Immortal Trees Bookshop weekly newsletter: Issue 16

Thursday, August 17

Hello, readers!

Happy Thursday to you! When I was driving to work today, I saw this license plate and thought of our awesome customers. Always sunny, always patient, we really do have the best type of people coming through our door, and that list includes you!

SALE EXTENDED!!!!

EEEEE!!! Jane Austen Book Club! This meeting is to help us figure out what book to start with (do we start or end with P&P?!?) and when would work best for our schedules. If there is interest, I'd love to discuss having tea and finger foods at our meetings, and maybe fan lessons...and maybe even simple dance lessons! We could make it as culturally immersive as we like by bringing a little bit of Regency England to our little bookshop.

Intellectual August Week 3:

"Paris is always a good idea" - Audrey Hepburn

Bonjour, explorers! This week we travel under the English Channel on the train through the Chunnel and over the French countryside to the relaxed city of Paris. Here we find pairs of people, arm in arm, strolling along the long, wide, sandy path down the middle of the Tuileries Garden. In the distance, you see a three-arched structure, and just beyond, a shiny pyramid made of glass. You have arrived at one of Paris' gems: the French Musee du Louvre! Originally a fortress, and then a palace home for a few centuries of royals (including King Louis XIV and Marie Antoinette), it eventually became a museum. A very big decorated museum.

I have two links for you today. One lets you float around in the different halls of the museum, and the other has a more intimate view of a small section called the Petite Gallery. (I like that this is the museum giving you a little sample of what they have so you want to see the rest in person!) On the website for the Petite Gallery, when you get to the 360 degree room of your choice, there are illuminated circles on the floor to help you advance to the next section. (In the first room, the circle is down the hallway below the name "Petite Galerie" up on the wall. Email me if you can't find it.)

I have had the pleasure of exploring this breathtaking museum in person, and it is truly an amazingly lovely building just by itself. They have even left a part of the palace in it original grandeur with its time-period polished furniture, delicately embroidered fabrics, and gilded ornate decorations. (I feel these rooms are a better example of royal extravagance than the rooms in the Palace of Versailles.)

Let me know if there is something you find that is noteworthy! I'm always interested in checking out what you find. Happy travels!

Reaching out to our community: Update

We are looking to reach out to more people through newspaper and magazine paid advertising and then hopefully hire a few employees so we can plan more events and programming for our shop. We are asking our community to help us out by spreading the word about our Go Fund Me account. You can read all about our shop and our plan to use the funds at the link below. (I took the previous really long-winded descriptions from previous newsletters out so I could add new stuff to this newsletter.)

Thank you, as always, for supporting us!

UPDATE: We have been talking with the West Valley View newspaper, and are scheduling a 1/8 ad hopefully to start in September. It will be about $250 a week to advertise (if we commit to a 6-month period), so any help you can give us will be applied to reaching out to a wider audience. We really need more customers to come to our shop so we can keep the doors open. Thank you so very much for your help. :)

Editor's last words: Everyone has a story

I keep my photos in Google Photos, so it sometimes offers up a slideshow or showcased photo. On Tuesday, it showed me photos from a year ago when Mr Bookshop, Aurora, and I left to drive Aurora to school in Utah. It was actually a smooth trip, she was walking on sunshine, and I took a lot of fun photos as we spent some last-minute quality family time together. (She is still thriving and adulting and being an awesome human, working her job and getting ready for her 2nd year at university.)

Some of you know, I joke about my poor memory, so having those photos pop up to dust off my brain was a real treat. It was sad because she was moving away, but super exciting for her big adventure. She was focused and ready, and you can see it in the pictures.

We don't ever know the impact a photo will have when we take it. Our lives are busy and we get distracted, and photos allow us the moment to stop, breathe, and reflect on events.

September is going to be Tell your Story September here at the shop, and we would like to invite you to join us. Next week, I will be posting a list of prompt words to inspire you to record a little of your day. You can do one per day (there are 30 prompts) or do a few a day or just do it 30 times. You don't have to feel obligated to finish it in September, but it might be a fun challenge. I will be taking a daily photo (which I plan on printing on my little Sprocket printer and sticking it in my traveler's notebook), but your options are only limited by your imagination. You could take a photo, draw a picture, make a doodle, write one line of text, write a poem, write a song, journal about your day, cook a recipe...anything. Just try to make it about YOU because it's your story you are telling. If 30 is too many, pick a few off the list that speak to you.

And then....on Saturday, September 30 - the last day of September - come hang out with us in the shop and share something from your month. Maybe you, Amy, and I can be in a photo together to finish out the month's photos.

We are hoping doing this little creative exercise will not only help you record a little glimpse of your life, but will help inspire you to keep logging what you do - what you think, feel, experience, taste, hear, watch - so your story will be recorded. You are important, and your story should be told. :)

Look for the list next week so you can start thinking and planning how you want to record things. Maybe a journal, maybe somewhere digital, maybe you want to get it printed in a bound book through Costco or Shutterfly, or maybe you want to use posterboard or canvas and make it a poster you can hang on your wall. I'm really looking forward to seeing how everyone plays with this challenge.

You are welcome to come in and bounce ideas off of us in the next two weeks as we count-down to Sept 1. And I will even let you get a sneak-peek at the list. ;)

Have a great rest of your week, you amazing people.

~ Charity and Amy (and Jack and Toothless)