Christina Perri‘s 2011 hit “A Thousand Years,” originally written for The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 1, is now a children’s book.
The picture book, illustrated by Joy Hwang Ruiz, has been reimagined as the story of the love between a mother and her child. Christina says in a statement, “I am so grateful for the opportunity to have adapted ‘A Thousand Years,’ a song so dear to me, into a children’s book! It feels so right to read these words to my girls, so I hope you enjoy reading it to your little ones, too.”
Christina additionally tells People, “I had to rearrange some of the lyrics to make it more children’s book-friendly and shift it more toward a mother and child’s love. I feel like it already was, in a sense. People played the original to their kids long before I decided to sing it to my own kids. It feels very full circle and very exciting.”
Noting that she wrote the song when she was only 24, Christina tells People, “As I grew up, it was like all the listeners and the fans of this song grew up, and then they all started getting married. And then, all of a sudden, it went from a movie song to the biggest wedding song.”
“Now everybody started having babies and everyone is playing this song for their babies,” she adds. “And then I myself started having babies, so it’s all been like organic timeline like in my actual life.”
Christina is mom to daughters Pixie and Carmella. She tells People that Ruiz included details of her and her daughters’ lives in the illustrations, like Carmella’s pet rabbit and her own tattoos.
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