“I envied the owl. It could go wherever it wanted, and I was trapped in a ghost’s boat on the river”
Illustrator Noel Lunceford, 9, for A Lasso for Adagio by Julian March, 12.
Published September/October 2003.

A note from William Rubel

A few weeks ago I put out the call for Stone Soup-aged bloggers. Several of you responded and so I am very happy to announce our first young bloggers live on the Stone Soup website:

Lukas Cooke, today writing about nature;
Jessica Crocker, who brings us a sewing blog beginning with a tutorial on how to sew a book cover;
Sarah Cymrot, writing today about Ray Bradbury’s novel, Fahrenheit 451; and
Leo Smith, who is writing about sports, beginning with what he wrote at the end of the summer regarding the trade options for Kyre Irving.

Welcome, bloggers! All of us at Stone Soup love to see your first blog posts and look forward to what you will be sharing in future.

And, there is always room for more. Blogging can offer some of you writers a venue for writing on a much wider range of subjects than we publish in the monthly issues of Stone Soup. If others of you are interested in blogging, let us know by posting a free submission or suggestion to our blogging category.

Meanwhile, do please visit our new bloggers and leave them a comment.

Teacher bloggers wanted

We are also interested in hosting blogs by teachers with strong creative writing programs. If that is you (and you know who you are) please write to me or post a proposal to the blogging submissions category above, and we can talk about blogging possibilities. The main thing we ask is that you be consistent with posts–something like once per week to once per month.

Halloween contest!

When I was a child, Halloween was for little kids. This is no longer the case. Where I live, in Santa Cruz, California, about 8,000 adults gather in the downtown on Halloween to show off their costumes. It is amazing! Pumpkin carving has also developed from the very simple triangle-shaped eyes to fantastically evocative or elaborate pumpkin creations. Get ready to document your Halloween. We want to see your pictures of your creations, your costumes, and your experiences of Halloween 2017.

I’ll remind you again next Saturday and, of course, the contest will end on November 1, so please take this as a first reminder and an invitation to start sending us your pictures for a special Halloween context gallery on our website. Just send them into our Artwork submissions category and include the words ‘Halloween 2017’ in the title.

Until Next WeekWilliam

From Stone Soup
July/August 2007

Ellie’s Market

By Alice Mar-Abe, 11
Illustrated by Emina S. Sonnad, 12

“Alexandra! Alexandra!” came the excited voice of my younger cousin Clara from the hallway. “You get to take Max and me shopping for Halloween costumes!” I smiled at her seven-year-old excitement as I stepped out into the crisp autumn air, filled with leaves in a hurry to get to the ground. Halloween was coming, and that meant lots of shopping to be done, and that meant I would get to go to my second favorite place in the world: Ellie’s Market.

A delicious aroma of pumpkin spice wafted out as I pulled open the door and the cheery jingling of bells met my ears. I had arrived at my second home, and at the counter was my best friend, Cecil, who owned Ellie’s Market with his brother Harry You couldn’t exactly romp and play with Cecil the way two kids would, and that is what many people remember doing with their best friends, but in a way Cecil was even better. He was almost like a grandfather. Oh yes, I had other kid friends, but hanging out with Cecil was fun…/more

Saturday Newsletter: October 21, 2017