What do butterflies, a happy cactus and colorful geometric shapes have in common?

According to the creative minds of Mesa’s youth — bikes. The city of Mesa’s bicycle and pedestrian program and Mesa Public Library recently announced the winners of Mesa’s first Bike to Books design contest. Young local artists submitted more than 90 unique designs to the contest, according to a release.

Mesa transportation department and Mesa Public Library staff reviewed and voted on all the entries. Three winners were selected from each of the three age categories and they are:

• First place, pre-K to second grade — “Fairy Lane” by Nora Jaeger.
• First place, third to sixth grade — “Readers Are Leaders” by Holly Hom.
• First place, seventh to 12th grade — “Like Flying” by Josephine Smeets.

To get a better look at all the winning designs, go to mesalibrary.org/biketobooks.

Grand prize winners will have their art installed on a Mesa shared-use path. The city of Mesa’s transportation department’s striping crew will do the installations using thermoplastic and propane torches.

Second and third place winners received bicycle safety gear and bike themed gift bag and all nine finalists received recognition and a certificate signed by city of Mesa officials during the City Council meeting on Sept. 19. The nine finalists are: Nora Jaeger, Burns Sabey, Violet Swenson, Holly Hom, Kailee Killingsworth, Gwen Swenson, Josephine Smeets, Claire Bachrach, and Venise Wang.