March 21, 2026
EXCLUSIVE!
Read this amazing story, Blue as the Aster Flower, by Cora Ruth Kutcher.
Blue as the Aster Flower
1918
In her room, Anne Brigham flipped through her book. Painted pink, her turret room contained a canopied bed, a white coverlet draping it with a quaint design of roses clustered together.
Putting her book back on the shelf, Anne picked up a framed photograph of a young man in a soldier’s uniform. Although the picture had no color, Anne knew the shade of those twinkling eyes, blue as the aster flower, just like hers. She knew also the dark hair color, her own, a rippling river of hazelnut, a perfect resemblance to her father’s, only longer.
Anne fought back tears as she clasped the only picture of her father to her breast. She remembered the last hug he had given her, wrapping his strong arms about her, whispering, “I’ll be home soon, dearest.”
That had been a year ago.
Suddenly, she heard a bird. The sweet, lilting song lifted Anne’s spirits, and she returned the picture to its memorial place and swept over to the window. Though the night was settling over the forest, this little robin was still awake, giving the woods a last revelry before dark.
Anne smiled to herself. “Yes, little robin. Through all this turmoil, you have been joyful.”
Minutes later, hurried steps sounded on the stairs and George burst into the quiet room, causing the robin to take flight. Anne turned and was about to reprimand her brother, but the pale face of George stopped her. “Quick, we’re leaving. That explosion we heard an hour ago was a bomb a few miles from here.”
“Oh, Georgie! No, I can’t.”
“Get your things, only the nec-essities,” and then George left.
Anne opened the closet and ran her hand over the silken dresses. She picked the humblest one and exchanged her dainty evening slippers for a pair of old boots. Taking the bed sheet off her bed, she wrapped her belongings: one old dress, a pair of stockings, a brush, a straw hat, and a few shillings from her secret account under her mattress. Giving a last glance around the room, Anne’s eyes fell on the picture. Tears clouded her vision. No, she couldn’t take this. If they were caught, her family could be killed if they saw her father in his English uniform.
“Anne!” Pricie cried, “Come down here!”
Anne memorized every detail of her father, then ran, locking the door to her room and putting the key in her pocket.
In the kitchen, Mrs. Brigham ladened her children’s sacks with provisions. Then, they all crept out the back door and their mother locked it. She slipped the key under the back stairs underneath the cinderblock.
“We will return soon, won’t we Mother?” asked George.
“We can only pray, dear,” and then Mrs. Brigham locked the gate.
Then, they left. Only the nighthawk saw them depart, four shadowy figures slipping down the drive, and it whistled a sad farewell to the heavens that only Anne understood.
1948
Anne lifted a finger to her lips to silence them, though none had been speaking, as if they had entered a holy place. “Look, there it is.”
There it was indeed, the Villa Brigham, weather-torn and dilapidated, but the house. Anne darted ahead and fell to her knees, a most un-ladylike posture. Putting her hand underneath the cinderblock, she felt the key there and brought it out, catching many cobwebs as she did.
Old Mrs. Brigham gasped. “Oh children! I never thought it would be here.”
It was Anne who opened the back door. The kitchen was dusty, plaster from the ceiling covering the floor. Anne stepped into the hall and stood with a reverent air, looking at the place the stairs had used to be. The top floor had collapsed, causing a wave of dust to mingle in the air. Bringing out her handkerchief, a habit she had acquired, Anne wiped her eyes. Her home, more destroyed than she had imagined it, was not the stately Villa Brigham she had loved as a little girl.
Anne remembered leaving here so many years ago. Her father’s picture had sat so proudly on her shelf and now was lost—just like him. Anne’s heart ached to see her father’s picture once more. That photo had been taken just before he had left to fight. Every day after his death, Anne had gathered asters in his honor, woven them together for a flower garland and draped them around the silver frame of his picture. Asters had been his favorite flowers and Anne had been named after them. Mr. Brigham had said that when he first looked into Anne’s blue eyes, the name had come to him in a flash: Anne Aster Brigham. Her mother called her Anne, but to her father, she had remained Aster. If she closed her eyes and thought back thirty years before, Anne could still see him, plain as if he were in that moment. Anne covered her face with her handkerchief.
At last, taking her handkerchief from her eyes, Anne watched as sun peeked through an upper window. The rays fell on the heap of rubble that had been the upstairs, illuminating a rectangle of silver. . . stuffing the handkerchief in her pocket, Anne clawed her way through the rubble, recognizing the canopy bed to be her own, despite the splintered legs and frame. Clambering up and over a shelf with rotting boards and drawing her hand quickly from a moth-eaten silk dress with a pretty blue sash that she remembered wearing to her cousin’s wedding, Anne, at last, closed her hand around her prize. Dusty and grimy, the piece of glass was cracked, but inside was the same man, blue eyes twinkling, lips smiling. It was her father.
“Mother! Look what I’ve found!” shrieked Anne, wading out of the sea of debris, cutting herself on a broken windowpane, and flying through the door. The warning creaks of the floor were unheard in her hasty flight.
Her mother met her in the kitchen. “What, Anne? What is it?”
Anne thrust the frame into Mrs. Brigham’s hands.
She remembered looking at her father one last time. It really had been the last time, for a month later, they had received news that John Brigham had been killed.
“I remember that night,” whispered Anne, “Oh Mother! I wanted this very thing, just to see his face.”
Anne could never explain it for as long as she lived, but every year, when other things began to die and wilt, she would find the last remaining aster flower, always as bright and lively as if it had just bloomed.
ASA QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“A volcano? John, we do not do Christmas.”
—Asa, to John, as John was making a volcano out of Play-Doh.
BIBLE VERSE OF THE WEEK
You shall not wear a garment of different sorts, such as wool and linen mixed together.
Deuteronomy 22:11
Editor’s Note: Merrilee is quite infuriated that people did not wear socks back then.
DAD JOKE OF THE WEEK 😖
provided by Dad (John-David) Warren
Q: What is the difference between swine flu and bird flu?
A: One requires oinkment and the other requires tweetment.
AD
Join our fun writing contest! All ages are welcome. There will a prize for the first-place winner! If you would like to enter the writing contest, see page A5 for more information about the contest (such as the rules and more about the prize). Send in a dad joke to shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com (officially licensed dads only). Dad joke requirements: must be as terrible, groan-y, yet still hilarious as possible. (This may seem impossible, but dads do it every day)
BREAKING NEWS
WATER APPARENTLY ‘NOT WET’
According to Elliott Garrett, age 9, water is actually not wet. Apparently it just makes stuff wet somehow. Elliott insisted that rain is not wet. Of course if Elliott said it, it must be right (ask Miss Gena about the giraffe incident), so we looked it up and apparently ‘wet’ is when a liquid sticks to a solid surface, which would technically mean that water, in fact, is not actually wet. We are incredibly confused. What does this mean? Is fire not hot? Is ice not cold? Is Jelly Bean not chompy? Are goats not ESCAPE ARTISTS?!?! It seems that all the logic in the world is upside down. To learn more, contact shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com.
EXCLUSIVE!
WRITING CONTEST
Because of a wonderful idea from Cora Ruth Kutcher, age 13, we have decided to hold a writing contest for the Shabbat group. Participants of all ages are welcome. The story can be as short as you like, but it cannot exceed 1,000 words. All genres are fine. Your story must be submitted to shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com by Saturday, April 11. The contest stories will be published in the ninth issue on April 18. Do not include your name on your story to keep the contest impartial. You are also not to tell anyone which story you wrote. Everyone will vote on the story they think is the best. You can send in your vote to shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com. The author whose story receives the most votes will have their name mentioned and story re-printed in the tenth issue, as well as receiving a twenty-dollar gift card of their choice. If you have any questions, please contact the editor at shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com for more information. Thank you so much for participating!
Tip for your story: Think about the audience you are writing for. Everyone gets to vote, so try to write something that everyone will enjoy.
SHABBAT GROUP BIRTHDAY SECTION
Evelyn Morris: Turned 8 on March 16, 2026
EXCLUSIVE!
KOALAS OR CHICKENS? SURVEY
Merrilee Warren, age 12, is very annoyed that apparently most people like koalas better than chickens. Koalas aren’t even useful! And chickens are way more cute! AND they lay your breakfast! Chickens are way better than koalas. Which one do YOU think is better: koalas or chickens? Send in your vote to shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com now! We will announce the winning animal in the special edition Passover issue on Thursday, April 4. Thank you for voting! (Do not forget to vote for chickens or Merrilee will be very grumpy.)
BREAKING NEWS
UHHHH CALL TO ACTION
Merrilee Warren, editor of the Shabbat Group Times newsletter, has recently been researching things that newsletters have, because hardly anyone has been sending in stories and articles. (Sad!) Apparently news-letters have “calls to action”, so Merrilee is going to call everyone to the action of sending stuff to shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com so that we can publish it in the newsletter! Yay! So far our only contributors have been Gabby Carriere, age 18 (see issues 4 and 6); Elliott Garrett, age 9 (see issue 5); Elijah Sansing, age 14 (see issue 6); John Warren, age 10 (see issue 6); and Cora Ruth Kutcher, age 13 (see pages A1—A4). That is only SEVEN PEOPLE if you count the editor and co-editor (Jelly Bean)! Now compare that to the 1,700 contributors of NEW YORK Times! We only have 0.4% of that! Please contribute! We would really like it! This is a community newsletter—we want everyone to be in it!
LOCAL HEROES SECTION
This is our list of this week’s heroes! If you know any local heroes, please send in their name to shabbatgrouptimes@gmail.com so that we can put them in this section next time!
- Cora Ruth Kutcher
Known Heroism: Wrote a very awesome story for Shabbat Group Times (see pages A1—A4) AND came up with great idea for awesome writing contest (see page A5)
- Sam Morris
Known Heroism: Is kind even when the other boys are kind of mean to the girls
- Asa Warren
Known Heroism: Waaaaiiiiit a minute…
LOCAL VILLAINS SECTION
- Jelly Bean Warren
Known Villain-ness: Being incredibly chompy (see issue 6)
- Merrilee Warren
Known Villain-ness: Illegal gambling with dead lightbulbs and acorns (see issue 6)
- The Stinkin’ Goats Warren
Known Villain-ness: Having breakfast that was actually the peach tree
- Those Six Chickens Mrs. Adrianna Gave Us Warren
Known Villain-ness: Escaping chicken fence
Note: Melissa Warren nominated the last two villains.
NOTICE
Due to the fact that no one has been sending in any news lately (except for Cora Ruth, for which we are infinitely grateful), Merrilee must resort to adding in her story, Superdude and the Amazing Heroes, to this week’s issue. We warn you: it is incredibly boring. If you do not like incredibly boring things, please run and hide and don’t read this story. It is not funny, not exciting, and not fun at all. Do not read it. Merrilee advises that you skip over it. Great idea, Merrilee! Go read something else! (Unless you are an adult, in which case you probably LIKE boring things.)
* * *
SUPERDUDE AND THE AMAZING HEROES
Superdude was an awesome superhero. He was Superman’s barber’s dog walker’s nephew’s sister’s best friend’s third cousin twice removed. He had three super-powers and was the leader of a group of superheroes called W.D.H.N (We Don’t Have a Name)
It was a very awesome group. Superdude’s three powers were the ability to stay up all night without getting tired (as long as he went to bed at eight PM every night), the ability to breathe underwater (as long as he’s not wet), and the ability to turn invisible (as long as no one’s looking at him.)
His group consisted of five other superheroes: the Communicator, Toothpick, Cheeseman, Mindreader, and Wings. The Communicator had the power to speak any language, as long as he had learned it first. (He had learned one whole language—English!) Toothpick could make one toothpick appear out of thin air once every two months. Cheeseman could melt cheese with his hands. Not anything else. Just cheese (but YOU can’t melt cheese with your hands, can you, now answer me THAT). Mindreader could read anyone’s mind, as long as they were thinking about dumpsters. And Wings could fly as high as she wanted, as long as she was in a plane.
Together, the group kept the world safe. They hadn’t actually fought any crime yet, but it was probably because the villains were to scared to attack when a bunch of brave superheroes were around!
One day, a terrifying group of one-inch tall villains tried to take over the city! Superdude and his friends got together to discuss the problem.
Mindreader narrowed her eyes. “We must stop these fiends!”
Superdude flexed his giant (no, they were not actually giant) mus-cles. “Brilliant plan, Mindreader! Time to rid the world of these foes!”
“…which we were planning to do already?” Wings pointed out. No one paid attention.
“Alright,” the Communicator announced. “Now that we have decided to actually fight the evil villains, we must hatch a plan! Fojhbnvjmosv!”
“Which language was that?” Toothpick asked, poking his teeth with a toothpick.
The Communicator smiled slyly, his eyes fixing on Toothpick. “It is not a language. I made it up.”
“I knew that,” Toothpick said.
Wings yawned. “I’m tired. Here’s the plan: we go to bed and take a nap while the bad guys take over the world.”
“Good idea,” Cheeseman said. “I’m pretty tired, too. You guys, I literally ate a whole bag of chips earlier. All that work completely drained all my energy.”
Superdude slammed his fist on the table, which was actually pretty hard, so he jumped up and started going oof! Oof! “We are not giving up!”
“Uh, we never started in the first place,” Wings said. “We just said we would. We can turn that into a lie.” . “But we’ll need a lie machine,” the Communicator said. “Oh, I know where we can find one! Yijnqv[nutvqvyqtniothq!”
“Which is where?” said Cheeseman.
The Communicator sighed. “Ah, my dear boy—you must learn one day in life that there exists no such place as ‘Yijnqv[nutvqvyqtniothq.’”
“But…” Cheeseman said.
“Now is not the time for potty humor!” Mindreader cried. “We must unite! WE SHALL NOT GIVE UP!”
“Please can we give up? I’ll give you a cookie.” Wings said. Mindreader began to drool.
The puddle of drool became so big that it flooded the room, and the doors burst open. The six heroes floated outside, all wearing scuba diving outfits.
The wave of drool swept them through the streets, and they ended up right in front of the one-inch tall villains.
One of the villains pushed his way forward. “I am mmm, the leader of the Bad Guys!”
“What?” Superdude asked.
The villain frowned. “I am mmm, the leader of the Bad Guys.”
“Sorry?” Mindreader said.
The villain’s face turned red. “I AM mmm, THE LEADER OF THE—”
“Okay, okay!” Cheeseman interrupted. “You don’t have to yell.”
mmm launched himself at Cheeseman. “You will pay!”
Cheeseman tried to shake him off, but he was too weak. A moment later, all of the heroes were tied up.
mmm stood on top of Super-dude. “We have won!”
ddd and fff, mmm’s sidekicks, burst into ant-laughing. That was when Superdude realized—
“Hey! You guys are ants! Ants that just tied us up!” he cried. “THE BAD GUYS ARE A BUNCH OF ANTS!”
“That’s right!” mmm yelled. “And now we’re taking you to the Dungeon of No Picnic Food!”
Superdude threw back his head. “No!”
mmm snickered. “Yes!”
“No!”
“Yes!”
“No!”
“Yes!”
“No!”
“Yes!”
“No!”
“Yes!”
“No!”
“Yes!”
Superdude got tired of talking and fell asleep. mmm rolled his teensy little eyes.
ddd marched over and started to drag Mindreader and Wings to the dungeon with her tiny little ant-hands.
Mindreader started to sniffle. “No picnic food? Not even one tiny sandwich?”
“No!” laughed fff evilly. mmm gave him a low five (they had to do low fives because they were ants and seriously how would they do a five up high).
When they got to the Dungeon of No Picnic Food, Mindreader started to cry. Superdude had a great idea.
“Cry some more! Let’s flood our way out of this place!” he said.
Mindreader gave him a dirty look, then fell to pieces. Wings patted her on the back. “There, there.”
The water rose higher and higher, and the heroes floated closer and closer, and I kept using the same word over and over.
Of course, one of the heroes could breathe underwater (not naming any names), but he could only do that if he wasn’t wet. And he was very very very very very very very wet.
The Communicator’s head bumped the ceiling. “How was flooding the room a good idea?”
Wings swam around in circles like a little wafer. “I don’t know! And we’re going to drown!”
Mindreader gave Superdude a haughty look. “Nice going, Superdude. Look what you just did.”
Superdude made bubbles with his mouth. “I can get us out of this!”
Cheeseman fell asleep in the water.
The Communicator tried to make him wake up. “Ah! Wake up! Abybbpybep8nioioiouioaslnhopanwvownyovapnvojdhjaptpapwomwpao!”
“COMMUNICATOR YOU’RE BEING RIDICULOUS” Mindreader yelled.
Cheeseman woke up with a yawn. “What did I miss?”
“Oh, nothing, we’re just about to drown,” Toothpick said. “Maybe we can have yellow flowers at our funeral. I always loved those.”
“Quit thinking about funerals!” Wings snapped. “WE NEED TO GET OUT RIGHT NOW!”
Mindreader sniffed. “No. I refuse to get out unless you give me a cookie.”
“Literally where would she get a cookie?” Toothpick asked.
“Plus it’d be all soggy,” ddd added.
“What are you doing here?” Wings demanded.
ddd shrugged. “I wanted to come watch you all drown.”
Toothpick held up his hands, and suddenly, a toothpick appeared.
He ducked underwater and unlocked the lock. Water gushed out of the dungeon.
ddd scampered up the wall. “Hey! I almost got wet!”
“Tough!” snapped ooo, another ant. “You SHOULD be worrying about the fact that the PRISONERS ARE ESCAPING!”
ddd’s tiny jaws dropped. “No! We have to go get them!”
The two ants ran out of the room, and Superdude and his friends raised their eyebrows at each other. They were still sitting in the Dungeon of No Picnic Food.
“Oh, well.” Wings got up and hurried down the pathway. “At least those ants don’t know where we are.”
“Or do we?” Five ants named jjj, lll, iii, kkk, and www jumped down from the ceiling.
“Ha! You’re outnumbered!” called Wings.
“Or are we?” Two more ants, uuu and eee, jumped down. jjj laughed. “You’re going down!”
Well, it turned out all of these ants had not actually been practicing their fighting skills lately, and Superdude and his friends actually won. Can you believe it?
So anyway, the six heroes escaped the ants. But then they were caught by qqq, mmm’s daughter!
qqq glared at them. “Go away! We don’t need you to be ruining everything!”
Superdude looked at his friends. “That sounds like a pretty sweet deal. Anyone agree? I’m tired. Wings was right.”
Cheeseman, the Communicator, Mindreader, Wings, and Toothpick all raised their hands.
Superdude shook qqq’s miniature hand (one of them, anyway. She had six). “We’ll be going now.”
qqq nodded. “Good.”
And so the superheroes went home, and they vowed to never fight crime again.
Also ants took over the world.
THE END
Moral of the story: Do not ask a bunch of superheroes to defeat ants. They will lose.
EXCLUSIVE!
If you for some reason liked THAT story, then here is a preview of Merrilee’s novel, Traveler.
“We can’t teleport to the moon!” Lionel insisted. “There’s no oxygen!”
“SO?” Poppy said with a roll of her eyes. “We use SPACESUITS, OBVIOUSLY.”
“Do you own a spacesuit, Poppy?” Lionel asked dryly.
Poppy looked taken aback. “No”—her eyes brightened— “but we could STEAL some!”
“Steal spacesuits?” Lionel cried. “From where?”
“NASA, of COURSE!” .
“NASA?” Lionel looked more horrified than Aisling had ever seen him. “Do you have any idea how heavily guarded NASA is? We would be caught in half a second!”
“Hm…” Poppy scrunched up her eyebrows. “Maybe we could try the gift shop…”
“I really don’t think I could teleport to the moon, Poppy—especially not with the two of you,” Aisling said apologetically, trying extremely hard not to laugh. “I’d probably end up passing out in the middle of the sky and plummeting back to Earth.”
“I guess you’re right,” Poppy said sadly. “Oh, well. But you can teleport! Still! This is the best thing that’s ever happened ever! I know I already said that but STILL!!!”
Lionel glanced at his watch. “We should probably get going. We have to finish our book reports for English.”
“BOO,” Poppy grumbled. “English is so BORING. This is WAY more exciting. Wouldn’t our teacher understand if we explained it?”
“Oh, sure,” Aisling said dryly. “’Hey, we couldn’t do our book reports because we just discovered that I can magically teleport. Sorry. Maybe next time.’ I want to keep it a secret, Poppy. Please don’t tell anyone.”