Lullabelle's Castle Adventure

Lulabelle knew she was not supposed to be in this old castle, but she just couldn’t help herself.  She loved all the old paintings and wall hangings.  Being a fairy, she could fly all the way to the very top to see all the things that the people who had once lived there couldn’t see.

            As she flew down the cold, dark corridor, goosebumps popped up on her arms.  She didn’t know if they were from the cold or the excitement of what she might find.  As she rounded a corner, she came face to face with a large tapestry hanging on the far wall.  The designs were faded but she could see knights and ladies in waiting dancing in what looked like clouds.  She was awestruck.

            She twirled through the air as she imagined herself a part of the great tapestry.  She greeted the various knights and ladies and pretended to participate in polite conversation.  She danced to the imaginary music and dreamed of being among the clouds with the rest of the dancers.  She was having the time of her life. 

For her finale, she twirled the entire length of the tapestry.  The twirling made her dizzy, and she bumped into the wall.  She held onto the wall for a moment until the room stopped spinning, but when she tried to fly away, she found that she was hung on a nail.  The nail had snagged her dress just under her arm and had ripped a hole in her dress as she turned away from the wall to fly away.  Now she was hanging on the wall like a picture.  She couldn’t reach the nail with her hands.  She didn’t have room to flap her wings, and the more she struggled the more tangled her dress became. 

She tried to use magic to free herself, but that didn’t work either.  She had to be able to flap her wings to work magic, and she couldn’t.  She was truly stuck on the wall in an old castle, and nobody knew she was there.  Now she began to panic.

As she pondered her predicament, an old tabby cat strolled down the corridor.  She had seen that cat before.  He belonged to the town doctor, and he was a mean one.  The cat had already spied Lullabelle, and he licked his chops as he pondered how to get to her. 

Lullabelle frantically looked around her to see if she could find anything to free her from the nail.  She noticed a crack in the wall just above where her feet were hanging.  She tried to get the heel of her foot into the crack to lift herself off the nail, but each time her foot slipped from the crack when she tried to lift herself up.

Meanwhile, the cat had jumped onto the tapestry and was slowly climbing up to where Lullabelle was hanging.  He was already halfway to her, when a small mouse climbed down the wall to Lullabelle’s position.  The mouse began to chew on Lullabelle’s dress at the point where it was caught on the nail.

“Oh, please hurry, dear sweet mouse,” exclaimed Lullabelle.

The cat saw the mouse as well and began to climb faster.  The cat was nearly upon them when the mouse finally freed Lullabelle’s dress from the nail.  Lullabelle sprang from the wall and scooped up the mouse just as the cat launched at them.  Lullabelle cradled the mouse as she flew them both to safety leaving the cat wailing in defeat.

When they reached the outside of the castle, Lullabelle set the mouse down on the ground and said, “You saved my life.  What can I give you in exchange for such a kindness?”

The mouse simply looked at Lullabelle with its small eyes and wiggled its little nose.

“I know,” said Lullabelle as she bent down and touched the mouse on the nose as she flapped her wings.  “I give you the gift of camouflage.  Whenever you are in danger, you will have the ability to blend in with your surroundings.”

The mouse crawled away, and Lullabelle flew toward her home.  From that day on the mouse and Lullabelle were the best of friends.  She still visited the old castle, but always made sure her friend, the mouse, was close to keep an eye out for that old tabby cat.            

The Desert Display

          Summer the cardinal felt like her wings were going to fall off.  She and her family were flying to Texas to visit some old friends.  They had left Melody Meadow three days ago and still had one more day of flying to get there.  All she could see for miles and miles was nothing but dirt, grass, and a few sad looking trees.  She already missed the greenness of Melody Meadow and wondered why anyone would live in such a drab place.

            For the rest of that day, the scenery changed little.  Summer thought she might go insane with boredom.  Ever since they crossed the Mississippi River, the land had become flatter than she thought possible.  That night she and her family rested in one of the few trees to be found.  Summer did not like this trip already.

            The next morning came much sooner than Summer wanted.  Her dreams had taken her back to Melody Meadow, and she was greatly dismayed to wake up in the flat nothingness of Texas.

            “Come on, Honey,” her dad said.  “We’re almost there.  Soon you will be playing with Anne Marie.”

            Summer had not seen her friend, Anne Marie the scissortail flycatcher, in over a year.  When Anne Marie’s family had come to Melody Meadow last year to visit, the two of them had a wonderful time playing together.  Maybe seeing Anne Marie would make everything better.

            As the day progressed, huge storm clouds began to develop in the western sky.  It was hard to tell just how far away they were because of the flatness of the land.  Summer and her family were about an hour from Anne Marie’s family’s home.  Her dad looked with concern at the building storm and urged his family to fly a little faster.

            “Come on, guys,” he said to the family.  “We don’t want to get caught in that storm.  It’s not much further.  Let’s see how fast we can get there.”

            Everyone groaned, but everyone put on as much speed as possible.  Summer looked at the building storm and began to get nervous.  That actually made it a little easier for her to crank up the speed.  She had never seen such huge storm clouds before.  The wind began to pick up, and Summer had to let her mom break the wind for her.  Thunder rolled out over the open plains.  That scared Summer and made her even more nervous.  Now even she urged her family to fly faster.

            Finally her dad spotted the tree where the scissortail flycatchers lived.  “Come on, guys,” he called.  “There it is!”

            With one final burst of speed Summer and her family made it to the tree where their friends were waiting for them.  As soon as they were inside, the rain began to fall in torrents.  Summer breathed a sigh of relief, as everyone sat down to a supper of insects their friends had prepared for them.

            Anne Marie’s family lived in one of the last trees before the landscape turned to mostly desert.  Their nest was built into a hollow in the tree, which protected them from the heat of the day and from the strong storms that occurred in that part of the country.  Summer was so glad their nest wasn’t just in a branch.  She had never seen such a storm before.  After supper she settled down next to her friend, Anne Marie, and fell fast asleep.

            The next morning Summer woke up in a strange place.  For a moment she forgot where she was.  Then she realized she was in Texas with her friend, Anne Marie.  She liked Anne Marie, but she didn’t like Texas and wanted more than anything to be home.

            Suddenly Anne Marie called to her, “Hey, Summer, come look at this.”

            Summer stood in the doorway of Anne Marie’s nest and looked out at the landscape.  Overnight, the world had bloomed with color.  Everywhere she looked something had bloomed.  Even the cacti had flowers on them.

            Summer looked at Anne Marie bewildered and then asked, “What happened?”

            “This is what happens when it rains in the desert.  It doesn’t happen very often, but when it does, it is beautiful,” said Anne Marie.

            Summer stood next to her friend and stared in awe at the change in the landscape.  Yesterday everything had been some shade of brown or yellow.  Now she could see every color of the rainbow.  Maybe Texas wasn’t that bad after all.

Madison and the Dragon Kite

           Madison followed her sister, Marie, into the backyard.  Marie carried their kite, their very special dragon kite, in her hands.  Madison looked up at the beautiful blue sky and then at the trees swaying in the strong March wind.  This was a perfect day to fly a kite.

            Madison and Marie had worked for two days on their very special dragon kite.  They managed to use every single color in their box of 48 crayons somewhere on the kite.  The tail of the dragon had nine different layers to it.  It was truly a sight to behold.  Madison had worked especially hard on the head of the dragon.  She wanted it to look ferocious.

            When they reached the clearing in the backyard, Marie handed the string to Madison while she held the kite.  “Now you hold onto that string and don’t you let go for anything,” commanded Marie.  “I’ll run behind holding the kite up while you run with the string.  We don’t want it to drag the ground.”

            Madison wrapped the end of the string around her wrist a couple of times and then firmly grasped the coil of string in both hands.  When Marie gave the command to run, both girls took off.  For a while nothing happened.  Then Marie held the kite up a little higher, and it suddenly caught wind.

            “Unwind some string!” Marie called to Madison. 

Madison started unwinding string as fast as she could, but the wind was too strong for her.  The coil of string flew out of her hands and started unwinding at will.  Before long the string was at full extension.  The only thing that kept the kite from flying away was the string that was wrapped around Madison’s wrist.

Madison tried to control the kite, but before long she found that the kite was dragging her along at a run.  Madison fought to control the kite and unfortunately did not notice that she was heading straight for the muddy place right in front of the blackberry vines.  When her feet hit the mud, they slipped out from under her leaving her sliding on her bottom straight for the blackberry briers.  Desperately, she tried to unwrap the string from her wrist before she hit the briers.  Too late.  The string came off of her wrist after she became completely tangled.

“Marie!!!!” screamed Madison, but Marie was already there, trying to gently pull the briers off of her sister.  It took several minutes to free Madison and not before the briers scratched her in more places than she cared to count.

“Where’s our beautiful dragon kite?” Madison cried.

“It’s in a tree over in the neighbor’s yard,” said Marie pitifully.  “Don’t look.  It’s bad.”

Marie gently helped her sister to her feet and walked with her back to the house.  Madison hurt everywhere.  When they reached the house, Marie called for their mom and helped her nurse all of Madison’s wounds.  When they were through, Madison looked like one big bandage.  Mom let Madison put on her pajamas early because they were soft and would not hurt her scratches.  Then she fixed the girls some hot chocolate to drink while she went next door to fetch the kite.

When she walked through the door with the kite, both girls gasped.  “Our kite,” cried Marie.  “It’s ruined.”

“Oh girls,” signed Mom, “I am so sorry.  But you know, you made it once.  You could make it again.”

Madison looked at Marie.  Marie looked at Madison.  “I guess we could,” said Marie.

“Just not today,” said Madison as both girls began to giggle.

Lily's Midnight Adventure

           Lily snuggled down into her warm bed.  She had on her favorite pajamas, the ones with flowers all over.  All that remained was her goodnight kiss from Mom and Dad.  When Mom and Dad came into her room they kissed her on the forehead and turned out the light.

            Before long Lily heard a loud horn and woke to find herself in a large boot with furniture in it and a front door.  An old woman was cooking at an old fashioned stove, and children were everywhere.

            Lily went up to one of the children and asked, “Where am I?”

            The child replied, “You are in the house of the old woman who lived in a shoe.”

            “Oh, “ said Lily and went outside.

            The sun shone brightly on the boot that was a house.  Lily looked across the yard and saw the edge of a forest.  A well-worn path snaked into the forest and out of sight.  Lily decided that she would take the path to see if maybe the path might lead her home.

            After traveling a short way the path opened onto a meadow.  In the middle of the meadow sat a cute little cottage with a garden out to the side.  A pretty young lady was watering her flowers in the garden. 

            Lily walked up to the young lady and said, “Hi, my name is Lily.  What is yours?”

            “Hello,” said the young lady as she looked up at Lily, “my name is Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary.”

            “Oh,” said Lily.  “That’s a pretty garden you have.”

            “Why, thank you,” replied the young lady.

            “Do you know where this path leads?” asked Lily.

            “No, I do not,” answered the young lady.  Then she went back to watering her garden.

            “Well, goodbye, “ said Lily as she waved goodbye and followed the path through the meadow.  Before long she came upon a young lady that was clearly distressed. 

            “Hello,” called Lily, “Is something the matter?”

            “Yes,” cried the young lady, “I have lost my sheep and cannot find them anywhere.  Have you seen them?”

            “No,” said Lily.  “By the way, I’m Lily.  What’s your name?”

            “My name is Little Bo Peep,” answered the young lady.

            “Oh,” said Lily.  “Maybe Mary, Mary Quite Contrary has seen them.  She lives in that cottage over there.”

            Oh, thank you!” exclaimed Little Bo Peep.  “I will go ask her at once.”

            Lily watched as Little Bo Peep made her way to the cottage, and then set out along the path.  Once again, it entered the forest.  She continued on the path for a little while until it opened up into a clearing.  In the middle of the clearing stood a boy dressed all in blue.  In his hand was a horn.  When the boy saw Lily, he put the horn to his mouth and blew.

            Suddenly, Lily woke up in her nice warm bed.  She snuggled deeper into her bed and took a deep breath.  The smell of sausages drifted up from downstairs where her mother was cooking breakfast.  It had only been a dream.

Madison and the Blue Jay

          Madison bounded out the front door with the picnic blanket in her arms.  Her older sister, Marie, followed carrying the picnic basket.  It was Pumpkin Carving Day, her family’s favorite fall ritual.  Every year their dad would gut the pumpkins during the morning.  Then at lunchtime, they would have a picnic lunch under the big maple tree by the house.  After that, each one of them would get to design a pumpkin and help their dad carve it.

            As Madison walked out to the maple tree, she took in a big breath of fresh air.  The sky was a brilliant blue.  The air had just a hint of crispness to it without being cold.  Leaves flew with every gust of wind.  It was going to be a gorgeous day for carving pumpkins.

            Madison started to spread out the blanket in her arms.  Her kitten, Socks, had followed them out of the house and was now playing with the blanket as Madison tried to spread it. 

“Hey you!” Madison said playfully, “Leave that alone!”

They had only had Socks for a couple of weeks and kept her inside because she needed to get bigger.  She was mostly black but had white feet and a white tip on her tail.  When Madison first saw her, Madison thought she looked like she had on socks.  So, Socks became her name.

            When Madison finally managed to spread the blanket, Marie brought out the ham sandwiches and the biscuits with jam.  This was also part of the ritual along with warm apple cider, which their mother was preparing at the moment.  Madison wanted to dive in and eat, but she knew she had to wait for her parents.

            While she was waiting, she looked over at the gutted pumpkins.  Her dad had cut off the top and dug out all the insides.  The top of each pumpkin sat in front of the pumpkin.  Beside the pumpkins all the insides were in a dishpan.  Madison couldn’t look at it because it looked yucky.  Later, after they carved the pumpkins, her dad would dig out some of the pumpkin seeds and roast them.  This was also part of the ritual.

            Suddenly Madison heard a very loud cawing sound, and something swooped down toward Socks.  At first, it looked like a huge mass of blue and feathers.  Then Madison realized it was a blue jay, and it was attacking Socks.  The blue jay was cawing and diving at the kitten trying to peck her or pull out some of her fur.  Marie was screaming and trying to swat the bird to make it go away.  Madison tried to grab Socks, but the blue jay dived at her when she got close.  Then Madison remembered the pumpkin insides that were in the dishpan.  Even though it was nasty, she picked up a handful and threw it at the bird.  Some of it did hit the bird.  The blue jay flew up for a second, and Marie grabbed the kitten and stuffed her in one of the gutted pumpkins.  Socks meowed pitifully as Marie quickly put the top on the pumpkin. 

            The blue jay didn’t stay in the air for long.  Just as soon as Marie put the top on the pumpkin, the blue jay dived landing on top of the pumpkin.  It pecked at the top of the pumpkin cawing angrily.  Madison went back for another handful of pumpkin insides.  This time she hit the bird in the face.  Marie also grabbed pumpkin insides, and both girls pelted the blue jay until it flew up into the tree.  It sat on a limb next to their chimney and cawed angrily at the girls.

            Just then, their mom came out with the warm apple cider and saw pumpkin insides on everything including the girls. 

“What in the world?” Mom exclaimed.

After another moment’s observation, she heard the angry blue jay and the pitiful meowing of the kitten.  She sat the apple cider down and went back in the house to get her broom.

            “Girls!” she exclaimed, “Where is the kitten?”

            “She’s in the pumpkin,” answered Marie.

            “Okay,” Mom ordered, “Marie, you and Madison pick up the pumpkin and take it in the house.  The blue jay will attack again if it sees the kitten.”

            Madison and Marie went over to the pumpkin and picked it up together.  They carefully made their way to the porch with Socks meowing the whole way.  The blue jay flew from the branch, but changed its mind when it saw Mom’s broom.  It landed on another branch and cawed angrily at Mom.

            When the girls were safely in the house with the pumpkin, Mom came inside with the apple cider.  They lifted poor Socks out of the pumpkin and sat her on her favorite cushion.

            “I guess we will have to change our plans this year,” said Mom with a sigh.  “I don’t think the blue jay will let us carve our pumpkins under the tree in peace.”

            Just then Dad came in the backdoor.  He had been in the backyard preparing a bonfire for later.  Mom and Dad moved all the picnic stuff and the pumpkins to another spot in the backyard.  When they were sure the blue jay was not going to interfere, they started their Pumpkin Carving Day ritual all over. This time they left Socks in the house.

Lily's Flower Igloo

Illustration by Summer  Age:  8  Paris, TN

               This is now a children's book!!!!

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It is also available in ebook form from:

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Ahmed's Crazy Camel

           Ahmed sat on a rock in front of his house looking out at the vast Arabian Desert. He held a grayish fruit in his hands.   His thoughts were on his family’s camel and the great accident that had occurred over a month ago.  Men from an oil company had come out to their property with this huge digging machine.  As they were working, the machine had swung around and hit their camel in the head.   From that point, he started making a sound that was closer to a cow’s moo than a camel’s grunt, but otherwise seemed normal.

Most of Ahmed’s family didn’t really care how the camel acted as long as he still took Father, who was a spice merchant, out to the nomads to sell spices.  They did not even have a name for the camel.  They simply called him, Camel. 

For some reason, Ahmed really liked this camel.  Of course, the camel acted like a normal camel.  He grunted at everyone, spat at Ahmed’s father every time he tried to load him, and was all around grumpy like every other camel, but not around Ahmed.  Around Ahmed the camel was somewhat affectionate for a camel.  Ahmed and this camel had an understanding and mutual respect for one another.  It made Ahmed extremely sad that this had happened to his friend, and he wanted to try to find a way to make him better.

Earlier that day, Ahmed had talked to this old fortuneteller.  She had sold him the strange grayish fruit he now held in his hands.  She had told him that if he would feed the camel the fruit, it would bring the camel back to his senses.  Ahmed was waiting for his father to return from a trip to the nomad tribes so that he could give the fruit to his friend, Camel.  He was hoping with all his might that the old fortuneteller had not lied to him and took his money.

Before long, Ahmed saw a familiar swaying object coming into sight.  His father and Camel were back.  After Father unloaded his bundles of spices, Ahmed took the camel to water and feed him.  He let Camel get his fill of water before he placed the strange fruit in front of him.

“Here, boy,” said Ahmed, “eat this.  It should make you feel better.”

The camel bent down and smelled the strange fruit.  Then he took a bite and immediately spit the fruit everywhere.  He started making a weird honking sound and scraped his mouth against the ground.  Ahmed tried to get close to the camel to calm him down, but it was no use.  The camel was spitting, honking, and running around frantically.  Finally, Ahmed sat down on a rock and waited for the camel to calm himself down.  It took nearly 15 minutes.  When the camel stopped all the commotion, Ahmed looked at the camel hopefully to see if all the raucous had been worth it.  The camel gave Ahmed a mournful look and mooed.

Ahmed was devastated.  It hadn’t worked.  Camel was still mooing.  That fortuneteller had scammed him.  Ahmed’s anger rose within him.  He got up from the rock and kicked a stone out into the desert.  Then Camel came up to Ahmed and started gently chewing on his hair.  Ahmed turned around and stroked the camel’s neck.  He wanted to cry.

“I’m sorry I made you eat that awful fruit,” Ahmed said to Camel.  “I just wanted you to be normal again.”

Camel bent down, snatched a bit of grass, and began to chew slowly.  Ahmed stood back and looked at Camel’s sad, mournful eyes.  He decided that it didn’t matter that Camel mooed instead of grunting like other camels.  Camel was his friend, and they still had their understanding and respect for one another.

Ahmed led Camel into the stable and made sure he had clean hay.  Then he put him up for the night.  As Ahmed walked into the house, he realized that he wasn't as sad about Camel anymore.  He was pretty sure that Camel was going to be just fine.