a fairy appeared...

Today the sun was out and we decided to take the kids for a walk in the dunes. I've told many people that one of the reasons I love Den Haag so is that it has all the bustle and culture of a major city, but all it takes is a 10 minute drive and you're in a place that is pure nature, where the air is clean and where you can walk for hours in peaceful surroundings.

We parked the car, loaded Elliot in the buggy and went on our way... kids running off squealing in excitement in front of us (maybe we should take them out more?). We walked for 30 minutes and came a cross a bench and a clearing, and decided it was a good place to stop and have lunch. We sat and ate, the kids ran around, we saw a rabbit or two, and when our tummies were satisfied and we started getting cold from sitting still, we got up again and got moving. We went 10 more minutes at a brisk pace and the complaining started. If you have kids, or have ever tried to undertake a journey of any sort with kids, you know the kind of complaining I'm talking about.

'Moooooom I'm tired.'

'Daaaaaaaaad, I need to pee.'

'I'm thiiiiiiirstyyyyyy' ... etc etc

We dealt with the things we could deal with (like the peeing and the thirst... oh, I just made that sound gross, sorry, that's not what I mean!!) and all that was left was the endless whining of how tired and cold they were. Nothing we said made it any better. Sander gave little Max a ride on his shoulders but he got fed up with that pretty quickly too. I knew we had to come up with a plan because we had a good 30 minutes to go before we would be back at the car... and if the whining wasn't going to subside I might have felt tempted to run and leave them to find their own way, and maybe come back looking for them after dark.

So I had a plan. We would tell a story, all of us together. I would start it off with a first line, and everyone would take turns adding lines, and twists to the story. Turns out the idea was a stroke of sheer genius on my part. The walk back to the car flew by and we had the following amazing story to talk about during the drive home:

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there lived a handsome prince. (me)

The prince wanted to go see the beautiful princess, and so he went on his way, on foot. (Lara)

To get to the princess he had to cross a dark and scary forrest, filled with huge disgusting spiders. (Sander)

He went through the forrest killing every single one of the disgusting spiders with his sword. (Lara)

Then suddenly he heard a voice behind him saying 'why did you kill all of my spiders?'. It was the great disgusting spider King, and he was very upset! (me)

The prince got so scared that he farted very loudly! (Sander)

The stink was so bad that it nearly killed the spider King. (Lara)

A fairy appeared. (Max)

The fairy quickly closed her nose and used her magic to make the horrible stinky prince fart disappear. (me)

The spider King and the prince were so relieved the smell was gone that they decided to be friends. (Lara)

The Prince offered to do something nice for the spider King to make up for killing all of his spiders. (me)

'Yes' said the spider King... 'There is one thing I want you to do for me. I want you to go to the Old Witch, kill her, and steal the big shining diamond from the Old Witch's castle. (Lara)

The prince quickly went on his way but realised he didn't know where the Old Witch lived! (me)

A fairy appeared. (Max)

The fairy knew where to go and used her magic to make an airplane appear so the prince could comfortably fly to the Old Witch's castle in 2 minutes. (Sander)

When he arrived, he saw the Old Witch and used his sword to kill her dead. (Lara)

Then he had to go look for the diamond inside the castle. He went down dark stairs, and through winding hallways with cobwebs, until he finally came to a small door that creaked when he tried to open it. CRREEAAAAK. (me)

The creaking scared the prince so bad that he farted again! The prince realised he had better find a bathroom before going to look for the diamond anymore. (Sander. Oh, the things I could say here)

He went to look for a bathroom and was very relieved to finally find one! He sat down and did his business, only to discover afterwards that there was no toilet paper! (Lara)

A fairy appeared. (Max)

The fairy used her magic to create enchanted toilet paper that wiped the prince's butt all on its own. (Lara)

Happily the prince went back to the room with the creaky door, and found the diamond inside. He put it in his pockets and...  (me)

...his pants fell to the floor! He had forgotten to fasten his belt after going to the bathroom! He quickly pulled them back up, fastened his belt, and left the castle with the diamond in his pocket.  (Sander)

When he came outside he saw the airplane had disappeared. What was he going to do! It was 15.000 miles back to the spider King! (Lara)

A fairy appeared. (Max)

The fairy gave the prince a magic razor scooter that whisked the prince back to the spider King in no time. (Julia)

He was going so fast that suddenly he lost the diamond, and then all of his clothes flew off and he was naked! (Lara)

A fairy appeared. (Max)

Without peeking, the fairy quickly gave the prince back his clothes and the diamond and the prince was back on his way. (me)

The spider King was so happy to have the diamond! (Julia)

The prince was really happy too! He finally went back on his way to see the princess. He told her what had happened to him and they got married and lived happily ever after. (Lara).

We'll definitely be making up more of these in the future, and when we do, I'll share.