The idea to use Homestar Runner for a children's book came while Mike and Craig were in a bookstore, and commented on how "terrible" the children's books were, prompting the idea to create their own. They spent around two hours designing the look of Homestar Runner, Pom Pom, Strong Bad, and The Cheat, and completed the book within a day. They only printed about five to ten copies to share with friends, and had no intention to publish it. However, they had no idea that their father had sent out the book as a manuscript for submission to about 80 different publishers, but they only got rejection letters back, if anything. They later used the Super NES video game "Mario Paint" to create the first cartoon featuring the characters.