A Fairy Wish - Christmas Story

A Fairy Wish
A Christmas Poppet and Teddy Story

Once upon at a time, not so long ago and not so far away, there lived a little girl called Poppet who was six and a half years old. She always helped her Mum. She had a younger Brother called Teddy who was four and a bit. He sometimes helped their Mum. They were the best of friends and went everywhere together.

They lived with their Mum and Dad in a tiny village in a beautiful valley between two big high mountains. The valley had lovely green fields with lots of cows, sheep, chickens and ducks. Through the fields ran a stream of clear icy cold water babbling and bubbling over the rocks as it headed down into the lake below. Poppet and Teddy loved to throw stones into the stream and watch the water splash up and sometimes wet their feet.

Sheppey, the family dog, enjoyed chasing the stones into the water and trying to find them. He would come bounding out and start shaking madly to dry himself. Poppet and Teddy would run away to avoid being sprayed with freezing water. That happened some time ago as poor Sheppey was getting very old and had stopped joining in the fun. Now, he just lies around in the sun and sleeps.


One day in November, Dad lifted him up ever so gently and put him carefully on an old rug in the cart and took him away. They never saw him again. That night, Dad sat them down by the fire and explained that Sheppey had died and gone to play with all his doggy friends up in Heaven. They were very sad and talked for ages in their bedroom before falling asleep.

Poppet had an idea, “Why don’t we ask Mum and Dad for a puppy for Christmas?”
“Yeah let’s,” replied Teddy, all excited.
So they did, but it was bad news. “We’ve already got your Christmas presents and puppies cost a lot of money,” explained Mum. “Maybe next year?”


The Christmas holidays arrived and Mum asked them to take Speedy, the family donkey, up to the clearing in the forest and collect wood for the fire. They fixed the baskets to Speedy’s back and started off for the woods. Flighty, the mountain eagle, circled high over head. He knew it was his job to make sure they were safe and came to no harm.

The clearing was not far away but it took ages, as Speedy didn’t like walking up hills. It was quite a big clearing except for a single tree, a not very nice looking tree left in the middle. Poppet had heard Dad saying the Fairies lived under the tree, and it would bring bad luck to all who lived in the village if it were ever cut down. That made it a very special tree.

There were plenty of old bits of wood and branches lying around, so they quickly filled Speedy’s baskets. They were just about to head home when they heard a sound a bit like a baby crying. They looked around but could see no one, but still the crying continued. Suddenly, Teddy spotted a tiny man standing under the special tree. He wore a grubby green suit with a pointy up hat and pointy out boots. He was crying and tears were running down his face, landing in a puddle at his feet. Poppet and Teddy ran over to the tree.

“What’s wrong?” asked Poppet.

“Oh dear me. What am I going to do?” The wee man whispered between big sobs.

“I am a Fairy and grown ups are not allowed to see me. I have to be invisible, but I suppose it’s all right for children to see me.”

“But, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?” said Teddy

“My family doesn't have any food for Christmas dinner.” His crying got worse.

Poppet, who knew a bit about fairies questioned, “I thought fairies just had to wish and dinner would appear?”

“That’s right, but we only have 100 wishes a year, and I’ve used up all of mine. What am I going to do? My children will starve.”

Teddy thought for a minute, “Maybe we could save you some of our dinner.”

“Would you do that? I’d be ever so grateful.”

“We could hide some in a paper bag and bring it up here after our dinner,” explained Poppet.

“You are such lovely kind children. How can I repay you? Let me think.” He moved his hat back and scratched his head. Finally, after what seemed ages to Poppet and Teddy he said, “I’ve got it, I’ve got it!“ He was jumping up and down. “ On New Years Eve, I get my next year’s 100 wishes. If you make a wish, I’ll use my first wish to make your wish come true.”

Poppet had to explain to Teddy just what was happening.

“Look into my eyes and make your wish. I’ll know what it is.”

They held hands, looked into the fairies eyes and made a wish.

Of course, they couldn’t tell their mum and dad. They probably wouldn’t believe them, besides if their wish was to come true they had to find a way to sneak some of their Christmas dinner into bags and get it up to the special tree.

Mum always made an extra big Christmas dinner, and this year Poppet and Teddy ate it all up even the Brussel sprouts and asked for seconds.

“My goodness, you two are hungry today," said Mum.

“Oh it was such a lovely dinner.”

Under the table, they managed to fill two bags with turkey, roasty potatoes, carrots, stuffing and just a little Christmas pudding. It was so nice they ate most of it themselves.

“Can we go out and play? We won’t be very long.”

“Not until you’ve helped with the dishes,” said Dad who was settling down with his newspaper and slippers.

The dishes were washed in extra quick time.

Hiding the bags of food under their coats, they ran up to the clearing in the forest. The little fairy was nowhere to be seen, so they put the bags under the Special tree and stood back. Suddenly like magic, the bags lifted up like they were floating and slowly moved around to the far side of the Special tree and disappeared down a hole. Poppet and Teddy thought they heard a faint cheer, but they couldn’t be certain.

Now all they could do was go home and wait and wonder if their wish would come true. New Years day came, still no sign of their wish coming true. Maybe it was a dream? Maybe the fairy had been naughty and didn’t get this years one hundred wishes? Maybe this, maybe that, Poppet and Teddy lay in bed wondering and wondering.

Then one night, when they had nearly fallen asleep they heard a gentle tapping at the window and there standing on the windowsill was their Fairy. They flung open the window nearly knocking him over.

“Careful now, careful,” he said “That was a lovely dinner, my children were really happy and had a great Christmas. Now, about your wish. Sorry it has taken so long but I wanted to get a really, really nice one for you. Tomorrow morning, when you open the back door, your wish will be waiting for you. But you must not open the door before eight o’clock.”

How could they sleep? After awhile they did.

They were up, washed and dressed bright and early and sat at the kitchen table watching the Cuckoo clock. The minutes passed very slowly.

“Do you think we could just have a wee peep out?” said Teddy moving towards the door.

“No, no,” cried Poppet. “We must do exactly what the Fairy said or our wish won’t come true.”

At last, the Cuckoo sprung out of the tiny hatches in the clock and they raced to the door and flung it open.

Ending one
There, on the step, all fluffy and wriggling and wagging its tail was the nicest, cuddliest puppy they had ever seen.

Ending two
There on the step was the funniest looking animal you have ever seen. The front half looked like a cute little dog while the back half looked like a rabbit. Poppet had wished for a puppy and Teddy a bunny. It was all fluffy and wriggling and wagging its stubby wee tail. It was the nicest, cuddliest Dogbit they had ever seen.