Wednesday, September 18, 2013

The Tale of the Big Mess

Illustration by Bailey  Age:  7
Ms. Amanda Cook's 2nd grade class
          Hayden the turtle looked over the huge mess that had once been his back yard.  At the edge of the yard stood the empty grape vine that had been full earlier this morning.  The ground was covered with grape skins, grape seeds, and grapevine leaves.  This morning while he had been eating the grapes, it had been so much fun.  Now that he looked at his mess, he wanted to cry. 
When his parents found the mess, they said, “Pick up this mess before you do anything else and we mean ANYTHING!”
Hayden picked up one leaf, and then just sat down staring at the mess.  He wanted to be anywhere doing anything else except picking up this mess.
Suddenly, the butterfly twins, Summer and Madison, flew up and landed on the grape vine.  “What are you doing?” asked Summer.
“I have to pick up my mess before I can do anything else,” mumbled Hayden miserably.
“Wow! That’s a big mess!” exclaimed Madison.
“I don’t even know where to begin or what I do with it when I do pick it up,” stated Hayden as he picked up another leaf.
Illustration by Tyler  Age:  8
Ms. Amanda Cook's 2nd grade class
“Maybe we can help,” said Summer.  “Make a pile of leaves, and then Madison and I can take them to the tall grass to dump them.”
Hayden perked up.  He liked that idea.  At least it gave him a place to start.  He set out at once moving all the leaves into a pile next to the grapevine.  Madison and Summer grabbed handfuls of leaves and flew over the tall grass letting the leaves fall.  The girls had great fun watching the leaves fall into the grass.
“This makes me think of autumn,” said Summer as she released a stream of leaves behind her.
“Yes, it does,” agreed Madison as she chased the leaves Summer had just released.
When the twins had deposited the last of the leaves, they waved goodbye to Hayden and set off to play in the tall grass.  Hayden was once again left alone with his huge mess.  However, now it wasn’t as big as it was before.  He decided that he would tackle the seeds next and started stacking seeds in a pile next to the grapevine.
When the pile was nearly finished, Audra the duck waddled up to Hayden.  “What are you doing?” she asked.
“I have to pick up my mess before I can do anything else,” said Hayden not quite as miserable as before.  “But I don’t know what I am going to do with these grape seeds.”
“Oohh!!  I love grape seeds!” exclaimed Audra as she waddled over to the pile of grape seeds.  Soon the pile of grape seeds was in Audra’s tummy.
“Well, that takes care of those,” said Hayden.  “I don’t guess you like grape skins, do you?”
Audra made a face at him and shook her head.  “Here comes Emerson,” said Audra.  “Maybe he will know what to do with the grape skins.”
Audra waved goodbye to Hayden and waddled off as Emerson the dragonfly flew up and landed on the grapevine.  “What are you doing?” asked Emerson.
“I have to pick up this mess before I can do anything else,” replied Hayden.  “But I don’t know what to do with the grape skins.”
Emerson thought hard.  “Maybe we could dump them in the tall grass.  I bet that will help the grass grow.  The farmer in the big house beyond the tall grass often puts stuff like that in his garden,” he said.
Hayden liked that idea.  Emerson quickly made a little basket out of grass while Hayden started making a pile of grape skins.  When the basket was finished, Emerson took load after load of grape skins to the tall grass making sure to dump each load in a different place.  Soon all the grape skins were gone.
“I’m done!” exclaimed Hayden.  “Before I started I thought it would take me days to pick up all this mess.  I probably would still be working on it if I hadn’t gotten help from my friends.  Thanks!”
“Your welcome,” said Emerson.  “Now lets go find everyone else so you can tell them thanks, too.”

Emerson and Hayden set off for the clearing to find the rest of their friends.  They found Audra, Summer, and Madison playing with leaves the twins had brought from the tall grass.  Soon all five friends romped and played in the leaves just as if autumn had come in the middle of summer.

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