The Paper Riot Store

The story behind "Amazing Grace."

John Newton spent years working on slave ships, and for a time he captained them. He later left that life, became a minister in the English village of Olney, and in his later years wrote against the slave trade.

He wrote "Amazing Grace" to go with his sermon on New Year's Day, 1773, and it was printed in 1779. The tune most of us sing it to wasn't paired with the words until the 1830s, here in America.

Where do you remember first hearing it sung?

This page is in Bold and Easy Hymns of Grace, fifty hymns drawn big enough to color, from The Paper Riot Store.

Peak leaf week across most of the country, and the eight pages in the Cozy Autumn Pack are the only ones I've drawn that you can't buy anywhere.

They aren't in any book. A pumpkin wheelbarrow, a hedgehog among the leaves, a basket of apples, a sweater laid out flat. Drawn as a set, not pulled out of something else.

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Link in bio.

Your turn. If this page were on your table right now, what would you color first: the roses, the gate, or the path?

And what color are those roses going to be?

The page is "In the Garden" from Bold and Easy Hymns of Grace, from The Paper Riot Store.

The story behind "It Is Well with My Soul."

In November 1873, Horatio Spafford's wife and four daughters sailed for Europe ahead of him. Their ship sank in the Atlantic. His wife survived. All four girls were lost. Her telegram to him began with two words: "Saved alone."

He sailed to meet her, and after that crossing he wrote the words so many of us know by heart: "When peace, like a river, attendeth my way." Philip Bliss set them to music, and the hymn was first printed in 1876.

Which line of this one stays with you?

This page is in Bold and Easy Hymns of Grace, fifty hymns drawn big enough to color, from The Paper Riot Store.

First thing I've ever published that isn't a coloring book.

Big Print Autumn Word Search is seventy-five autumn puzzles set in capital letters 8.5 millimeters tall — a good deal larger than the type in a standard puzzle book. One puzzle per two-page spread, so nothing is crowded onto half a page. The answers at the back are written out in plain words instead of printed as a shrunken grid with circles drawn on it, which is the part most large-print puzzle books skip.

Same reasoning as the coloring books, applied to a different kind of page. Large print has to include the small stuff — the answer key, the instructions, the page numbers — or the words on the cover don't mean anything.

222 pages, 8.5 x 11, $4.99 for the PDF. Paperback on Amazon.

Link in bio.

Activity directors and care staff: what's your go-to quiet activity for a fall afternoon?

Ours is a word search a resident can do without help. Big Print Autumn Word Search gives every puzzle its own page, with capitals 8.5 mm tall, so nobody has to squint or ask for a magnifier.

Buy the printable once and print a copy for everyone in the room, as often as you like.

Try a free sample page first: thepaperriotstore.com/free-coloring-pages/

"Bold and easy" has no official definition, which is why it's now printed on the cover of books that are neither.

What I mean by it: outlines thick enough to see from arm's length, shapes open enough that a marker tip isn't a precision instrument, one subject per page instead of six, and single-sided paper so nothing bleeds into the design underneath.

What it doesn't mean is childish. Backyard Birding has forty North American birds in it and a fact about each one. The drawing is bold. The subject is for an adult.

Longer version is on the blog.

Link in bio.



https://www.thepaperriotstore.com/blog/what-is-a-bold-and-easy-coloring-book/

Which hymn could you still sing all the way through without the hymnal?

Tell us in the comments. We'd love to know which ones are still in your heart.

Bold and Easy Hymns of Grace has fifty of the hymns so many of us grew up singing, in big letters you can color and hum along to.

thepaperriotstore.com/books/hymns-of-grace/