The Attack of the Christmas Lights by Eliana Pacillo, 12 (Walpole, MA) published in Stone Soup December 2021 A note from William Wow! It’s Christmas! The end of another strange year. I am in Los Angeles visiting a friend. I had planned on being in Egypt! I’d like to extend a special thanks to Emma Wood for another year of brilliant work as editor-in-chief of Stone Soup and judge of our annual Book Contest. Thanks to our fabulous staff — Sarah Ainsworth, Laura Moran, Caleb Berg, and Tayleigh Greene. Jane Levi has just left the company. Thank you to Jane for extraordinary work these last few years helping to shepherd the magazine. Thanks to all of you who have supported our 2021 Annual Drive. As we have mentioned, we are starting a big push to get Stone Soup back to self-sufficiency. We have this amazing $25,000 matching gift so everything you give between now and the end of the year is matched, doubling the value of your gift. I think the best ending to the 2021 newsletters is to leave the last word with one of our writers. I hope you enjoy this reading of a poem by Emma Hoff, one of our students. As this poem was written during one of our Saturday writing workshops, all the time she had to write it in was 30 minutes! Until next year. Highlights from the past week online Don’t miss the latest content from our Book Reviewers and Young Bloggers at Stonesoup.com! Sarayu B., 11, wrote a gripping personal narrative about the time their grandmother was hospitalized with COVID-19. Analise Braddock, 9(Katonah, NY) From Stone Soup December 2021 Parallel Christmas By Analise Braddock, 9 (Katonah, NY) Parallel lines don’t stop. Christmas doesn’t stop. The snow sticks and not a light flicks out. Not a curve or a bend in a parallel line. The time ticks and tocks for Santa. Comes and goes for Christmas, but the lines of Santa’s are forever. Get ready, hang the stockings. Set out the cookies and milk. Light up the tree for a parallel Christmas. 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.
Christmas
A New Christmas Tradition, a poem by Eleanor, 13
Eleanor Dagan, 13 (Bethesda, MD) A New Christmas Tradition Eleanor Dagan, 13 Singing, dancing, musical instruments playing, The season of joy, and of red and green Every year at Wes we do a magical Christmas show, the spirit is filled with songs, performances, and instruments blasting through the gym The carols begin, the echoes chime in, the trumpets play and the clarinets follow everything is in sync, everything is perfect Things have changed things are not the same, the new Christmas tradition was on zoom, glitches occurred, but we made it work, sound squeaked, Echoed and yelped but we made it work, we made it work, like we did in the years past, we made it work in a new Christmas tradition.
Flash Contest #26, December 2020: Create a piece of art in any style, inspired by a family tradition – our winners and their work
Our December Flash Contest was based on our weekly creativity prompt #130, a wonderful creative challenge issued by our Stone Soup intern, Anya Geist, asking you to make a piece of art inspired by a family tradition. Needless to say, given the time of year, we received lots of entries based on holidays, including Christmas, Chinese New Year, and Navratri, plus some regular family traditions that go on all the year round. As well as encountering a diverse range of traditions, we also received works of art in many, many styles and media: collage, drawing, oil on canvas, knitting, models made in paper and clay, paper cut outs and digital art. It was really exciting to see the range of materials and cultures represented in these stories from your families. Well done to everyone who entered, and thank you for bringing us so much holiday cheer! And thank you Anya, for a great seasonal prompt! In particular, we congratulate our Honorable Mentions and our Winners, whose work you can appreciate below. Winners Rangoli by Prisha Aswal, 8, Portland, OR Family of Pirates by Paris Andreou Hadjipavlou, 7, Nicosia, Cyprus Knitting up Memories by Audrey Hou, 11, Portland, OR Chinese New Year Windmill by Sophia Li, 9, Redwood City, CA A Paper Chinese New Year by Serena Lin, 10, Scarsdale, NY Honorable Mentions Chinese New Year by Yuxuan Jiang, 11, Portland, OR Secret Santa with my Sisters by Lucinda Mancini, 8, Glenside, PA Soaring in the Sky by Jessie Zhang, 9, Portland, OR Christmas Chaos by Joycelyn Zhang, 10, San Diego, CA Paper Art by Alexis Zou, 13, Lake Oswego, OR Prisha Aswal, 8Portland, OR Rangoli Prisha Aswal, 8 In our family, we celebrate a lot of traditions from all the cultures. One of my favorite festivals is Navratri, and during this festival we have a tradition of making Rangoli. Navratri occurs just before Diwali (the festival of Lights) and is celebrated to mark the victory of Good over Evil and Light over Darkness. A Rangoli is a colourful design, made on the floor near the entrance of the house, to welcome guests. Usually people make it with powder colors or colored chalks. It is usually made in a circle and then a pattern is repeated to complete the circle using bright colors. I love making Rangoli with my parents. For this project, I chose to make a Rangoli on canvas. Since Rangolis are usually round, I really wanted to use Earth as my design . It was not easy for me to make it perfectly, so I decided to go with an outline and chose red color to fill the land because red is the color of Love. I also put an oil lamp in the center as Light means knowledge and drives away darkness. I added Namaste, Hola, Bonjour, Ni Hao and Hello, to show that even though people speak different languages , their feelings are the same. Around my Earth, I used bright and colorful patterns and then colored the rest of the canvas in midnight blue to show the universe. Rangoli for Navratri by Prisha Aswal, 8, Portland, OR Paris Andreou Hadjipavlou, 7Nicosia, Cyprus Family of Pirates Paris Andreou Hadjipavlou, 7 Due to quarantine we have developed a family tradition of dress up. In this one we are dressing up as pirates, to hunt for treasure and explore the seas. . . Family of Pirates by Paris Andreou Hadjipavlou, 7, Nicosia, Cyprus Audrey Hou, 11Portland, OR Knitting up Memories Audrey Hou, 11 Knitting up Memories by Audrey Hou, 11, Portland, OR Sophia Li, 9Redwood City, CA Chinese New Year Windmill Sophia Li, 9 I made this for fun and gave it to my mom. It’s a Chinese New Year windmill that means good luck and health. I wrote thank you in Chinese on it and drew a dragon. Chinese New Year Windmill by Sophia Li, 9, Redwood City, CA Serena Lin, 10Scarsdale, NY A Paper Chinese New Year Serena Lin, 10, Scarsdale, NY My family is Chinese and we celebrate Chinese New Year every year. My artwork is made by hand with paper and clay, representing Chinese New Year. A Paper Chinese New Year by Serena Lin, 10, Scarsdale, NY
