In the Forest

written and photographed

by Elise

 (written by Donna Gawell’s granddaughter in 2016)

 Charro heard the leaves crunch. It frightened him! Charro thought he heard the dangerous hunters, he shivered and then he ran. He did not know it was his own footsteps. Charro ran into Mrs. Wolf and Baby Wolf.

   “Shh! Charro! You will wake up Baby Wolf!” said Mrs. Wolf.

   Suddenly, they heard a “ribbit” and were scared. Leap the lazy frog popped out of a log and surprised them. “Hi, guyth!  Thorry I thurprithed you, but I hear thomething weird.”

   All of a sudden, they heard some animals fighting. Then they noticed it was Eddie and Betty, the twin moose.

   Charro said “Shh! Hunters might hear you. Betty said, “We are sorry. It is just that we disagree. I want to eat tender leaves and Eddy wants to eat salmon.”

   The animals heard, “tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk…”

   Charro was frightened and said, “It is the hunters. I think they are licking their lips!”

   But, it was just Elise and Colin, the silly bearded dragons. They were on a branch fighting over a toy ball. Elise yelled, “I called the ball!”

   Colin shouted, “No, I called it!”

   “Oh, stop it, Colin and Elise!” howled Mrs. Wolf.

   Suddenly, they heard a shooting noise.

   Owl swooped down and screeched, “Meeting…right now at the oak tree!” The animals all ran to the tree.

   Owl said “This is a very important meeting. I saw the hunters coming and they were hiding behind the pine trees for a while. The animals need to scare them away. The hunters are very dangerous!”

   Charro thought of an idea to frighten off the hunters! “I have a plan to scare them off.”

   Owl said, “As mayor of the forest, I demand you to tell us your plan right now.”

   Charro replied, “Here’s the plan: Eddie and Betty the Moose, ram your heads together and that will scare the hunters. Then the bearded dragons will climb up into the hunters’ shirts and bite them really hard! Mrs. Wolf will howl until they get really scared. I will run in front of the hunters to frighten them. And Owl you will swoop from the air a couple of times. Frog, leap on their faces and lick them. That will be disgusting!”

   Frog said, “Hey, my feelings are hurt!”

   Charro said, “Leap, you have one of the most important jobs! It might be disgusting to the hunters, though.”

   Each animal did their job and they succeeded. The hunters screamed and ran away.  The animals were all happy!

The end.