As the world begins to open up again, Girl Pride International is looking forward to developing our current projects and creating new ones. We are a New York State registered nonprofit organization in the process of receiving our 501(c)(3) status, and have an active board who is intensively working to help make our vision a reality. We are always on the lookout for dedicated students and adults to help us on our journey, and have open arms for any partnering organizations who may want to collaborate and help further our vision. Currently, GPI is developing projects and collaborating with other organizations and nonprofits to assist Afghan refugees, especially young women and girls, in settling into the Long Island and greater NYC area. We believe now is a pivotal time to lead by example and with our actions to make the Afghan people feel welcomed and safe, and to let them know they belong and have a stake in the United States and the democratic values we hold. By mobilizing our communities, near and far, Girl Pride International believes we can have a great impact on refugees around the world, and by fostering a culture of acceptance and proactive empathy and inclusion, with a special focus on the disproportionately marginalized young women, we hope that together, we can make: “Today’s Girls, Tomorrow’s Leaders!”
Stone Soup Magazine for young readers, writers, and artists
Saturday Newsletter: November 20, 2021
Monochrome | Ashley Jun, 13 (Short Hills, NJ), published in Stone Soup November 2021 A note from William Firstly, congratulations to our Stone Soup editor, Emma Wood! Her most recent book of poems, The Real World, has just been published! Reading Emma’s poetry is a great way to get to know her better! In the same spirit that I ask you to support our young authors by buying their book, please support Emma by purchasing The Real World. You can pre-order it now. The book will be shipped to you on its official publication date. Open House Our second annual open house is on Tuesday, November 30 at 4 p.m. PST. Clicking on the date will add it to your calendar. This is your opportunity to meet our staff, ask questions, and share with people at the meeting. Everyone is welcome! Last year we had a good mix of students and adults attending. We look forward to seeing you! Until next time, Highlights from the past week online Don’t miss the latest content from our Book Reviewers and Young Bloggers at on our blog! Georgia, 12, wrote a review of Lucy Worsley’s novel The Austen Girls, which is this month’s featured novel for the Stone Soup Book Club. Mihika Sarkar Omachi, 12, published a brilliant comic strip about a trip she took to Bali with her family. From Stone Soup November 2021 The Mourning Dove By Meital Friend, 13 (Brooklyn, NY) There was a mourning dove sitting on our roof. Well, sitting might not be the right word. Most of the time, we say one word because a better word doesn’t exist. For example, if there was a word that meant there is a bomb whistling toward your family and all you can do is wait for the explosion which will ruin your life, then the nurse with purple lipstick would have said it, instead of just “I’m sorry.” And how do you receive an apology when you can never accept it, even if you pretend you can? Most of the time, people act like apologies are gifts the apologizer is giving to the person they’re apologizing to. But, looking at the shiny purple lips of the nurse, I wondered what to do with her apology. When you have a gift you don’t want, do you still have to write a thank-you note? I guessed you did. So, I just told the nurse, “It’s okay.” I think that was maybe the first lie in an avalanche of lies. Or maybe it wasn’t. But there was a mourning dove sitting on our roof. And the reason that I wasn’t sure that sitting was the right word, is that it wasn’t moving at all. Usually when people sit, they fidget, or move their head around if they’re a bird. But the mourning dove wasn’t moving at all. “Why won’t it move?” asked Aunt Jasmine, trying to pretend everything was normal despite the traces of tears on her cheeks that proved the opposite, looking up at the beautiful bird. It really was beautiful, with its gray-brown feathers with smudges of purple, and eyelids a brilliant blue green. But I didn’t want beauty. Or maybe I did. “Maybe it’s dead,” I said, in a voice that didn’t sound or feel like me. The words didn’t sound or feel like me, either. Continue reading here… Stone Soup is published by Children’s Art Foundation-Stone Soup Inc., a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit organization registered in the United States of America, EIN: 23-7317498. Stone Soup’s advisors: Abby Austin, Mike Axelrod, Annabelle Baird, Jem Burch, Evelyn Chen, Juliet Fraser, Zoe Hall, Montanna Harling, Alicia & Joe Havilland, Lara Katz, Rebecca Kilroy, Christine Leishman, Julie Minnis, Jessica Opolko, Tara Prakash, Denise Prata, Logan Roberts, Emily Tarco, Rebecca Ramos Velasquez, Susan Wilky.
How Stories Work—Writing Workshop #22: Eating
An update from the twenty-second Writing Workshop with Conner Bassett A summary of the workshop held on Saturday November 20 In preparation and celebration of Thanksgiving, this week we focused on the time honored tradition of eating. We began by looking at a couple different paintings: The Feast of Dives by Master of James IV of Scotland and The Potato Eaters by Van Gogh. Both paintings exalted the poor and therefore the hungry, while the former in particular represented the act of eating as a sort of monstrous excess, which was also found in Mound of Butter by Antoine Vollon, Vertumnus by Giuseppe Arcimboldo, and Hotdog in #NYC by Valery Jung. By way of literary examples, we looked at the poem “Eating Together” by Li-Young Lee and “Eating Poetry” by Mark Strand. The former we found to display eating as communal and ritualistic, whereas the latter associated eating with animalistic and demonic traits. The Challenge: Write a story/poem in which people are eating. Think about what food symbolizes in your story/poem. The Participants: Penelope, Nova, Lina, Alice B, Audrey, Emma, Shilla, Josh, Ethan, Svitra
