Story Owls

Another weekend gone! Time has been flying faster than the Concorde! This week we were busy getting kids ready, to get ready for school. Pranathi’s son has the first day of his first school today! The weekend before the one gone by,  we had a fun story telling session in Cubbon Park! It was a lovely, magical section of the park, just off the beautiful Red Brick library. We were under the raintrees and cotton trees, so the green grass had specks of almost cloud like cotton everywhere. The shade of the trees made everyone forget that it was a really hot day! We had two stories for our young clients. The first one was a classic, “The Best Nest” by E.L. Reid. It has been a favourite book for us, and Shilpa was the proud owner of her own copy, one she’s been reading since she was a child! The second one was a fun rendition of “The Birds and Pancakes”. As our little clients and their children started arriving, they all settled comfortably under the shade of trees, we start...

We rang in our last event for the month of April with a birthday party. The birthday boy a 5yr chirpy young fellow is an enthusiastic story listener. Our main challenge was to keep a group of 15 kids of age group 4-5 yrs engaged. As this age group would get bored easily with just words , we had to work on a story which would make the story telling interactive . We finally shortlisted "The Lion King" for the event. This was a story that the birthday boy hadnt heard of. On the day of event it took us hardly a few seconds to gather the kids. All of them were looking forward for the story telling (seems it was mentioned in the invite). As we started with the story telling we realized that none of the kids had seen the movie and were all new to the characters in the story. This worked in favor for us. We slowly unfolded the castle rock scene with "Circle of Life"...Soon the kids were engrossed with Simba and his antics, hyenas laughing all around the room, relatin...

World Book Day just passed by. Our earlier goal was to start our Book Review series on this blog on that auspicious day. However, the work week got hectic and so Storyowls bring you the first book review, a couple of days late. Expect a book review every week henceforth :)  The Book: The Lion King The Author: Don Ferguson Appropriate age group : 3 to As long as you want to read! The first time I heard about this book was when I was tuned into Radio and they were playing "Hakuna Matata"... I fell in love with the concept of 2 words turning into a problem free philosophy. Most of us would be familiar with the movie. The book pretty much is a summary of the movie. Lion King is all about this young lion cub Simba who is born as a future king to the animals of the Pride Rock! He is quite a carefree, brave guy who enjoys going on adventures, with his friend Nala a lioness cub, to prove that he can handle everything but then keeps falling into trouble.  ...

Early last week, we got to celebrate a dear little four year old’s birthday party, with some fun and stories, at the local Pizza joint. Speaking to our client’s mom, we got to know that there are two things that he loves! One was Thomas the Train, and secondly, Paw Patrol! He loves Paw Patrol so much, that his birthday was themed on it. Given this brief, we decided to dig into our bag full of stories to see what was it that he would love to hear.  Our obvious themes would be trains, and pups with personality. Finally we chose two stories. One, about a toy train with dreams of riding on the moon and another, about this naughty pup called Wagz. Although the stories were pretty small and easy read worthy, we decided to add the special StoryOwls magic to it. A couple of practice sessions with our most critical audience (our children) and we knew our client and his friends would love it! On the day of his birthday, the children started arriving at the party. They were...

It was a dark night.. pitch dark.. all the street lights were out.. no moon.. The wind was blowing fiercely. There was a slight drizzle. In the dimly lit room, he got up to get ready. He quickly dressed himself  - in black. Black shirt, black trousers, black boots, dark glasses.. Who was he?? Zeeeem Boooom Baaaa... He stepped out, locked the door behind him, and stealthily went down the stairs - tock, tock, tock, the sound of his boots, amplified by the silence in the neighbourhood...  Now what did he do...? this Zeeeem Boooom Baaaa.... He crossed the road..  and walked towards a motorbike - a black motorbike. It was parked near a bush. He sat himself on the bike and wore his helmet. And turned the ignition on. Chugh, chugh, chugh. It was silent again. He tried once more to start the bike, and failed...Again, who was he?? Zeeeem Boooom Baaaa... What did he do now... This Zeeeem Boooom Baaaa? He lifted his head and looked far ahead, as if waiting for something to co...

On warm days like it is today, even watching the screen of the computer as we type away seems to make the temperatures rise! Wouldn't it be so much better sitting with a large bowl of ice cream and looking at pop-up books ?  Reading a book before going to sleep is a routine we've been following for a long time now. My daughter's current favourite, is a book called " The Magic Box ", a pop-up book. A story, but not a story.  We have read the book together so many times that she practically knows every word I say (which means I have to be consistent), and every single object on the popped up page. I don't mind reading it as many times as she wants. (Yes, motherhood has given a near infinity level of patience) and every time we read, there is scope for improvisation. The book talks about the endless possibilities of adventures with a carton box. Every time we read, we are talking about the endless possibilities of each scenario. A pir...