I was jumping on the couch with scissors. The reason I remember is because I didn’t do things like that. I was the oldest kid, the responsible one. Abundance had made me sturdy, with thick, auburn hair and wit enough. I did chores, made A+’s on school papers, and watched the “little kids.” I was…
Here at Story Warren we like to talk a lot about encouraging holy imagination in children and for good reason: Both the culture without and our inherent weakness within militate against seeing the world through the prism of God’s perspective. Today, though, I want to talk about something different. I want to talk about holy…
It’s been a while since I could write for the Story Warren because of our conferences. My mind is still a big puddle of gray goo because of them, so I’m going to write about something I’m watching happen right now, a little creative drama played out in my son’s life. I just want to…
If you have children between the ages of four and ten, I commend to you the Bible Story Book by Elsie E. Egermeier, who sounds like a Dr. Seuss character, but isn’t. Originally published around 1922, Elsie’s (can I call her Elsie? Egermeier is SO hard to spell!) book provides a chronological overview of the…
I lived in Africa as a child/young man and there’s a part of me that has never gotten over the African sky and the beautiful people I knew. So, when I received a guest post submission from a missionary there, I was eager to pass it on to you. Alan Howell and his family live…
We have great hopes for our children’s lives. We want them to love well, so we create opportunities for them to serve others. We want them to be wise, so we invest hours in purposeful, thoughtful conversation. We want them to desire truth and goodness, so we offer tantalizing tastes of the eternal banquet found…
Some time ago, my oldest son did something that got him in big trouble. Â He received stern discipline, and a few days later, he did it again. I called him into my office and closed the door. Â I crouched down to look at him, and I asked him if he knew why he was in…
Note: I wrote this over a year ago (though it hasn’t been previously published). That’s why the ages are all wrong and I’m even balder now. Why haven’t I published it till now? Well, it’s more intimate and self-revelatory than I’m usually very comfortable with. (I am, as that one man once said, a man.)…
I’m bad at keeping up with trendy ideas. I only recently ran across an idea from 1898, written by Daniel Burleigh Parkhurst in his still-respected book, The Painter in Oil: Talent is just another name for the love of a thing.” But I’m a quick learner, and soon found an essay by Seth Godin, which…
The Blizzard came and transformed the city. Before the snowploughs and the footprints and the salt and the dirt could arrive, I got up early to capture it. I stepped out of my apartment—and into Narnia. Complete with lampposts. Everywhere, everything was brimming with light. Beauty that catches in your throat. Sudden brightness—shining in the…
There was a bad storm rolling, so we piled in the basement to wait it out. As far as I can remember, I was five, which means it was probably the spring of 1977. Your grandparents have always been fond of simple, self-driven entertainment. They respected me enough to believe I could find something worthwhile…
Take a peek at our event coming up on March 23 in southern West Virginia for kids aged 7–12 (featuring our own, illustrious Zach Franzen–creator of the image above). It’s called: Illustrate Your Imagination: A Workshop For Kids Who Love to Draw. Check it out. And now, a movie. This short film won an Oscar…
