Once upon a time…

It’s been a while since I’ve done this, though I used to do it a lot when Rosemary was younger. As some of you will know by now, Eleanor is at ‘that age’ – the one where every single thing makes her cry and scream and kick. Apart from the things that make her laugh and giggle and smile and cuddle, of course. Every bedtime (and most mornings) involves a fight to get clothes on. Sometimes I just grab her and put her clothes on as quickly as possible and pretend not to hear her loud complaints, other times we sing songs – the favourites being ‘The Wheels on the Bus’ and ‘The Grand Old Duke of York’.

Tonight, I started telling a story, in the manner of those I used to make up for Rosemary. Both girls were immediately engrossed, though Eleanor lost interest as we got further in…

 

ONCE UPON A TIME there were two sisters called Rosemary and Eleanor. They lived in a big house with their Mummy, their Daddy and their dog, Wesley. One day Rosemary decided to cook dinner [No, I didn’t!]. So she went to the shop and bought some eggs and some bread, [And some chocolate!] and some chocolate and some [Asparagus!] asparagus and she came home and made fried egg sarnies which she served with asparagus and then chocolate and squirty cream for pudding. Everyone loved the dinner and ate it all up. Then it was time to get their pyjamas on [giggle from Eleanor] and then they brushed their teeth and had stories and Eleanor went through to have stories with Daddy, while Mummy listened to Rosemary reading her school books [But that’s just normal bedtime now. Something else has to happen!]

While Daddy was reading to Eleanor and Rosemary was reading to Daddy, there was a knock at the door. Mummy rushed down to answer it and do you know who was at the door? [Eva?] No, it wasn’t Eva. [Granny?] No, it wasn’t Granny at the door. It was Harry Potter at the door. [big grin from Rosemary]

‘Hello,’ said Harry Potter, ‘There’s a bit of a disaster in the magical world and I could do with some help. Do any of you know any magic?’

[‘Yes! I do! Me!’ said Rosemary.]

‘Great. What magic do you know?’

[‘Um. I can do floating and um…’]

‘Can you make light at all?’

[‘Yes! Yes! Lumos! I can make light.’]

‘Wonderful. Could you come and help me out, then? My wand’s having a bit of trouble with light-making and I have important business for Dumbledore tonight.’

[‘Yes! I’ll come with you, Harry Potter.’]

‘Is that OK with you?’ Harry Potter asked Mummy.

Mummy was a bit worried, but she knew Harry Potter would look after Rosemary, ‘As long as you take care of her and get her back in time for school.’

‘No problem.’

And off Rosemary went for an adventure with Harry Potter…

 

And really that should have been the end of it for the night. Except Rosemary wasn’t satisfied and needed more things to happen, so Eleanor went off with Tinkerbell (who flew through the window) and lots of Eleanor’s friends from baby group (and Grace and Lola from the Twitterverse, of course). Then Daddy had to go and rescue someone with Batman (who jumped out of the computer in the office, when Mummy and Daddy decided to get on with some work while the girls were away on their adventures), Mummy and Eva (Mummy had called Eva round because she was feeling lonely without everyone) went off with Dorothy (who had jumped out of the TV) to rescue the Wizard of Oz, who’d been kidnapped and then, poor Wesley was left all on his own and he barked and barked until Sizzles (who jumped out of a book, not the TV, you know) turned up to take him on some adventure somewhere, though we don’t know exactly what because we don’t speak dog language.

And tomorrow night we’re apparently going to have Chapter 2, in which we will find out what adventures everyone is going on. And apparently it’s going to be a big long chapter book, so we’ll be reading it for a few nights yet. Eek! She used always to be satisfied with a two-minute tale of taking Wesley for a walk or finding a butterfly.

 

Do you ever make up stories with your children? Do you manage to do so without infringing on lots of people’s copyright? Any ideas what should happen to the Goddard Clark family on their night-time adventures?