The rough stone’s tale

Rough Stone

The rough stone watched as Ben and Marc began to build a city in the sand pit. They made mounds of sand into hills and parks, and arranged thick wooden blocks to make walls for shops and houses and garages. Ben then balanced some large flat bricks on top to make roofs.

“We don’t want the rain to get in,” he said.

“Or tigers,” said Marc. “They might jump over the walls if there are no roofs.”

Rough Stone felt a bit jealous of the blocks. No one would want to use him for anything. Who would need a blotchy white-and-yellow stone that wasn’t properly round or properly square and had lots of holes all over it?

His heart sank even lower when Marc spoke again. “We need some statues in the park. Parks always have big interesting stones for people to look at.”

Rough Stone knew he would be ignored. Ben grabbed the basket of stones and immediately chose a dark red shiny one to be the statue. He then stood three lego people next to it. “They’re visitors,” he said. “They’re admiring it.”

Rough Stone was very sad. He wanted to be admired.

He grew even sadder when Marc leant over and picked up the large flat stone lying next to him. It was blue-grey and very beautiful.

“This will be for cars to park on when they visit our city,” Marc said, laying the stone flat in the sand pit.

Rough Stone had fallen into a corner of the basket by now. He lay there moaning, “I’m rubbish, I’m useless, and soooo ugly no one will ever want me. I may as well live at the bottom of the sea.”

Just then, Marc gave a shout. “HEY!”

Rough Stone and Ben both jumped.

“We haven’t got any water,” said Marc. “Ben, help me dig a river!”

The two boys set about digging a long winding channel in the sand with their hands. It wound its way through all the houses and shops and garages, from one side of the sand pit to the other. They dug down so deep that they could see the blue bottom of the sand pit. “Brilliant,” said Marc. “It looks like water now.”

“But how are people going to get across?” said Ben. “We’ve used all the long bricks so we can’t build a bridge.”

Marc looked round. “I know!” he said. “What if we put a stepping stone in the middle of the river? People will be able to get across in two jumps.”

Ben agreed. “But it needs to be a really rough stone,” he said. “People will slip on a smooth one.”

Rough Stone sat up straight. He was rough. He was also just about the right size for a stepping stone. Maybe he was meant to be a stepping stone! He held his breath and hoped.

After looking at all the stones in the basket, Ben picked up Rough Stone. “This stone is exactly the right one,” he said. “And his creamy yellow colour will be easy to see when anyone wants to jump onto him.”

Ben placed him in the middle of the blue stream. Rough Stone felt at home straight away, and made himself comfortable. As he fell asleep, he realised that whenever someone needed to cross the river, he’d be just the right stone to help them. And it made him very happy.

The moral of this tale is that there is always something you can do better than anyone else.

The wax crayon’s tale

Blue Wax

The wax crayons were in a plastic tub to stop them rolling off the table. The trouble was that Blue Wax liked rolling around more than anything else. And when he did, the other crayons loved to watch. Except Green Wax, who was NOT AMUSED. She said, “If you don’t stop messing around like an idiot, the children will never use us to colour again. They think wax crayons are only for babies.”

The other crayons knew this was true, and they sat very still in the plastic tub.

But Blue Wax got fed up, and started bobbing around and pushing the others.

At that minute, Jodi came over and laughed at him. She started shaking the table so that the crayons rattled and jolted even more. “I’m bored, I’m bored, I’m bored,” she chanted. “What shall I do till bedtime?”

Green Wax was furious. So she gave an almighty shove, and Blue Wax flew out of the tub and onto the table. “That’ll teach you,” she said crossly.

Jodi immediately stopped shaking the table and sat down. “I think I’ll use you,” she said to Blue Wax. “I haven’t used wax crayons for AGES.”

She took Blue Wax in her hand and grabbed a sheet of white paper. Then she carefully drew a circle and filled it with all sorts of shapes. She didn’t press very hard and Blue Wax found this interesting. The very small children had always scrubbed at the paper until it tore. He liked Jodi colouring gently.

“I’m going to press harder now,” she told Blue Wax, “but I’ll be careful not to break you. I just want to make these lines show up properly. You’re the most important bit of this drawing.”

Blue Wax was amazed. Jodi was doing something new, and he – Blue Wax – was the most important bit of it. He looked at Green Wax and smirked.

Eventually, Jodi laid him on the table and took up Green Wax to fill in the shapes she’d drawn. Blue Wax didn’t mind. He was pleased to have been the one who started off this brilliant idea.

Suddenly, there was a SNAP! He jumped.

“Bother!” said Jodi crossly. “The green one has broken.”

But Blue Wax didn’t smirk now. He saw that the paper covering Green Wax was torn, and he felt sorry for her.

After a moment, he had an idea. But he couldn’t tell Jodi what to do, so he’d have to show her.

He started rolling backwards and forwards over the table to attract her attention. She stared at him in amazement.

“Of course!” she said. “I can roll the green crayon on its side and make lighter marks that will go with your heavy blue ones.”

And that’s what she did. She pulled the torn paper off Green Wax and turned her on her side to colour the rest of the shapes. When she’d finished, the picture looked super smart, and Blue Wax grinned happily at Green Wax.

“We made Jodi’s picture together and it’s the best in the world,” he told her. “Can we be friends now?”

Green Wax nodded, and they fell asleep side by side in the plastic tub, knowing that Jodi would use them again before long. They’d proved that wax crayons weren’t just for babies.

The moral of this tale is that being kind is always better than being best.

The wooden block’s tale

Wooden Block

The wooden block woke with a shock. He’d been daydreaming because no one had played with the bricks for a long time.

But now, Ben was tipping them all out on the floor. “Let’s play a block game,” he said to Jake. “A sort of competition.”

A competition? Wooden Block was excited. That sounded fun. He hoped he would be part of the winning building.

Jake and Ben started sorting Wooden Block and his friends into six piles. Wooden Block was small and square, so he was put with the others like himself. Long ones went in one place, thin ones in another – and when they were all sorted, there was a pile of funny shaped ones left: triangles, curves and arches.

“We’ll put them all together in one group,” said Ben.

Then they gave each group a number and rolled two dice. Wooden Block found out that when they rolled a three, they took a brick like himself. He liked being number three and was soon picked up and put into Jake’s building.

It was a very odd building because Ben said you had to build with the bricks you won. Wooden Block was laughing to himself because their buildings became wobbly and crooked!

“DONE!” shouted Jake soon afterwards.

But before you could say “bricks are brilliant”, Jake and Ben had chucked puppets at them and knocked them flat.

Wooden Block was a bit bruised, and lay there on the floor, fighting to get his breath back.

But he couldn’t lie there long. Ben said they’d to build ALL the blocks into one huge, tall building as fast as they could. “Bigger and better! Get going!” he shouted.

Wooden Block found himself placed level with Jake’s knees – and the building grew higher and higher as Ben added an arch, a tall straight block and two small fat bricks on top of him.

He looked up and saw that the building was now as tall as Jake’s shoulders. He felt it start to wobble.

“Oh dear,” he said to the wooden arch above him. “It’s a long way to fall down and I feel battered and bruised already.”

The arch said, “It’s better than staying in that boring box all day while the other toys have fun.”

Wooden Block wanted to nod to show he agreed, but he knew that if he did, they would all fall down right then.

When Ben stretched up to put the last brick on the building, Wooden Block held his breath – he knew Ben and Jake were about to topple them over with a crash!

But then Jake said, “Let’s see if we can take them apart, one at a time, without knocking them down.”

“Great idea!” said Ben. “We’ll put them to bed in tidy rows.”

And that’s what they did.

Wooden Block had to wait a long time for his turn, and he was very sleepy by the time they laid him next to a row of long thin blocks. But the knocking noises of the other bricks coming into the box kept him awake a bit longer.

Just long enough to hear Ben say, “Good night, wooden blocks. We had a brilliant time with you today.”

Wooden Block dreamt all night of wonderful buildings, large and small – and in all of them, someone had placed him over the main doorway where everybody could admire him!

The moral of this tale is that people don’t always do what you expect.

The tea cup’s tale

The pale blue tea cup

Leona and Natalie were having a tea party with Teddy, Crocodile and Koala. The pale blue tea cup watched as Leona and Natalie sat their animal friends in a circle on some cushions and put the tray of tea cups and saucers in the middle.

The pale blue tea cup was really excited – mostly, he only got to do something when Mark used him to make sand castles. Sometimes he was filled with water when Kaylee wanted to wet bits of clay and join them together. But he was a tea cup and tea cups were meant to give people cups of tea to drink! And that’s what he was going to do now, it seemed.

He looked round at the animals that Leona and Natalie had invited.

Teddy was grinning from ear to ear. “I’ve always wanted to go to a real tea party,” he whispered to the tea cup. “I hope I get to drink out of you. I like pale blue best.”

Crocodile was sleepy, so he sat still and didn’t snap at anyone. Koala was bouncing around and kept falling off his cushion.

Leona started giving each of her guests a plate, a saucer and a cup. She gave out matched sets: pink ones to Koala, dark blue ones to Natalie, middling blue ones to Crocodile – and then she stopped.

“Oh dear,” she said. “There aren’t enough sets here for us to have one each. I need this pale blue set myself, but then Teddy won’t have one.”

Teddy looked hurt and upset. And the pale blue tea cup felt awkward, as if he’d caused a big problem.

Crocodile suddenly snapped his teeth. “Well, I’ve got mine, so I’m okay. Let’s get on with the tea party.” He pulled his middling blue tea cup, plate and saucer close beside him so that no one could take it.

“I’m not sharing mine,” said Natalie, grabbing her dark blue ones. “Teddy won’t mind if he goes without.”

Koala picked his set up and started moving them around, placing the tea cup in the saucer and the plate beside them. “I’m okay with these,” he said. “Pink is my favourite colour.”

The pale blue tea cup watched in dismay as Teddy started to cry big wet tears all down his fur. It was horrible to see. So he turned to the pale blue saucer and the pale blue plate and said: “What can we do? Teddy can share a plate with Natalie, but it’s not very clean to share cups.”

The plate looked thoughtful, and then glanced at the tea tray again. “There are bowls on there, too,” he said. “Teddy might like to have a big pale blue bowl to match us.”

The saucer agreed. “Yes. It’s like a large soup bowl, so he’d get an extra big drink in it. Then he wouldn’t feel left out.”

The pale blue tea cup thought this was a brilliant solution and told Leona all about it.

She smiled happily down at them. “You’re a very kind little tea set,” she said. “I should have thought of that myself.”

While she was giving Teddy his bowl of drink, and sharing her plate with him, she suddenly had another thought.

“Hey, Natalie,” she called. “Let’s put these other three bowls on their heads. It’ll look like they came in their best hats to our tea party!”

And that is what they did. And when it was time to settled down to bed, Teddy found that the pale blue tea cup, plate, saucer and bowl were beside him.

“Why are you still here?” he whispered sleepily.

“Because we’re your friends,” said the tea cup. “And friends stick up for each other.”

The moral of this tale is that it is good to be kind and make sure someone is not left out of the game.