The hippo’s tale

Hippo

Hippo opened his enormous mouth and roared and roared. He was very cross. Three crocodiles had swum into his river and started splashing and snapping and swishing around.

Ben and Jodi were having a brilliant time with the tub of water. They held onto the crocodiles and thrashed them around in the water. They shrieked and shouted as they played, and Hippo got madder and madder. He liked peace and quiet!

No one took any notice of his angry roaring. So he turned round and walked across the playroom to where Leona was playing with the large dolls and changing their clothes ready to go for a walk.

“Please may I sit here and watch quietly?” Hippo said politely.

But Leona took no notice of him. She was too busy with the dolls and their clothes.

So Hippo walked over to the puppets. “Please may I sit here and watch?” he asked.

“Of course you can,” said Monkey. But Monkey and Koala were chasing each other around, and their noise made Hippo’s head ache. So he wandered over to the bricks. Marc was building a tower.

“Please may I sit and watch?” asked Hippo politely.

“Of course you can,” said Marc. “But mind out: they’re just ABOUT  TO––”

Too late!

The bricks fell on Hippo’s head. Now he had a real headache the size of a football. He got up and stomped off into the forest where the king and queen and their fairies lived.

The king looked up as Hippo dragged himself to a shady corner and lay down. “You poor thing,” he said kindly. “Whatever is wrong?”

Hippo could hardly speak, he was so upset. But he managed to explain about the crocodiles, the dolls, the puppets and the bricks. “I just need somewhere quiet to rest,” he said. “That’s not too much to ask, is it?”

The king went off to talk to his wise fairies. When he came back, he whispered something in Hippo’s ears. Then he said, “Now you have a good sleep here in the woods, and then go do what we have told you, and all will be well.”

As the sun began to set behind the trees, Hippo woke from his sleep and set off towards his river. When he arrived, he noticed that Ben and Jodi had stopped splashing water. But the crocodiles were still there, chasing each other around and making a noise.

Remembering what the king had whispered to him, Hippo calmly said, “Good evening and good night!” to the crocodiles. Then he slid his huge body into his favourite stretch of the river. He went in far enough that only his nose and eyes showed above the water.

As he settled down and made himself comfortable, he realised that the water stopped any noise entering his ears, just like the king had promised. Everything went really quiet, and before long he found he could ignore the new crocodiles in his river and be perfectly happy living there alongside them. So he sighed deeply, sent a mental “thank you” to the king and his fairies, and fell asleep.

The moral of the Tale is that you can learn new ways to deal with anything and be happy again.

The game counter’s tale

Game counters

The blue game counter was having fun. Leona rushed him round the Snakes and Ladders board. She hoped to get him home first and beat Jake’s counter. Blue Counter felt really happy when she won the game.

But then Leona walked off and left him on the table, and there wasn’t really anything else to do. When no one played games, he didn’t really want to be a game counter!

He sat with the green, yellow and red counters and watched Jake and Leona as they started to play with the farm. “Just look at the fun they’re having,” he said. “I wish we could join in.”

Jake was moving the tractor out of the big barn. “Mind out, Leona!” he called. “Move those sheep out of my way!”

Leona used her sheepdog to move the tiny lambs and their mothers into a pen in the corner of the farmyard. Then Jake drove the tractor backwards out of the barn doors, turned it round and steered it carefully through the gate into the field.

Blue Counter watched as Jake pretended to leave bales of hay in the field for the cows and sheep to eat.

Leona said, “You need some proper bales of hay. Why don’t you look around and find something you could use as hay?”

Jake walked round the playroom. Straightaway, he saw the counters that Leona and he had left on the table. Blue Counter was excited! The counters would make wonderful pretend hay!

Jake must have thought so too, because he grabbed a handful of counters and tipped them into the trailer on the back of his tractor. Then he drove the tractor round the field again and dumped a few counters in each corner.

Leona’s sheepdog then drove the flock of sheep and lambs into the field. “There, everyone is happy now,” she said.

But just then, a large woolly sheep came over and sniffed at the pretend bales of hay. Blue Counter was scared and cried out: “Help! I don’t want to be eaten.”

But Jake didn’t hear him. He’d gone across the playroom. Blue Counter had to sit there as the sheep sniffed around and Leona pretended to make them eat. “I don’t think they like counters instead of real hay,” she said to Jake. “What shall we do now?”

Jake was sitting at the table. He turned the Snakes and Ladders board over to the other side and looked at the Ludo game. He called back: “Come and have a game of Ludo with me. I’ll beat you this time.”

Leona and Jake put the board between them, and Leona started to take blue counters and put them in position. “There are only three!” she cried.  ”Where is the fourth blue counter?”

Jake looked puzzled too. “Three of my green ones are missing!” he said.

Meanwhile, Blue Counter was in the field. A small flock of sheep stood around him, looking hungry. He held his breath. Would Leona and Jake remember where he was?

Suddenly Jake clapped his hands. “I know! We used them as hay bales! They’re in the field.”

He ran over and rescued Blue Counter and his friends from the sheep. By the time Leona and Jake finished their game, Blue Counter was really tired, and ready to go to bed in the black box all the counters lived in. He felt glad he was just a small game counter in a black box!

The moral of the tale is that it’s okay to be what you are. You are special!

The yellow snake’s tale

Yellow Snake

Leona was playing with the long slippery green snake. She pushed its head among the cushions and pretended it was going underground to find some treasure. Then she crawled right into the cushions after it. Only her feet were left sticking out behind. Ben was cheering her on.

Leona looked like she was having fun, and Yellow Snake felt a bit left out. He didn’t really want to rummage in the cushions but he did want to have something to do.

He squirmed around on the hard blue stool where Ben had left him. “They always take the long green snake,” he said sadly. “It’s because I’m all bendy and yellow and not very long. I can’t stretch as far as Green Snake.”

A voice behind him said, “Well at least you’re not scary like Green Snake.”

Yellow Snake coiled himself up and poked his head round to see who’d spoken. He was astonished – the voice belonged to the huge hairy, scary monster who didn’t have a name.

“Are you saying you’re scared of Green Snake?” asked Yellow Snake in surprise. “Why, you’re a hundred times more frightening than he is!”

“Oh no I’m not,” the monster growled. “Everyone knows I’m a monster so they just laugh at me. I can’t scare anyone now. But the green snake is sometimes nice and sometimes spits poison at me. That’s really frightening.”

Yellow Snake felt very sorry for the monster with no name. It was bad enough being a monster. It was horrid having no name. But if a monster couldn’t scare people, that was very bad indeed.

“Shall we play together?” he asked the monster.

It was the monster’s turn to look surprised. “No one EVER asks me to play,” he said. “I don’t even know how to play proper games.”

“We don’t have to play proper games,” said Yellow Snake. “We just have to have fun being ourselves. You could try to catch me, and use your axe and pretend to chop me up!”

The monster gave a hairy, leering grin. “And you could escape every time I nearly catch you,” he said. Then he paused and looked worried. “What if I really catch you and am about to chop you up? I’m very good at catching things as small as you.”

Yellow Snake had a think. “Well, it’s only a game, so you’ll have to give a loud horrible chuckle just before you catch me. That will frighten me off. And I’ll slither away fast. I’m good at that!”

So Yellow Snake and the monster with no name played chasing and escaping all the time till Ben and Leona had stopped playing around in the cushions. They had so much fun slithering and chopping that they were quite surprised when Ben came over and said, “Time for bed, you two. Sorry we left you out. We’ll all play together tomorrow, so you won’t be bored.”

He put Yellow Snake and the monster with no name into the toy tray and left the room with Leona.

When everything in the playroom was quiet and dark, Yellow Snake coiled himself up ready to sleep and said to the monster, “I wasn’t bored! I was much happier slithering and escaping from you than having to burrow for treasure in a silly old cushion. What about you?”

But the monster with no name didn’t answer. He’d fallen fast asleep already!

The moral of this tale is that you are often much happier being yourself and doing what you’re good at.

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 tambourine’s tale

The tambourine

The tambourine sat on the floor with all the other instruments and rattled quietly to himself as the children stomped round the room looking for something to play with. The tambourine loved his own tinkly, crashy, smashy sound, and he loved being picked up and shaken violently. It made his life really exciting.

He was sort-of friends with the maracas, but he didn’t really like their rattly insides. He was best friends with the drums, because he liked loud noises. But their noise was different – more bang-y and thumpy, so he didn’t mind if the children chose them as well as him. He could always make himself heard. He liked to be loudest and best.

Suddenly, he found himself being pushed to one side. Kaylee had picked up the triangle. The tambourine frowned and rattled his bells a little bit. Surely a tambourine was better than a triangle?

Kaylee tinkled a little on the triangle and then said to Mark, “Come and make some music with me.”

Mark came over and took up the maracas. He shook them and made them shush-shush a little.

“Listen to the little peas inside these maracas,” he said to Kaylee. “It’s like the wind in the trees.”

Kaylee grinned and tinkled the triangle a few times. “I’m making a noise like wind chimes.”

Ben came and picked up the drums. “I’ll make some thunder,” he said and whammed on the drum so hard that everyone jumped in surprise.

The tambourine felt very sad. He really wanted to join in but no one had any spare hands to hold him with!

Mark made his maraca-wind blow louder and louder. The peas in the maracas were whacking hard from side to side.

Kaylee shouted. “We need some lightning! Someone find something to make lightning with!”

The tambourine held his breath and hoped and hoped. He thought he could be good at lightning. But there was no one to pick him up.

Suddenly the door of the playroom opened and Kaylee’s mum called, “That’s a fabulous storm but it’s now bedtime. Put the instruments away, please!”

“Mum! No!” called Kaylee. “Please come and make some lightning so that it’s a proper storm!”

Mum looked round and saw the tambourine on the floor. “This is just perfect for lightning,” she said and grabbed him with both hands. The tambourine was ecstatic! Mum moved him fast. Up, down, pause… up, down, pause… The light from the bulbs in the ceiling flashed on his bells even though Mum was careful not to make them ring. The tambourine knew he was making the best lightning ever. Without a single rattle.

At the height of the storm, Kaylee called, “Right, make the storm die away. Wind, you go first.” And Mark gradually made the maracas grow quiet.

“Now the wind chimes can’t chime,” said Kaylee, and put the triangle down.

Mum stopped flashing the tambourine about and said, “No more lightning. The storm has moved away.”

Ben made the drum-thunder roll away into the distance. Everything was now quiet.

The children put the musical instruments into the music box and the tambourine smiled to himself as he fell asleep. He knew now that he didn’t always have to be the noisiest or chosen first to be an important part of the action.

The moral of this tale is that everyone has something else they’re good at even if they aren’t aware of it.

The crocodile’s tale

Crocodile

Crocodile sat on the window ledge, alone, as usual. Kaylee always put him there because if he stayed near the other toys, he would bite and nip with his sharp white teeth.

But Crocodile knew he was not being naughty. He was hungry! Starving, empty, ravenously hungry. No one ever fed him. How could he behave when he was hungry?

So he had to sit there on the ledge and watch as Kaylee played with the puppets and the pirates and then went to sit at the table with her pots of coloured playdoh.

Suddenly, Crocodile heard the magician’s voice. “I can see into your head, Crocodile. I can read your thoughts with my magic. I know you’re hungry. Why don’t you just tell Kaylee, and she’ll feed you?”

Crocodile was very surprised at the magician’s words. None of the toys liked the crocodile. And none of them ever talked to him.

“That’s because you bite and nip,” the magician said, reading Crocodile’s thoughts again. ‘You should try speaking when something’s wrong. It’s okay to be hungry!”

Crocodile’s tummy rumbled so much when he heard the word “hungry” that he wriggled and slid off the shelf. BANG! He landed right next to the magician and opened his mouth wide. His shiny white teeth were just about to gobble up the magician’s head when something dropped on his own head: THUD!

“Bother!” said Kaylee. “I’ve dropped the beautiful apple I was making.”

Before she could bend down to pick it up, Crocodile whirled round and snapped his jaws shut on the green playdoh. SQUELCH! Yummy!

“You naughty crocodile,” Kaylee said, and put him back on the ledge. “You’ve eaten my apple. Now I’ll have to make something else.”

But the minute she turned away, Crocodile slid off the ledge again and crept over to the table. He was still hungry!

He watched Kaylee make two slices of bread out of brown playdoh. Then he watched as she put some black playdoh in between the slices. Was it blackberry jam? Was it Marmite? Or was it roast beef? Crocodile’s tummy rumbled loudly again.

The magician spoke. “If you promise to stop biting the toys and start talking and playing with us, I could use my magic to make her drop the sandwich. Then you wouldn’t be hungry. Do you agree?”

Crocodile thought for a moment. He really wanted friends. But could he agree to talk instead of bite?

“OK, I’ll try,” he said slowly.

So the magician whispered, “Poxy toxy voxy wox!” and Kaylee’s playdoh sandwich fell to the floor.

“Bother!” she said. “It just slipped out of my hands.”

Before she could bend down to pick it up, Crocodile’s huge mouth shut round it: SNAP! GULP!

Kaylee glared at him. “You ate my apple and now you’ve eaten my sandwich,” she said. “What’s up with you?”

Out of the corner of his red and yellow eye, Crocodile saw the magician nodding at him.

He took a deep breath. He had a friend. And his friend had said he should tell Kaylee what was wrong.

“I’m hungry,” he said. “When I’m hungry, I snap and bite. Please could I have some more food?”

All the toys clapped because he’d spoken instead of nipping Kaylee’s hand. And Kaylee happily went back to the playdoh and made him cakes and pasta and meat and beautiful sprouts.

CRUNCH. MUNCH. GULP. Crocodile was so happy!

When he was completely full, he even remembered to say, “Thank you.” Then he lay down quietly on the mat with his new friends and fell fast sleep.

The moral of this tale is that people usually want to help if you tell them what’s wrong.

The lego brick’s tale

Grey Brick

The little grey lego brick sat in the box with all the other bricks and sulked. He had eight little studs on his front and eight little holes on his back. But he never looked at them because he hated being a little grey brick.

“I’d rather be part of a pirate ship,” he said to himself. “Or maybe a tree house. Or even a Big Top in a circus. Anything but a boring old brick.”

At that moment, a little girl came into the playroom. Grey Brick looked over the edge of the lego box, hoping she would choose him. But she didn’t come near him. This made him angry.

“That horrid Kaylee’s playing with the puppets yet again. She never wants to play with us. I hate those stupid puppets.”

“Don’t be silly,” Green Brick said. “She’s a girl. Girls can’t make good things out of lego anyway. Ben will be here soon. He likes building.”

But Grey Brick still wasn’t happy.

“Girls could build if they wanted to,” he said. “And Ben only uses difficult pieces, like rods and cogs and wheels. He only builds machines and cars. He won’t want to build a grey elephant or a grey mouse. I hate living in this play room. No one wants me any more.”

And he went to sleep, even though it was still only mid evening.

Suddenly, he felt himself flying through the air. His eyes opened wide. He was amazed to see his brothers tumbling out of the lego box with him.

“Wh-what’s happening?” he cried.

“I don’t know,” shouted Green Brick. “Perhaps we’re being thrown out!”

“Ooh, what’s this?” said a girl’s voice. It wasn’t Kaylee’s voice but someone else. Who could it be, thought Grey Brick to himself, as he rubbed his head and sat up near Green Brick.

“I’m really happy you asked me round to play,” said the new voice. “This is the best pile of lego bricks I’ve ever seen. Look how many there are! We can build anything!”

“What about a house?” said Kaylee. “Grey bricks for the walls and green ones for the grass in the garden.”

“Perfect!” said the new girl, who was obviously one of Kaylee’s friends. “I’ll start with this one.”

And she picked up Grey Brick and put him in pride of place in the corner of her building. The she placed Green Brick beside him and said, “The grass starts here. Do you want to do grass or walls?”

Because they were so near to each other, Grey Brick and Green Brick were able to talk in whispers.

“This is brilliant,” said Green Brick. “Just look at all those cogs and rods and wheels sitting over there doing nothing.”

“And the best thing is,” said Grey Brick thoughtfully, “now they know what fun we are, they’ll use us again and again to make all different kinds of buildings.”

“And Ben can still use the other pieces, so they won’t argue all the time,” said Green Brick. “Now let’s be quiet and have a sleep while they finish the rest of the walls.”

“I wonder what the finished house will look like?” said Grey Brick as he drifted off into the world of dreams. “Good night!”

The moral of this story is that someone will always want you just as you are. You are as nice as anyone else.