I'm participating in the Holiday Tales Blog Hop hosted by Bernie at Needle and Foot, and I have a story to share.
My dad was quite the story teller. He used to make up bedtime stories for my brother and me, and later for our younger brother and sister. The stories usually featured interesting characters, such as bumbling George Henry William Francis Gifiltefish and his sidekick Throckmorton P. Braithwaite the Third.
This story is from 1963. Dad always told stories with exaggerated voice and expression that made us giggle as he was telling them. At Christmas time he made up stories about Santa's workshop and the elves. The head elf was Gherkin; Stringfellow was in charge of decorations, and Thumbsy was in charge of... Well, here's the story.
Thumbsy & the Christmas Balls
As told by Russ Pomeroy to his children in 1963
Now
as you know, in Santa’s Workshop the elves work all year in preparation for
Christmas, for Santa’s big night delivering toys to all the good little girls
and boys. They have production lines for
all kinds of things: bicycles, dolls, games, trains and so forth, and also they
make all the Christmas decorations. The elf in charge of Santa’s workshop is
Gherkin. He’s the big boss of all the elves. It’s Gherkin’s job to make sure
everything gets done right and on time.
There’s
one little elf named Thumbsy who just can’t do anything right. He’s a likeable
guy, but he messes up everything he touches.
He bollixed up the bicycles. He
couldn’t make dolls. He couldn’t
assemble toy trains. Poor ol’ Thumbsy just can’t
seem to do anything right!
So
Gherkin goes to Stringfellow, the tall, skinny, serious elf who’s in charge of
the decorations department. If anyone can straighten out Thumbsy, Stringfellow
can. “Stringfellow,” says Gherkin,
“You’ve got to help me out here. I’m at
my wit’s end. I just don’t know what to
do with Thumbsy. Can you find something
he can do right?”
Well,
Stringfellow decides to put Thumbsy to work painting Christmas balls. How badly
could he mess that up? So he explains the production line for colored glass Christmas
balls, and how they get painted.
There was red paint, green paint, purple
paint, blue paint; gold paint, silver paint, and even pink paint … but no-o-o orange paint.
Everybody knows orange
isn’t a Christmas color!!!
Thumbsy’s
assignment is to dip each ball into a pot of color as it comes down the line.
There were red balls, green balls,
purple balls, blue balls; gold balls, silver balls, and even pink balls… but
no-o-o orange balls.
Balls
come faster than Thumbsy can keep up.
Poor clumsy Thumbsy tries to work fast enough, but he ends up making a
huge mess. Paint splatters everywhere!
There were splashes and splatters of red
paint, green paint, purple paint, blue paint; gold paint, silver paint, and
even pink paint … but no-o-o orange
paint.
Oh,
the chaos in the workshop! And still the balls keep coming down the line. Faster
and faster they come. Thumbsy tries his
best to keep up.
There were red balls, green balls,
purple balls, blue balls; gold balls, silver balls, and even pink balls.… They
were rolling and flying everywhere. But
no-o-o orange balls.
Now Thumbsy,
for all his clumsiness, is actually a pretty creative little guy. He gets the bright idea that if he
combines all the paints together he can dump all the
balls in at the same time and keep up.
So
he pours together all the red paint,
green paint, purple paint, blue paint; gold paint, silver paint, and even pink
paint. But no-o-o orange paint.
Balls
keep coming down the line. Thumbsy dumps
them into the paint and pulls them out. Uh-oh….
There are NO-o-o red balls, green balls,
purple balls, blue balls; no gold balls, silver balls, or even pink balls.
All the balls are orange! There are only ORANGE BALLS!!!!
And
orange isn’t a Christmas color.
Poor
ol’ Thumbsy has done it again.
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Check out these other participants in the Holiday Tales blog hop for more memories and stories:
