A Light to Hope By (pastel) by Leticia Cheng, 10; published in the November/December 2023 issue of Stone Soup A note from Tayleigh Greene Dear readers, As a kid, I remember spending entire days of winter break curled up reading by the light of a lamp not unlike the one so beautifully drawn by Leticia Cheng, 10, pictured above. These days, it’s rare that I have the opportunity to devote several hours in a row to reading; the many to-do’s of adulthood keep me busy. By the time you read this newsletter, I will have flown from my current home in Houston to my childhood home in California, to spend time with my mom, dad, and three brothers. I am so looking forward to being there with them, and I’m also looking forward to the “getting there.” I love flying because I have the rare chance to read without distractions, no chores to take care of, no internet. This holiday break, I hope you, no matter what age you are, devote some time to the simple pleasures that we tend to neglect, like curling up with a good book—or the latest issue of Stone Soup. If you’re not yet subscribed to Stone Soup, I am so excited to announce that we’re offering 50% off print + digital annual subscriptions for a limited time only. Enter the code happyholidays! at checkout to save on the magazine 100% written and illustrated by kids. This is an incredible deal; a sale of this scale won’t be offered again for a while. So, if you’re in need of some last minute gifts for the kids or educators in your life, there’s no better present, and no better time than the present. Looking ahead to 2024, I’m pleased to share that we’re offering an all new fiction writing workshop with long-time Stone Soup instructor Conner Bassett. Fiction Writing: Six Beginnings, Three Middles, and an End will meet Saturdays, January 27 through April 6, 2024 from 11:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Pacific time. Tickets are selling quickly, and space is limited, so I encourage you to register as soon as possible to secure your spot. Warmest wishes, P.S. As 2023 comes to a close, so does our Annual Drive. If you’re able to, please donate today using the button below and help us empower kids to be the authors of their own stories. Purchase a Gift Subscription Register for Writing Workshops Support Stone Soup 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.
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Saturday Newsletter: November 25, 2023
égalitariste (watercolor) by Verona Hofer, 12; published in the November/December 2023 issue of Stone Soup A note from Diane Landolf Dear readers, I hope those of you in the U.S. had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Now let’s all get ready for another kind of celebration! It’s our annual student reading, and everyone’s invited! On Saturday, December 2, at 11:00 am Pacific/2:00 pm Eastern, Stone Soup is hosting a virtual reading by students in our Stone Soup Writing Workshops. Join our student authors—along with their friends, family, teachers, and the workshop instructors—as they read their favorite pieces aloud. The online event is free, but a reservation is required. To reserve your spot and find out more about the reading, click here. If you participated in one of our workshops in 2023, we’d love to have you participate in the reading. Please submit the piece you’d like to read via Submittable under the category “Annual Writing Workshop Reading” by November 30. The maximum reading time per author is five minutes. We can’t wait to hear your work! Registration for our 2024 workshops will open soon, so check back for information about course offerings and how to sign up. With an open heart and a very full stomach, Register for our Annual Reading Submit your work to our Annual Reading From Stone Soup November/December 2023 Within the Stars by Mia Atkinson, 11 Olive didn’t know how long she’d sat on her bed staring at the stars. They were so bright that night, shining like thousands of little suns in the sky. It brightened up the window next to her bed, its paper-white curtain fully open. Olive sighed, a sound like a balloon deflating. She felt like that. Ten years ago, Olive had sat on this very bed, holding her breath and silently praying to the stars as her husband took his last breaths from a fever. They were too poor to pay for a doctor to come to their house, and going there would just take too long. That was when she lost her husband. That was when she became no one. That was when she became just an old woman with frail hands. Just. Olive wiped away a tear, staring at the full sky. The wind through the open window tickled her cheek as she stared out at the stars. She imagined that they were reaching out to her, glowing brightly. Her husband was up there too, waving at her and telling her that she would be all right, even though they both knew she wouldn’t. Not without him… Click here to find out what happens next. 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.
Saturday Newsletter: May 20, 2023
We interviewed critically acclaimed author Joanna Ruth Meyer as part of Fifty Years of Excellence: From the Archives. Illustration by Madeline Clark appeared alongside Joanna’s short story “The Hummingbird” in the May/June 1998 issue of Stone Soup. A note from Sage Millen Hi everybody! As you probably know, this year is Stone Soup’s 50th anniversary. Because Stone Soup has been such an important part of my life over the past five years (I was a frequent contributor and am now an intern), I wanted to do my part to ensure this wonderful organization has the resources to keep going for another fifty years. So, in about November of 2022, I started brainstorming fundraising ideas with my mom. We settled on a silent auction. My family had held two successful auctions in the past to raise money for Canuck Place Children’s Hospice. Not only did the events raise money, they were also really fun. To start, I picked a date several months away so I would have time to plan everything. Then, I sent out an email to almost everyone my parents and I know, explaining my initiative and asking for donations of handmade items we could sell at the auction. I also made several items to contribute, such as some cards with my photos on them, a loom-knitted toque, and some jewelry. I was very lucky to have such an artistic and generous circle of friends, because I received over fifty items! The next step was to create auction sheets; these include a photo and description of each item as well as the person who donated it, and space for bidders to fill in their bid amount and contact information. Before the event, I shared this document with everyone we had invited so those who couldn’t attend in person still had a chance to bid. The night before the auction, I closed access to the document; the online bidding was over. Then, I helped prepare our house for the auction by cleaning and setting up the items on tables and mantelpieces—even the piano. My mom and my nana made a variety of treats and snacks for guests to enjoy. Finally, people started arriving. I walked them around the house, showing them the various items, including knitted caps, weavings, paintings, baked goods, books, and even services such as gardening and pet photoshoots. We also set up a stand of Stone Soup issues by the door so people could see what their money was going towards. Soon, our house began to fill with people chatting and making bids, while my dad played soft music in the background. After an hour and a half, we ended the auction. People gave us the bidding sheets for the items they’d won along with payment and we gave them their item. Overall, we raised $1,748 CAD! That’s a much higher sum than what I was hoping for, so I’m very proud of the result. I also had multiple people tell me what a fun event it was, and how they were excited to learn about Stone Soup and would be introducing it to the young people in their lives. I had a great time hosting the auction, and I would recommend a similar project to anyone who wants to raise money for Stone Soup, or any other cause in your life in a fun way. However, it does take a lot of work—I was very lucky that my parents (especially my mom) helped me a lot with the process. Luckily, there are many other ways to raise money that also require less planning—there’s nothing like a good, old-fashioned lemonade stand! I wish you the best of luck in your future philanthropic endeavors. Donate to Stone Soup today! A note from Emma Wood On behalf of the whole Stone Soup team, thank you, Sage! We are grateful for the work you put into this auction and the money you raised for Stone Soup, but also incredibly proud of you. This is what Stone Soup is about: empowering youth to act now. To all the young people reading this, know that you can do things that matter now. You don’t have to wait until you’re out of college to publish your writing, to write a book, to have an exhibit for your artwork, to raise money for causes you believe in, to start organizations or a literary magazine; you can do that all now. We believe in you, and we are here to support you. On that note, I am really excited to share a project that my colleagues and I have been working on since January. We have been tracking down and interviewing historical contributors to the magazine—contributors who are now grown up. Until a few years ago, submissions were received via snail mail, and no emails were collected. And, for much of Stone Soup’s now-fifty-year history, personal email didn’t even exist! In the intervening years, many of these former contributors have married and changed their names, moved cities or states, and pursued professions outside of the arts. So you can imagine this was quite a challenging project. It is still ongoing. However, we have been able to connect with a number of former contributors, whom I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing about what Stone Soup meant to them and about what they’re up to now. These interviews have confirmed that Stone Soup has truly been succeeding in its mission to instill confidence and authority in young people, and that a Stone Soup publication is something many carry with them throughout their lives—in many cases literally as well as figuratively. I spoke with one former contributor from the 1970s who still had her original issues of Stone Soup! My colleague Tayleigh is publishing the interviews on Instagram and Facebook—they are truly inspiring, and I encourage you to check them out, and to follow us on social media so you can continue to see these inspiring interviews as we post them. I encourage you to also be sure to read
