He'en no longer asks for this story. It saddens me, because the Princess Helen stories are some of my favorites, and this is my favorite of the short-lived series.
Once upon a time, Princess Helen lived in a castle high in the mountains. She loved her subjects in the village below, and they loved her back.
Princess Helen's favorite color was red.* She had red everything. Her bedroom was painted red. She had a red rug, and red curtains, and a red bedspread. "Red, red, red," she would say, "Red is my favorite color!" And of course all her dresses were red. So, every day, Princess Helen would wear a red dress.
The people in the village below noticed that she only wore red dresses. "Wouldn't you like another color?" they asked. "A purple dress, or a blue dress, or a pink dress?"
"No, red is my favorite," said Princess Helen.
But the villagers didn't believe her. They thought that another color would make her happier. So, one night, while Princess Helen was asleep, the villagers snuck [N.B. - sneaked?] into her castle and took all her red dresses out of the closet. They took them all away. They replaced them with orange dresses, yellow dresses, green dresses, purple dresses, pink dresses, grey dresses, and dresses in all the colors of the rainbow. They were beautiful dresses, but they were not red.
When Princess Helen got up the next morning, she went to her closet and found that all her red dresses were gone! There were beautiful pink dresses, purple dresses, gold and silver dresses, and dresses in every color of the rainbow, but no red dresses at all.
Princess Helen was so sad, because red was her favorite, and she had no red dresses to wear. So, what did she do?
Little voice: I daw-no!
Did she sit down and cry?
Little voice: Yes!
Well, she did for a minute, probably, because she was sad. But does sitting and crying solve anything?
Little voice: Nooooo . . .
That's right, sitting and crying doesn't solve anything. So Princess Helen had a good cry, and then she wiped her eyes and blew her nose. And then she got up and found a pair of scissors. With those scissors, Princess Helen cut up one of her red curtains and . . . made another red dress!
Then she left the castle and went down to the village, wearing her new red dress.
When the villagers saw her wearing a red dress, they realized that red really was her favorite, and that she was really happy wearing red and not some other color.
So the villagers said they were sorry. And they came up to the castle and took away all the pink dresses and orange dresses, all the blue dresses and white dresses, all the gold and silver dresses, and they gave back all Princess Helen's own red dresses.
And everybody lived happily ever after.
Epilogue:
Should you ever use scissors to cut clothes or curtains?
Little voice: Nooooo....
That's right, it's just in the story. You cut only paper from your craft drawer. And you always tell Mom first that you're going to use scissors, right?
Little voice: Wight.
Wight.
=====
*Although He'en's actual favorite color is "pink! and puhpoe, and sio-fer, and gode!", the Princess Helen story has always been about the color red and does not change. I dunno why. I'm just the Mama.
No comments:
Post a Comment