LUSCIOUS CHAOS

I asked her what she planned to do with her life & she said she was way beyond that point already. I’m just happy I remember to be there when it happens, she said.

Life Plan

#storypeople #my life

∞ 04/30/12 at 01:46pm

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I don’t know how long I can do this, he said. I think the universe has different plans for me & we sat there in silence & I thought to myself that this is the thing we all come to & this is the thing we all fight & if we are lucky enough to lose, our lives become beautiful with mystery again & I sat there silent because that is not something that can be said.

Different Plans

#storypeople

∞ 12/01/11 at 11:24am

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via storypeople.com

reasons why I will never stop subscribing to StoryPeople emails:

OMG (Don’t you love it that you know what that means? We all have arrived in the 21st Century.) We have so many fun things to tell you, we can’t even fit them all in one email…

Before we do that, though, we’d like to tell you how our StoryPeople holiday season all started with Occupy Wall Street…
You know these past few months? It seemed like everybody was Occupying Everywhere. We wondered what we could occupy. But it wasn’t that easy, because we live in a small town in Iowa & all the good spots were pretty much already taken. (Just so you know, there are the folks who occupy the Back Home Bakery every morning & other folks who occupy Ruby’s Café & Mabe’s Pizza. Mainly any place with coffee & fresh baked goods…)
There was only one place left that we knew of: StoryPeople. Which worked out, since we were already there & had a good supply of treats close at hand.

But, somewhere along the way, we figured out that Occupying StoryPeople wasn’t the point. Somewhere along the way, we figured out that the real point was to Occupy Your Own Life. How to take back the wild, exuberant moments. How to feel them beating softly in the palm of your hand. How to know in your heart of hearts that being in your own life is the most precious thing there is.

Occupy Your Own Life. Now, that was something to get excited about…

We have to tell you it looked a lot like playing & laughing & swirling around the studio making up all sorts of new things.

Here’s some of what we came up with:

1. This year’s Holiday Ornaments. This one we’re going to blame on you, because so many of you kept pestering us starting back about June, asking if we were going to do another ornament. So, we did. Six new ones, to be exact. Four of them are wood & two are wire, so they’re almost like mini-versions of the big StoryPeople sculptures. Click here if you want to see them right now for yourself…

Even though we were sort of occupying StoryPeople at the time, none of these ornaments were made under protest. Each of them is made by hand & with love. Which brings us to a very important point: there are only 200 of each ornament. We could probably make up a good story about why we stopped at 200, but we’re not going to, because the truth is pretty simple. We got distracted by other stuff that seemed just as fun, so instead of suffering & slogging through more, we all laughed & said Ta-dah! We’re done.

(Staying happy is mainly about paying attention to when you’re not happy any more & then doing something that makes you happy again. We call this Rule #1 for Occupy Your Own Life.)

2. Then, there are the new board books for your favorite small people. (Or for your favorite big people who like small people sitting in their laps while they read together. Or maybe just for you. Especially now that you’re a key player in Occupy Your Own Life. Yippee!) They’re three of your all-time favorite Brian Andreas stories made into brightly-colored books.

(You know the calendar things we did a few weeks ago? Think that same bright colored paint-on-board look & you’ll have a good start on what these books are like. If you haven’t seen our calendar-like things, take a peek here. Or go straight to the board books right here.)

There’s so much more, but we’re just going to list them & let you go check it out if you’re interested:

3. Like 20% off on all prints (Not including Create Your Owns) through December 26th
4. Or the 10% off special if you get three of the new Board Books.

5. Or Off The Wall

6. Or our first children’s book, The I Love You More Book.

Ornaments. Board books. Specials galore. They all add up to lots of ways to get great stories from all of us here at StoryPeople. Feel free to drop by www.storypeople.com any time & see for yourself.

That leaves just one more thing.

We’d like you to take a moment before you dive into this holiday season. Close your eyes. Check in with yourself & see if you’re Occupying Your Own Life. Take a deep breath & look around & see the other people who are standing there with you, arm in arm. Savor the love & laughter & wild moments of this life you have right now.

Occupy Your Own Life. Because you can. Because that’s where you’ll find the really great stories. (We can’t wait to hear how it goes…)

As always, with love,

The Crew at StoryPeople