Confetti Park Children's Workshop

Tag: tale

  • Storytime: Lafitte’s Restless Ghost narrated by Ted Lindsay

    Storytime: Lafitte’s Restless Ghost narrated by Ted Lindsay

    You’ve heard of Pirate Jean Lafitte, a French pirate who gained infamy in the bays and swamps off the Gulf of Mexico. He lived from 17080-1823. He is often featured in tales of treasure hunters and is part of many legends from Louisiana and Texas.

    Here is one that takes place in Laport, off the coast of Galveston Bay… in the 1800s, many years after Lafitte;s death. We learn thatt he ghost of the smuggler continually wanders the earth searching for a worthy inheritor. Only when he finds a person who is worthy can he at last rest.

    The story is narrated for you by Ted Lindsay of Mooringsport, La.

    We begin with a weary travel who is approaching an abandoned house at dusk, and he enters it to take shelter from the cold wind. He can hear the waves tearing at the bluffs of Galveston Bay…. After stabling his tired horse, he enters the old house and builds a fire for comfort.

    He wakes to find a strange man standing over him, who beckons him to follow. The weary traveler, in a stupor, is so commanded by the presence and entreaty in the eyes of the stranger that he does….

    The strange man says to him,

    “Here more gold lies buried than is good for any man. All you have to do is dig, and it is yours. You can use it; I cannot. However, it must only be applied purposes of highest beneficence. Not one penny may be evilly or selfishly spent. Do you understand?”

    I said “Yes.”

    Then the visitant was gone, and I was shivering with cold.

    What happens next? Listen to the full story as featured on Confetti Park!

  • Storytime: Coming Up Cajun by Carrie Delatte

    Storytime: Coming Up Cajun by Carrie Delatte

    Coming Up Cajun by Carrie DelatteIt’s Confetti Park Storytime! In this episode, author Carrie Delatte narrates her children’s book Coming Up Cajun, which is based on the true tales of two little boys growing up in the heart of Cajun Country.

    Full of nature, this sweet tale told in rhyming verse captures some of the wholesome outdoor activities, daily chores, and good times of Carrie’s own children.

    “From the green of the land, to the blue of the bayous, they made the best of their time in the splendour of a Southern youth,” says Carrie.

    The story is educational for how it captures all the activities that are part of daily life for kids growing up in the country, such as gathering eggs, trapping, fishing, hunting, loading bales of hay, tending livestock, paddling in their pirogues…. In addition, Coming Up Cajun is chock full of Cajun French vocabulary, and Carrie includes a handy glossary for readers’ benefit.

    Carrie DelatteBorn and raised in quaint Gheens, Louisiana, Carrie Delatte is the proud mother of four young children. She was brought up on a small farm off of Central Bayou Lafourche, and she enjoys southern living and the beauty of nature.

    Carrie was diagnosed at the age of seven with the neurological disorder known as Tourette’s Syndrome. Carrie has vowed to donate 10% of proceeds from each title she releases to the Tourette’s Association of America (formerly called the National Tourette’s Syndrome Association) to further assist in the search for a cure, research and educational purposes. Her one outlet from the daily life of a “ticcer” is her writing.

    Thank you so much, Carrie, for sharing your stories with Confetti Park!

  • Storytime: Foolish John, A Louisiana Folktale narrated by Ted Lindsay

    Storytime: Foolish John, A Louisiana Folktale narrated by Ted Lindsay

    jesterFoolish John is a literal-minded character who appears in American folk stories as a fool who always gets things right somehow. In Louisiana folk tales, he was called Jean Sotte, and he had many misadventures that resulted in happy outcomes despite all of his foolish interpretations of situations.

    A later year character who might have been inspired by the Foolish John stories is America Bedelia: “Everyone loves Amelia Bedelia, the literal-minded housekeeper! When she makes a sponge cake, she puts in real sponges. When she weeds the garden, she replants the weeds. And when she pitches a tent, she throws it into the woods!”

    In this Foolish John tale, which is narrated by Ted Lindsay of Mooringsport, Foolish John is sent by his mother to sell a cow hide. What does he do? He strings it up on a tree, like a sail blowing in the wind above the woods. The misadventure continues from there, leading to great riches for John.

  • Storytime: The Little Louisiana Pine Tree

    Storytime: The Little Louisiana Pine Tree

    Pine TreeIn this episode of Confetti Park, we hear an old folk tale told with Louisiana flair. This is the old-time tale of a little pine tree who cannot be satisfied with what she has. This pine tree wishes for new leaves, because she wants to be different from all the other pine trees.

    Somehow she gets her wish one night, and wakes up covered in different kinds of leaves. Then the little pine tree finds that she has different kinds of problems.

    If only this pine tree could realize how beautiful she is… We know that her green needles are so fragrant in the spring and summer. We appreciate the soft, quiet carpet created on the forest floor when she drops her needles. And we love the soothing song she sings when the wind blows through her needled treetop, high above us.

    If only we all could see our beauty, as others see it in us, and be happy with who we are.

    Thank you to Magpie Baccinelli for narrating this Louisiana folk tale for Confetti Park!

  • Storytime: The Ghost Tree by Yvette Landry

    Storytime: The Ghost Tree by Yvette Landry

    The Ghost Tree by Yvette Landry
    The Ghost Tree by Yvette Landry

    From the swamps of the Atchafalaya Basin comes The Ghost Tree, a tale so terrifying that children will never forget its warning, and will never look at oak trees the same.

    The story of three brothers who defy their parents on All Hallow’s Eve was written by musician Yvette Landry of Breaux Bridge. We are so delighted that Yvette narrated her spooky story for Confetti Park! It is a winner of the 2015 Louisiana Young Readers’ Choice Award.

    The story begins in her ancestral home, the small, somewhat isolated community of Isle Labbé, and ends in the swamps of the Atchafalaya Basin. Her grandfather tells her of an ancient Native American legend: A cursed tree that comes to life every Halloween. Unlucky travelers who stumble across the tree on that fateful night are never seen again. He would know after all, he’s the only one ever to survive an encounter with … The Ghost Tree.

    From her website: Yvette Landry grew up in Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, not far from the levees of the Atchafalaya Basin, North America’s largest swampland. It was in and around that swamp where she learned to hunt, fish, ride horses, dance, understand French, and tell stories.

    After earning a master’s degree in education and developing a successful teaching career, she began telling stories through song. The songs were a hit, and so was Yvette. Playing a variety of instruments in several Cajun bands, Yvette also fronts her own band.

    Her debut award-winning album titled “Should Have Known” was released in 2010. Over the past several years, Yvette has traveled the world and played countless cultural festivals from the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival to the GrassRoots Festival of Music and Dance in New York. She toured Russia and served as a Cultural Ambassador on behalf of the Library of Congress to perform at the Festival of Traditional American Music.

    Learn more about Yvette Landry’s music and stories and her marvelous career on her website, http://yvettelandry.com/.