Josie's Bedtime StoryFluffles and the grumpy worm

Let me tell you a story. It's all about a little rabbit, Fluffles.

Fluffles bounces through the long green grass of the park every day, singing a little ditty

of a song to himself. He hums and hums as sweet a little tune as you've ever heard,

and as he hums, and bounces, he smiles at all the creatures he sees, beaming from ear

to ear. Fluffles is such a happy rabbit that he makes all the other creatures lives

brighter.

But there's one grumpy old worm, Pritchard, who every day when he sees Fluffles

bounce past, smiling and humming, wriggles around and frowns his best frown right at

Fluffles. You see, Pritchard likes being grumpy, he doesn't want to be happy and

smiley, and he certainly doesn't want anyone else being happy and smiley.

One day Pritchard is waiting right by his favourite patch of dirt for Fluffles to come past,

ready with a frown he's been working on for days. He waits and waits, but there's no

sign of Fluffles. There's no humming, not even the familiar thud...thud...thud of rabbit

pads hitting the ground.

Now Pritchard is really annoyed, "Who does that rabbit think he is? You can't just

bounce past every day and then one day not turn up! It's just rude." So off he goes to

find Fluffles and give him a piece of his mind.

Pritchard looks high and low, but Fluffles is nowhere to be found, eventually Pritchard

gives up, wriggles back home, and just frowns at an old leaf.

The next day, as Pritchard is tending to his favourite dirt patch, he hears that

thud...thud...thud, sure enough bouncing over the hill comes Fluffles, smiling and

humming. Pritchard works up his best frown, and as Fluffles is about to pass by, smil-

ing at the little worm, he stops. Prithcard is so taken aback, he forgets about his

frown, and stares confused at Fluffles.

"You missed me didn't you?" says Fluffles, "You see, however much you frown at me, I

know it makes you happy to do it, so I know you're not really feeling grumpy inside,

frowning at ME makes YOU happy. So every day I'll come past, and I'll smile at you,

and as you frown back I'll know that you're happy."

Josie's Bedtime StoryCharly and the fish bullies

Let me tell you a story. It's about a bird called Charly.

Charly's favourite thing to do was fly. She flew all day, first up really high, as high as

she could go, then down low, swooping between trees and through hedges. She

couldn't be happier.

Charly lived next to a little stream, it was such a busy stream with fish coming and go-

ing all day long, but it was very nice. All the fish always said hello and waved their fins

as they past by Charly's nest. Everyone knew each other, and everyone looked out for

one another.

One day, at the beginning of summer, some fish arrived in the stream. They were very

mean and loud, and everyone thought they were just big bullies. They teased the other

fish and splashed water at Charly when she was flying.

Charly and the other fish were very sad. The stream had always been such a lovely

place, but now these bullies were ruining it for everyone and no-one wanted to be

there.

"Something has to be done" Charly thought. She knew that the only way to stop a bully

was to show them you weren't afraid, but she had to tell everyone. She decided she

wasn't going to be scared and flew out of her nest.

She ducked and dived flying up and down above the stream, and as the mean fish tried

to splash water at her she just swooped away from it. And as she flew she squawked,

"I'm not afraid of you mean fish! You're just bullies and I'm not scared of bullies! And

no-one else is either. So if you can't stay here and be nice then just go away!".

All the other fish in the stream heard Charly squawk and came out from where they

were hiding, they swam about and joined in with Charly. The bullies were so surprised

that they stopped their splashing and were all very quiet.

Eventually everything died down and everything was silent, the mean fish did not know

what to do. Charly swooped down and landed on the bank next to them.

"So what do you have to say?" said Charly to the bullies.

"We're sss-sorry" stuttered one of the fish, "we didn't realise we were so mean, we

promise we'll be nicer in the future." The other fish nodded with him.

"Do you really mean that?" said Charly, "because if you do you should tell everyone why

you were such bullies.".

The fish turned around to face everyone and said together, "we're very sorry, we prom-

ise we'll be nicer in the future. We were just nervous about getting along and didn't

want to feel like the outsiders. We want to live here with everyone and be happy.".

And with that the stream was peaceful again and everyone was happy. But everyone

always remembered that day and the lesson that however scary a bully is they're just

scared themselves.