Sparkle Stories Blog
A home for Sparkle audio stories, crafts, recipes, and kind words!
Sparkle Weekly Wonderings: Maple Syrup
Stories of maple syrup: collecting sap, boiling it, and tasting it — but if you listen closely, you’ll hear the other kind of sap running, too. The magic transformation of spring manifests not only in the natural world … but also in our children.
Friday's Kind Words: Part of Our Breakfast Routine
My son just got a Sparkle subscription for his birthday and now it’s part of our breakfast routine to listen to another story! ~Elizabeth
Sparkle Craft: Maple Watercolor Notecards
If you're feeling wistful for this late-winter tradition, give this week's craft a try. These watercolor notecards use maple syrup as a base to make the paints swirl into lovely patterns and shapes.
sparkle kitchen: warm kale salad with maple dressing
This warm kale salad with maple dressing is one of our favorite lunches for a yucky winter Saturday afternoon
Storybox Playlist: Stories of Maple Syrup Magic
In the northeastern U.S., there is not more powerful symbol of the coming spring than maple syrup. We trudge through the snow, tree to tree, to tap a little bit of each tree's running sap. The taste is not only sweet, but filled with promise, resilience, and possibility for the season ahead!
Sparkle Weekly Wondering: Dry Gables - Good Neighbors
Today we launch a third Dry Gables collection: “Good Neighbors.”
Friday's Kind Words: Quiet, Settled Space
We love Sparkle Stories! It is something I've been sharing with my seven-year-old son for a few years now and we both enjoy the stories and the quiet, settled space that it helps us create. ~Beth
Exploring the Dry Gables Series - "Get It Done!"
The Enneagram is a complex and meaningful model of human personality. It offers us a road map in helping us to identify who we are at our best and what blocks us from a place of happiness and greater ease. Here we explore it through one of our own Sparkle Stories collections.
Dry Gables: The Stories and How to Use Them
Dry Gables is a unique series of stories centered around the people who live and work in a Victorian era small town in South Dakota. Each of the nine characters embodies a way of being in the world — with unique behaviors, motivations, and fears.
Sparkle Craft: Clothespin Race Cars
Perhaps it's because our family just finished our first season of pinewood derby, but I can readily identify with Jane's deep dive into learning about cars. What makes them go faster? Is aerodynamics important? Or is it all about weight? The research and reading and testing is fascinating.
Sparkle Kitchen: Leek and Sausage Soup
Inspired by the leek sausages that Marta has to leave when she's called to help with the conflict in this story, this soup is hearty and warm, but — between the leeks, spinach, and lemon — also just bright enough to make you think there might be a hope of spring coming soon.
Storybox Playlist: The Stories Behind Dry Gables
The Dry Gables Collections are a delightful and engaging series of stories about a Victorian town in South Dakota — but did you know the stories were constructed to help you better understand your child?
Story Support for Parents and Teachers
What makes Sparkle Stories ... Sparkle Stories? What makes us different than, say, children’s podcasts? or audiobooks? or Disney? or Netflix Kids?
The Mission of Sparkle
This week we are focusing on "What We Are Really Up To" over here at Sparkle. We're talking about the core of who we are and what we do: our mission.
Bauer Baby Hat DIY Tutorial
Whether you're nesting yourself or you know someone who is, this little hat is adorably sweet on a new baby. Follow the instructions in the Sparkle Craft Tutorial to get started!
Why Storytelling Is Way Better Than Lecturing Your Kids
There is an alternative parenting technique that is hardly new. It has been used since our species could speak, and it is not only effective, it is delightful: storytelling. We are wired for it — literally. The neuroscience is conclusive — we use stories to build our realities and make sense of them.
Sparkle Kitchen: Birthday Pancakes
These birthday pancakes are a great way to kick off the next special day in your family. The recipe isn't extraordinary — just basic pancakes — but, by using a squeeze bottle to make notes or drawings in the batter, you can make these pancakes an extra-fun birthday morning surprise.
Storybox Playlist: Sparkle Mission — What are We Really Doing?
We believe that stories are not only powerful but are truly the language of children.
Sparkle Weekly Wonderings: Strength
In addition to celebrating warrior women, powerful queens, and defiant girls, let us also celebrate the kind of strength that is currently transforming this country and the world: the total strength of the feminine.
Friday's Kind Words: A Smooth Transition from Screens
Your podcast has made the transition from being a TV family to being a (mostly) screen-free family so smooth because he LOVES the podcast.
