Family Storytelling Program: Wild Rose and Other Stories of Plants and Flowers

LOCATION: The Studio

Cost: $20 per family, includes refreshments.

Register Now!

Laura Simms and Beatrice Bowles celebrate our connection to nature and to the wisdom of falling in love with the Earth.

Laura Simms is an award winning performer, writer, and educator advocating storytelling as compassionate action for personal and community transformation. She performs worldwide combining ancient myth and true life story for adult and family audiences.  She is the Artistic Director of the Hans Christian Andersen Storytelling Center in NY and the founder of The Center for Engaged Storytelling (new).   She has been  a Senior Research Fellow for the International Peace institute at Rutgers University Newark under the auspices of UNESCO.  As a spokesperson for storytelling she presents keynotes and workshops in conferences, villages, schools, universities and community events. She is a member of the Therapeutic Arts Alliance of Manhattan, and a senior teacher of Shambhala Buddhist meditation.  Laura received the Brimstone Award for Engaged Storytelling, CHOICE award for best story collection and Sesame Street’s SUNNY DAYS award for work with children worldwide. In 2011 she recieved a Life Time Achievement Award from the National Storytelling Netwrok.  She is co-faculty with Terry Tempest Williams’ at University of Utah, consults with ETSU’s CANCER STORIES project, and is spoken word consultant for Foundations, NGOS working in post disaster and conflicts. She recently appeared at the Newark Peace Summit and the Conference on World Peace and Values in Monterrey, Mexico. Her Most recent book is OUR SECRET TERRITORY: The Essence of Storytelling (Sentient Publications, June 2011).  She is completing a new work:  THE SANCTUARY OF A STORY (TBA).  Laura is the mother of best selling author Ishmael Beah.

Beatrice Bowles tells stories in schools, museums, and botanical gardens across the country and on radio and the internet. Her CD/audiobook, “Cloudspinner and the Hungry Serpent” won a Storytelling World honors award in 2015. Bea is also a dedicated gardener and artist.

Stories told by Bea Bowles are featured in the new Audible audio series, “Story Party”

Story Party is a family-friendly audio series featuring tall tales, folk tales, rabbit tails and everything in between. Full of live performances from the most imaginative storytellers around the country, children will feel like they’re a part of the audience as they listen, sing and clap along. This series is perfect for a long drive with the whole family, perhaps through the woods to Grandmother’s house. Or maybe just a short trip (with a dose of unexpected gridlock) over to the soccer game.

Beatrice has recorded 5 CD/audiobooks of fairy tales and nature myths, and is weaving “Spider Grandmother’s Web of Wonder,” a storybook illustrated with flower photographs by Ted P Kipping. She has performed in schools and gardens across the country and in Europe, and at Louisville’s Festival of Faiths.