Wednesday's Words on a Friday

 

The original Words for Wednesday was begun by Delores and eventually taken over by a moveable feast of participants when Delores had computer troubles. Sadly, Delores has now closed her blog forever due to other problems.

The aim of the words is to encourage us to write. A story, a poem, whatever comes to mind.

If you are posting an entry on your own blog, please let us know so we can come along to read it and add a few encouraging words.

This month the words/prompts are supplied by WiseWebWoman and can be found here

This week's words/prompts are:

1. jewel

2. jigsaw

3. jerboa

4. jasmine

5. jerrycan

6. jump

7. jumbo

8 jellyfish

Here is my story ( a long chapter)

 “One more thing,” said Lottie, poking her head through the doorway. “Khoral Kai dropped in yesterday afternoon wanting to tell you something, but you had just gone to the Post Office so I took the message. He said when the constables take their lunch outside, they discuss Aiden and Cynthia and some of the kids who live nearby have been listening in. A couple of parents are upset, because the kids might misunderstand.” “Thank you Lottie,” said Ray. “I’ll have a word with the men, the Higgins and Greenhill families live right behind us, probably Kate or young Dean has heard something and repeated it.” George, still on the phone, asked Lottie, “anything from the bakery this morning?”

“I shouldn’t,” said Lottie, “but order me a blueberry Danish please. I’ll bring in the money for the kitty tomorrow.”

A few days later, most of the children had been spoken to by their parents and now knew they should stay away from the Police Station area, as things were going on that shouldn’t be heard by children and once it was all sorted and finished, more would be explained, to the older children at least. They were on their way to the park again, Chrissie and Maggie making plans to study together again, Maggie had a great way of explaining Math so that Chrissie could understand it better. The others were discussing the holiday project set by the teachers. Each had to find as much as they could about an animal from another country, an animal that wasn’t also in England, so no cats, dogs or horses. Khoral saw them enter the park and noticed a few children were missing. He remembered that Neil and Don Jackson were spending a week with their grandparents, but still the crowd of youngsters was smaller this week. He greeted all of them by name as they settled into chairs under the big oak tree, asking “who is this little one?” as Barbara and Claire Hartley found seats. “Our little sister, Alison,” said Claire. “She doesn’t go to school yet, but Mum made us bring her, said it would be good for her to get some fresh air now that her chicken pox is all cleared up.”

“Chicken pox?” asked Khoral. “Yes,” said Barbara. “some of the others have it now, so they couldn’t come today.”
“I see,” said Khoral, “so they’ll miss out on a story. Perhaps I shouldn’t tell one today and instead you can all tell me what you have been doing for your holiday projects.” A loud chatter arose as they all began talking at once, Khoral just grinned a smile so wide, looking at all the happy faces. They soon settled again and he began asking questions about the animals, learning from them about Giraffes in Africa, Pandas in China, even koalas and wombats in Australia. “And you Charlotte? What have you chosen?” “I did my project on Jerboas, they look like rats, but with big ears like bunnies and their tails are twice as long as their bodies.” “From which country?” asked Khoral. “They can be found in a few countries, there are different types, but all with similar features, for instance they all live in burrows, but I learned the indigenous Australian people called them ‘Kultarr’. “That’s very interesting,” said Khoral. “Several of you chose Australian animals. Have any of you been to Australia?” “I have,” said Michael Brass and Bruce Williams together. “We’re cousins,” Michael explained and we have other cousins downunder, which is what we call Australia, because it is down under the equator.” “We went one year for Christmas, because we didn’t believe there was no snow at Christmas anywhere, so our parents took us to visit the big farm which they call a sheep station and it was so very hot there!” said Bruce. “They never see any snow at all!”

“Would anyone like to hear more about the sheep station?” asked Khoral. “Yes!” shouted the rest of the crowd. “Alright then, Michael and Bruce, come up the front here, you two are the story tellers for the day.” The boys felt quite proud to be given this honour and started by describing the station homestead, which was the greenest part of the whole station. “The homestead is where the family lives, the house is huge with wide shady verandas on all sides and there is a windmill to bring water from the underground, there are windmills all over the property to bring up enough water for the sheep if it doesn’t rain enough,” said Bruce. “It’s a very dry country,” said Michael, “and the sheep station covers thirty thousand acres of land, with the homestead house being in the middle of one acre that has been planted with trees for shade and a few vegetable gardens and the verandas have Jasmine and Wisteria climbing all over for more shade.”

“We went out with Uncle Jack one day to check on the water troughs,” said Michael, “and we had to carry a jerrycan filled with water to drink from and a basket with lunch packed by Aunty Betty.” “You should have seen the scones!” said Bruce, “jumbo they were, Uncle Jack said they were man-sized because out in the bush men have big appetites.” “The bush is what they call the parts in the middle of Australia and it’s also called The Outback, most of the cities are around the coastline because The Outback is so harsh and dry. Not too many people want to live out there,” said Michael. “We checked on some water troughs and at one of them we saw a small mob of kangaroos jump away as we drove up. Uncle Jack said that’s what they call a group of ‘roos, a “mob”, and they drink from the troughs too.” “I remember how hot it was,” said Bruce, “ we wanted to take our shirts and hats off, but Uncle Jack said we would have sunstroke and sunburn, but he did let us splash a bit of water on our head and then make our hats wet to help us keep cool on the way back to the house.”

“Are there many people working on the station?” asked Khoral. “Not while we were there,” said Bruce, “but they get a “gang” in once a year for shearing the sheep and things get real busy then. They bunk in the houses along the homestead boundary and Aunt Betty and Granny Claudia spend hours every day cooking and baking to feed everyone if the gang doesn’t bring their own cook with them.” “Some do and some don’t,” said Michael. “What do you all do when the work is finished?” asked Charlotte Reuben. “Well, the nearest town is three days drive away,” said Michael, “so once it gets dark we just do things like reading or playing cards.” “Aunt Betty likes to do jigsaws,” said Bruce, “and we helped her with one that was pretty difficult. It was a black background with a pile of sparkling jewels spilled in the middle and they were all diamonds so the colours were all the same.” “That must have been hard,” said Barbara. “I did a jigsaw once that was all jellyfish with no other background, that was hard too,” said Charlotte.