The Pack Leader!
The Team
Aaron Fowler (aka Mr. Aaron) is a Nationally Credentialed Teaching Artist with Young Audiences, a Master Teaching Artist with Wolf Trap Early Learning through the Arts, and a founding Teaching Artist with Arts Partners Wichita. Aaron is a highly sought-after performing artist working in schools and libraries around the country with his interactive programing. Aaron has worked in the classroom for more than 37 years and loves accompanying folks in becoming their best selves.
Find out more about Aaron at aaronfowler.org
Bella is a yellow lab, and Choco is a chocolate lab, both of whom have both a Therapy Dog certification through Therapy Dog International (TDI) and a Professional Therapy Dog certification in Kansas.
As Aaron traveled around the country he worked in several classrooms and schools that had therapy dogs. In 2014 he decided to pursue getting a lab puppy and training it to work with him in the classroom. Bella was born on January 1, 2015, and Aaron picked her up when she was 10 weeks old. Choco was born in November 2018 and started his life with Bella at 8 weeks old. Best of buddies now.
These two really are the stars of the shows!
Peter Mader
Illustrator of the Bella and Choco book series
Peter Mader is an artist, teacher and naturalist. He lives with his wife Kari on a small farm South of Augusta, Kansas. He believes in peace, the power of art, music and the written word as conduits that bring folks to a better understanding of themselves and the world we all share. "I believe we are all looking for a balance between the love we know is real and the chaos that tells us it is not."
Lee Shiney
Graphic Designer and Layout
Lee is an abstract painter, kinetic sculptor, and mixed media artist. He has participated in numerous solo and group art exhibitions, mostly in the Wichita, KS and Kansas City areas. Formerly a lifelong Kansan, he and his Iowa-born wife moved permanently in 2016 to a 1960s-era school building in Arcadia, Iowa where he makes art full-time.
Find out more about Lee at leeshiney.com