THE ADVENTURES OF TUMBLY, GRUMBLY AND RUMBLY.

Tumbly was always falling down, grumbly was always wearing a frown and rumbly was always ever so hungry.

One day the three friends decided to walk to Mr. Trundle’s shop: “Mr. Trundle’s Carpet Bundles”. They wanted to earn some money so they could buy extra chocolate. At home they were only allowed so much chocolate each since chocolate in large amounts makes your teeth bad and causes you to get fatter and fatter till it’s impossible to go through doorways which means it’s very difficult to leave home or go to new places with narrow doorways. There were so many places the three of them wanted to see but first of all they had to have something to eat which meant earning some money so they could buy food.

Stumbly wanted to walk to Mr. Trundle’s carpet shop but was always falling over his feet so he thought it’d be better to drive but then he remembered his father told him he was too little for that. Grumbly wanted to stay in bed because it was either too hot out, too wet or too cold and Rumbly was too hungry to work yet knew all the same that he must or he’d never get anything to eat. Yesterday he’d seen a Canada goose flying overhead and asked her if she knew where there was food. She just told him to go and find some and flew off in annoyance. Then he asked a crow for a share of what he kept in his beak:

“Caw no”!

The crow replied.

“Go and earn some money and then buy food with it”, he suggested.

Mr. Trundle was whistling as he opened up his shop. It smelt especially nice this morning as it had some brand new carpets in there. Mrs. Trundle had made him trim his beard as, like Tumbly, he’d tripped over it twice. Then she’d told him off for spending too much time counting the spiders which lived in it and threatened to hoover them all out with the vacuum cleaner hose. She’d done this once before when some of them crawled into her long hair at night when they went to bed. How he hated that! Anyway he saw the three little friends outside his window and wondered what they wanted. Eventually they told him they wanted to do some work so they could earn money for food.

“What sort of work”?

He asked them. They told him they could shampoo the carpets or lay them in the hedgehog houses down in the wood. Winter was coming soon and they’d need a good carpet if they were to hibernate in comfort. In the end he told them about a tortoise he knew who needed some carpet for his box. He too was soon to hibernate and needed to have some carpet and since the sweep had come and taken the leaves away and the wind had blown them away as well there was only some carpet of his which the tortoise could have. The three little friends carried the carpet between them. It wasn’t that big but they were small and it felt like a huge load to them. As usual Grumbly moaned about the weight of it, Tumbly fell over it and Rumbly’s stomach made such a loud noise that they all laughed – Even Grumbly did – Which made them almost drop it in the mud.

When the threesome arrived at the tortoise’s box they couldn’t see him at first. They thought that his shell seemed more like a giant stone and almost kicked it away when he peeped out, yawned and asked them what they wanted.

“We’ve brought you some carpet for your box”

They told him. They were looking at his lettuce as they began to fit the new carpet into its new home. They thought he’d be too slow to catch them and planned to run off with his lettuce at the end of their task. He offered them some and one bite told them just how boring it is to eat especially on its own. They longed once more for chocolate and that’s when they decided to go and see if there were any shops open but then they remembered they had no money. As they returned to Mr. Trundle’s shop they saw him sitting on the step outside his shop. He told Mrs. Trundle:

“If those three manage to lay that carpet in Mr. Tortoise’s box before bed time I’ll eat my hat”.

They seemed to spend so much time grumbling, stumbling and rumbling that he couldn’t see how they would be able to get it all done in time for sleep that night. His hat, which was a new pork pie hat which Mrs. Trundle had just bought him, tasted good. The three little friends were horrified to see him eat it and not offer them some especially after all their hard work. He laughed so much at their dismay that they told him they’d never come back again to help him in his shop. It was then that Mrs. Trundle appeared, invited the friends in and gave them some of her “treecle” pudding. They expected some lovely sticky runny treacle but instead ended up with her very own version, made out of trees which grew in her back garden. They told her how they longed for chocolate and then they saw them. Mr. Trundle had chocolate buttons on his shirt and trousers, on his jacket and even on his calculator which he used to add up the prices of his carpets and work out how much change was to be given back to his customers. While Mrs. Trundle was washing up the plates in the kitchen they busily ate them all and ran like the wind all the way home. As they tucked themselves into bed that night, they noticed that Tumbly had run home without falling down, Grumbly was no longer wearing his frown and at last Rumbly’s tummy had stopped its rumbling. As each fell asleep they began to dream of the chocolate buttons they’d stolen and of how nice they tasted – Much nicer than Mr. Trundle’s pork pie hat would have and definitely nicer than Mr. Tortoise’s lettuce!