Red Deer Rebels coach draws on life as a hockey dad for his first book

Children's book written by Clayton Jardine about his daughter learning to skate. (Source: Clayton Jardine)

An Alberta hockey coach can add author to his resume – inspired to write his first book while looking at his favourite photo of his daughter.

Clayton Jardine is the assistant coach for the Red Deer Rebels. The 35-year-old started his coaching career in 2015, working with several teams over the years, and never thought he would add children’s book author to that growing list.

“I had that thought in the back of my mind of always writing a book, and I didn’t think it’d be a children’s book,” Jardine recalled, saying he had toyed with the idea of writing about his coaching career until a photo he took of his daughter carrying her skates over her shoulder flipped a switch.

“We were on an 11-day bus trip and I was sitting around the bus with nothing to do, and I just started … writing and writing and writing,” he said, describing how the book all came together on a bus trip with the Rebels.

The book titled Piper and Her Brave Little Skates is a story about his three-year-old daughter lacing up for the first time and learning to skate.

“Every hockey parent has gone through it where your kid might last five seconds or five minutes or five hours on the ice,” Jardine said about the challenges of teaching your kid to skate. “That’s the joy of the day-to-day and seeing how much they love it (eventually).”

His wife Lindsay also helped with the editing of the book, and is working on another book about their two-year-old daughter that will be released in a few months.

“Our second book about our second-born is going to be a complete comedy because that’s the personality she is,” Jardine added.

Piper and Her Brave Little Skates can be found on Amazon.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Shelby Clarke