up writing them. In November, Seelen released his second children’s book, a 32-page, full-color book entitled The Great Big School Yard Good-Bye Waving Game. Inspired by his son’s class, who all returned his goodbye wave when he dropped off his son, Seelen’s book tells the story of a boy’s first week of school. To counter the main character’s fears, the father makes a contest of having the best goodbye wave.

“Writing the ending was a natural progression,” says Seelen. “The point of the story is that the kid makes friends.” The roles flip-flop when the main character has indeed made so many friends that he forgets to wave goodbye to his dad, who feels a little sad, until the character shares his biggest goodbye wave yet.

“It’s been a blast,” says Seelen, who has always enjoyed writing and thought this would be a good project to share with his kids.

In 2005, Seelen published his first children’s book, Daddy Is That the Best You Got? for his daughter Josie. The book, about a father trying to find a bedtime story so his daughter can fall asleep, shares some similarities. “They both involve a playful contest between parent and child,” says Seelen. The repetition of the parent trying and playfully acknowledging defeat engages children and is creative enough to hook parents.

“My philosophy is to write a book that parents will want to read and buy, and that kids will enjoy,” says Seelen.

Both books are being sold at the Eau Claire Borders and Seelen promotes them by reading to area schools and kindergarten students.

“It’s fun for them to see an author,” says Seelen, who also mentions the delight he has taking 20 minutes out of his work as a local attorney to sit in a classroom of five-year-olds.

Asked if there was a third book on the horizon, Seleen jokes, “I’m running out of kids. I’ll need to borrow one for my third book.” Though brimming with ideas for more stories, Seelen wants to focus on his first two books, continuing his readings at area schools and increasing his marketing area outside of the Chippewa Valley.

“At the end of the day, I do this for fun,” says Seelen. “If you try to make money out of it, it isn’t worth it.” Yet Seelen hopes that a distributor would pick up his books and he could save his time for writing. “I’d love to have a book come out every year.”

Though working full time, Seelen took a little over a year to publish his book. “The story idea comes very quickly,” says Seelen. When he finished hammering out the story, he hired UW-Eau Claire student Jessica Scheberl to illustrate. For about three or four months, the two met at Acoustic Cafe to go through illustrations, ideas, and revisions. Then Jill Olson of J. Olsen Typography did the graphic design work and documentation, about a 10-month process of putting words and pictures together.

“I’m happy that it’s 100 percent a Chippewa Valley product,” says Seelen, who even owns the publishing company JoBen Books, LLC with his wife Becky. “It’s fun to put together a professional product with everything right here.”

Chris Seelen’s books are available at Borders, 4030 Commonwealth Ave., Eau Claire. If your school or business would like to schedule a personal reading, contact Seelen at jobenbooks@charter.net.