Children’s Stories:
Read To At Bedtime,
From Grandfather.
Smashwords Edition
Copyright Bernard King 2011.
Book cover by
Bastien. (5yrs old and football mad)
Children’s Stories: Read-to at Bedtime from Grandfather.
by
Bernard King.
Contents
This book has been created not to read, but to tell. It is truly a bedtime story book.
There is repetition, children love repetition, there are expressions, clichés to the rest of us, but children love them. In fact children love anything they can relate to.
As a writer of scripts and novels, I have tried to combine both in these stories. There is dialogue for the reader to characterise, brightening a reading drone.
Work on these stories, and you will get as much fun reading them to the children, as they will get listening to them, and as much fun I have had writing them.
I tried to categorise the stories into age groups but abandoned the idea. My three year old Goddaughter seemed to enjoy them as much as my five year old Grandson. Although the seven and eight year olds lowered their bottom lips, scorning them somewhat with their vast experience.
There are no baddies in these stories, no evil characters, ogres or corpses, which to my horror, I see in many children’s books. The idea of these stories is to lull the little dynamos to sleep, not wake them screaming.
Finally, whilst I created all the stories, I did not choose which to put in this book. The kids did.
So you have a fully tested, market approved, choice here.
Of all the stories, the one most enjoyed by the grandchildren was The Conductor. It was voted the best, far ahead of the rest. When I suggested working on the stories, I meant to read the stories before they are told to the children, work out the voices of the characters, and then give a performance. The Conductor requires a lot of arm waving, which whilst my acting carried it to the top of the list, the amount of giggling when I closed the bedroom door did not hint of imminent sleep from my audience – you have been warned!
There was once a baker who baked the best bread for miles around. His shop was always full and his wife fat and happy serving content customers. One day a man said to her, she would sell more bread if she had more choice of loaves.
“Why don’t you get your husband to make a loaf with sugar in it? Then people will buy your ordinary bread, and the sweet loaf as well, and you will sell twice as much bread.”
He said that in a very clear voice as he was a very clever man.
The wife thought this was a wonderful idea and ordered her husband to try to make sugar bread.
Being a very, very good baker his first attempt was excellent. They tried the bread out at tea time, with butter on each slice, and agreed they would start selling the new bread the next day.
The baker got up extra early to start baking the new loaf and at eight o’clock when the shop opened there was twice as much bread lined up for the customers to buy.
But soon there was trouble.
“Oh my Goodness, there’s always trouble isn’t there?”
People were bringing back the bread they had bought.
Those that wanted ordinary bread had got sweet bread and those that wanted sweet bread had got ordinary bread. It took the fat wife, who was now not very happy, all day to sort out the problem.
“We can’t go like this,” said the fat wife, “otherwise I shall not be fat anymore, but worn down thin with worry.”
Then she had a brilliant idea.
“We must mark the loaves.” She said happily. “Then we will know which the sugar loaf is and which is not.”
The next day the baker began baking even extra early as he had to put marks on the loves. When the shop opened the loaves, beautifully marked, were ready for the customers to buy.
But soon there was trouble; again people were bringing back the bread they had bought.
“I wanted a sugar loaf and you gave me an ordinary loaf,” moaned a miserable old lady.
The fat wife said she was so sorry and reach another one from the shelf, but, when she looked at it, it had a large letter H stamped on the top, but so had the one the miserable old lady had given her back.
“Husband!” The fat wife yelled.
The husband who was quietly watching television in the flat above the shop groaned. When his wife shouted like that, it always meant bother.
On the counter were the two loaves both with the letter H stamped on them.
“How can I tell which is the sugar loaf and which is the ordinary loaf?” His fat wife demanded.
The baker sighed.
“It is easy,” he held up one loaf. “This has the letter H to say this loaf, has sugar.” He picked up the other loaf. “And this one has the letter H on it to say it hasn’t!”
The wife and the miserable old lady looked at each other - they had never heard anything so stupid in their life. Suddenly they each picked up a loaf, raised it above their heads and smacked the baker on the top of his head.
“And these loaves have the letter H on them,” they yelled. “To say they hurt!”
So the stupid baker changed all the H’s to S’s for Sugar. But he only put the S on the sugarloaf and everyone was happy and the stupid baker did not feel quite so stupid, even though his head was still very sore!
The Girl On The Moon
Jessica loved swings. She had a swing in her garden that she played on often, but the big swings in the park were the best.
The trouble with the big swings in the park was she always had to go with one of her parents as she was too small to go along on her own.
She liked to go with her mother, but her father was best. He pushed her much higher than her mother and did not say anything if she wriggled in her seat when the swing was at it’s highest. But her daddy was often home late from work, and, as it got dark quite early, she did not have very much time before it was time to go back home to bed.
One evening her father was very late and she made him run all the way to the park before it closed. She had hardly been on the swing for five minutes when the park keeper arrived.
“You will have to stop sir, it is getting dark, we’re closing,” he said to her father.
“Time for bed,”said her daddy.
“No not yet! Please, just one more push daddy,” Jessica cried. “Pleeeeeeeese!”
Her father, as it was the last push, made an extra effort and pushed much harder than he intended to.
The swing swung higher than ever before, so high in fact that Jessica disappeared, up and up, into the darkness.
The swing whooshed back down and Jessica’s father and the park keeper stared in amazement.
The swing was empty, Jessica had vanished.
They searched and searched, everywhere. With the park keeper’s torch they looked under the roundabout, around the slide, and even climbed into the tree house in case she had landed in there.
But there was no Jessica, at home her mummy was frantic, they called the police and the police also searched the park and everywhere in the town, but Jessica was nowhere to be found.
The next day the daddy went looking, he even went to the local airport to see if he could find her.
The controller at the airport looked at him strangely.
“It’s funny you should be looking for a little girl,” he said. “But one of pilots saw one last night.”
“Where! Where??” The daddy gasped, someone had seen his little girl at last!
“She shot past his window when he was flying over the big swings in the park.”
The daddy beamed, it was his little Jessica, it couldn’t be any one else.
“Did the pilot see where she went?” The daddy was all excited now.
“Straight to the moon of course, where all little girls who don’t go to bed go.”
The daddy shook the controllers hand to thank him for being so helpful.
“If you look through a telescope you will be able to see her,” the controller added as he waved goodbye.
The daddy bought a telescope and with the mummy that night the peered up at the moon, then they looked at each other in delight. There, in the middle of the moon, was their little Jessica – and she was making little castles out of moon dust!
“We must get her back!” Cried the mummy. “As soon as we can!”
The daddy just happened to know a friendly astronaut.
“Sure Mr Daddy, it just so happens I’m going to the moon tomorrow, of course I’ll bring her back.”
And he did, and Jessica was so thankful to be back home from the cold dusty moon.
The astronaut, the policeman, the controller, the park keeper and mummy and daddy and even Jessica all agreed.
Little girl’s who don’t go to bed when they are told to, could end up on the moon.
The Sausage Story
Once upon a time there was a very poor family. There was the skinny mother and her two skinny children who were all skinny because they were so poor, they never had enough money for food.
The father was a very grumpy man who was grumpy because had a very badly paid job and had to work very hard, which made him even grumpier.
One day, the children had had nothing to eat since breakfast, but their mother said not to worry because their father would bring some food when he came home.
All the afternoon they waited, getting hungrier and hungrier. The little boy was so hungry he thought about eating one of his toys but, just as he was going upstairs to get one, their father came through the front door.
With their mouths watering they watched him place a small packet on the kitchen table.
“That is the dinner for the four of us,” he said gruffly.
“There’s four sausages there. One for you and the two children mother, and three for me.”
Even thought the sausages were quite big, one piece of sausage would hardly be a mouthful for hungry children, said the mother.
“I’m hungry too and I have to work!” cried the father. “Now just you cook those sausages quickly while I have a short nap.”
Carefully, because she did not want to burn them, the mother cooked the sausages, then placed the sizzling bangers on a plate in the middle of the table.
Because she was a good mother she cut one of the sausages in half and placed the halves on the two children’s plates. going without one for herself. I think that’s terribly sad, don’t you?
WHOOSH! The sausages were gone in a flash, leaving two pair of hungry eyes staring at the three remaining , fat, round, juicy sausages.
The mother was just about to wake the father, who was snoring in a chair beside the table with his mouth wide open and his tongue flapping like all fathers do when they snore, when she stopped.
With another look at her two hungry children and another glance at the sausages she did not hesitate. Running her finger across the plate she scooped up the juice from the sausages. Then carefully, oh so carefully, she traced her finger around her husband’s lips until they shone and sparkled with the sausage juice.
“Quickly” she whispered as she took a sausage for each child and herself. “Eat them up.”
Do you think the children had to be told a second time? Of course not!
WHOOSH, WHOOSH. WHOOSH and the three sausages disappeared like greased lightening.
It was a while before the father opened first one eye, and then the other, then closed his mouth but opened it again to speak.
“Where’s my sausages! He demanded.
His wife looked at him astonishment.
“But you have eaten them!” she cried.
“But I have been asleep!” snorted the father. “I couldn’t have.”
“Lick your lips,” said the mother, “They’re covered in sausage juice.”
Slowly the father ran his tongue around his mouth and then looked at the empty sausage plate.
“I must have eaten them in my sleep,” moaned the father.
“You must have,” said the mother with a wink at her two grinning children.
Gregory The Garden Gnome
Once upon a time there was a garden gnome called Gregory. Gregory was a very important garden gnome because he looked after the doorway into Garden Gnome Land and you can’t get a much more important job than that.
One day there was a knock on the door to Garden Gnome Land. Not the usual small, pretty sort of tap you would expect from a garden gnome, but a very heavy, BANG! BANG! BANG!!
Outside stood a garden gnome, a big garden gnome, in fact a very big, garden gnome. Gregory had never seen a gnome so big. His big red hat was big, his big red face was big and his big green coat was big, big. But he was a garden gnome so Gregory stepped aside and invited him in. The big garden gnome had to bend down an awful long way to get through the door of Garden Gnome Land, in fact he had bend down so far the little bell on the top of his peaked cap tinkled as it touched the ground.
Because he had never seen him before, Gregory took Arthur, for that was the name of the big garden gnome, on a tour of Garden Gnome Land. He showed him the tree where they grew their money, the place where they made fishing rods because a lot of garden gnomes love to fish, the place where they made their tankards for holding beer because garden gnomes love to wave tankards of beer, and the place where they made butterfly nets because garden gnomes love to wave butterfly nets. Arthur kept asking Gregory where the party was, but Gregory had not been told of any party so he could not answer.
Eventually they came to the secret grotto, the most secret place in Garden Gnome Land. Gregory went in, but, as soon as Arthur tried to pass through the door, the alarm went.
“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten your pass,” said Gregory.
Arthur looked puzzled.
“I don’t have a pass,” he said. “But I’ve got a credit card – will that do?”
Gregory stopped. thunderstruck. In fact the thunder struck him so hard his hand flew to his mouth.
“Only humans have credit cards!” he gasped.
“But I am human.” Arthur wondered why Gregory, normally a usual healthy green had turned white.
“And,” Gregory was now nearly hysterical. “Now you know all the secrets of Garden Gnome Land!”
Humans were not allowed to know the secrets of Garden Gnome Land! This was terribly serious, if Gregory allowed Arthur to go home he might tell everybody about the money tree and everyone would be fishing, waving beer tankards and butterfly nets and the garden gnomes would be put out of business.
“But I can’t let you go home!” Piped a worried Gregory gnome.
Arthur looked awfully sad, he would never see his little girl and little boy again or even his wife.
There was a long silence and Gregory tried to put his arm around Arthur to comfort him which was very difficult as Arthur was three times the size of Gregory.
They quite still sat for over an hour on the grass opposite the secret grotto just like good garden gnomes should, until, suddenly, and without any warning, Gnome Gregory shot into the air.
“Yippee!” He yelled.
Arthur listened in amazement to his idea.
“I will give you a glass of gnome milk!” Shouted Gregory.
Gnome milk was very, very, very, in fact, very, very, very, strong. It was what the gnomes drank for their breakfast. It made them forget everything, which was why they always sat very still. Because no one has ever seen a garden gnome move – have you?
“You will forget you have been here!” Laughed Gregory.
So Arthur, very worried because he had to trust a garden gnome, slowly drank a huge glass of gnome milk.
Policeman Pat was used to surprises, but even his eyes popped like Popeye’s when he turned the corner. Stretched out, fast asleep, across the pavement was a garden gnome, a big garden gnome, a very big garden gnome, a garden gnome the size of a human.
“Hello, hello, hello!” Policeman Pat always said hello three times when he was surprised.
“Where’s the party?” Arthur asked sleepily.
Policeman Pat explained there were never any parties at eight o’clock in the morning in this street.
“I was on my way to a fancy dress party, that’s why I’m dressed like a gnome, but I must have fallen asleep because I don’t remember anymore.” Then Arthur stretched out on the pavement as though he was in bed and gave a big yawn.
The gnome who was fishing in the garden gave a great big wink to the gnome in the garden opposite who was waving a beer tankard, who gave a great big wink to garden gnome three doors down who was holding a butterfly net, who gave a great big wink to Gregory who was hiding in the bush in front of the door to Garden Gnome Land.