Fairy Tales for Staska

Short fairy tales written by M. and S. Dyachenkо for their daughter.
For older kindergarten and younger school age—sweet and funny, the kind of improvisations parents come up with to tell children at night.
Unexpected characters and plot twists amuse. For example:
“Once upon a time there was a hen. She laid eggs and then sat on them. One day, fifteen chicks hatched from her eggs—and one little excavator.
The chicks ran around the yard and cheeped, while the excavator dug up the sand with its little bucket. The hen watched him, watched him, and then said: I guess someone slipped me an excavator egg. Well, nothing— I’ll raise him as my own son….”

“Once upon a time there were wolves—a father, a mother, and a son. They had wings, so they were flying wolves. There were no such wolves anywhere else….”

“One hen never laid eggs. Instead, she carried all sorts of other things, and from those things all kinds of creatures hatched.
One day, the hen laid a spool of thread. From it hatched a thread-spinning spider. It wove a web, but it caught not flies— it caught bad dreams. As soon as a bad dream flew into the room to dream itself about a girl, the spider immediately trapped it in its web. The bad dream started to protest and struggle to break free, but the little spider wouldn’t let it go until it dried out and turned into a yellow leaf. In the morning, the mother was surprised where the fallen leaf on the floor came from, because the window was closed.”

And everything like that. Kids like it, and—according to reliable information—some adults do too.