Friends,

I’m sharing a request from the Express-News for a good story on Dia de los Muertos.

Please contact Elaine if you feel your story would be of relevance. Thanks! Elena

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Dear friends,

I need your help in finding a few sources for upcoming holiday stories.

My most pressuring request is for someone with a good story to tell on Dia de los Muertos. Perhaps you lost someone this year or even years ago that you will honor on Dia de los Muertos with an altar in your home. Perhaps you know someone you makes a pilgrimage each year to the gravesite of a loved one and decorates it. The story is for Nov. 2, so I need to find someone quickly. Please e-mail names, phone numbers, etc. of possible sources asap.

Next, I’m doing a story for Thanksgiving on giving thanks. It will invite readers of the Express-News to send in remembrances of letters and cards they’ve received over the years that express thanks for things great and small. We’re hoping to unearth stories in which people expressed thanks for major events in their lives, as well as little things that illustrates simple kindness. We’re hoping to find thanks in old frail paper, and old photos to go with them. Etiquette experts say that such notes and letters are a lost art, but your mom or grandmother might have something in their photo albums. Perhaps there are some of you out there who never thanked someone, but know you should have. That kind of story might work for this. To kick off the reader participation feature, I need to find at least one really good story of thanks to show what we’re looking for, so if you know someone who has a wonderful old thank you letter in their archives, please let me know. I’d love to feature them.

And, for Christmas, I’m doing a story on a family with a huge Nativity scene in their home. My editor would like me to feature a couple more. There must be other people who stage Nativity scenes for the holidays, so if you know of one in your family, or neighborhood or your church, please let me know.

Thank you so much for your time. I hope to hear from you soon.

Elaine Ayala
Features Writer
San Antonio Express-News
(210) 250-3402
eayala@express-news.net

Read Elaine’s blog on Latino news and features at http://blogs.mysanantonio.com/weblogs/latinlife/