Teddy Trouble

One morning Princess Peasblossom was woken up by the sound of wailing from outside her window.

“Waaaaaaaaaaa!”

Princess Peasblossom jumped out of bed and ran to the window to see who was making all the noise. It was her best friend, Diana Dragon. She was sitting in a puddle of tears and wailing loudly. “Waaaaaaaa!”

“What’s wrong Diana?” asked Peasblossom. But Diana was crying so loudly, she couldn’t hear the princess over her wails. So Peasblossom quickly got dressed and went outside to try and comfort her friend.

When she got to the dragon, Diana wasn’t wailing anymore, she was sniffling and sobbing and there were big tears rolling down her giant dragon face.

“Diana,” said Peasblossom, really worried. “Whatever is the matter?”

“He’s g-g-gone!” wailed Diana.

“Who is?” asked the princess.

“Sir Growls-a-lot,” replied the dragon, wiping her dripping nose with a giant handkerchief. “He was here when I went to sleep, but now he’s g-g-gone!” And she started wailing again.

Princess Peasblossom stuck her fingers in her ears, and used a foot to tap Diana and get her attention.

“Who is Sir Growls-a-lot?” she asked.

“M-m-my teddy bear,” sniffled Diana.

“Ah,” said the princess, understanding at last, “well, he can’t have gone far. It’s not like he can walk off by himself!”

“That’s what you think!” said a voice from above. It was Winnie Witch, flying in on her broomstick.

“All the teddy bears in the village are gone!”

Winnie landed near the puddle of Diana's tears.

“Even my bear, Abra Cadabra.” Winnie gave a little sniff, and a tear rolled down her cheek. She impatiently wiped it away. “Anyway, I looked and found a trail of little tiny teddy bear pawprints all wandering into the woods. All the teddy bears have walked off!”

“That’s terrible!” said Princess Peasblossom. “Today is the annual teddy bear festival too, we can’t have that without teddy bears! We’ll have to follow them!”

The three friends went into the woods and tried to follow the trail of teddy bear pawprints, but they kept finding themselves back where they had started.

“They must be going into the woods to have a teddy bear picnic,” said Winnie. “We won’t be able to follow them unless we are teddy bears too.”

“I’ve got an idea,” said Peasblossom, “let’s go look in my magic wardrobe.”

They all went inside and into Princess Peasblossom’s bedroom. In the magic wardrobe they found three teddy bear costumes and put on one each.

They were all teddy bears!

As teddy bears, they followed the trail of pawprints into the woods.

It seemed the teddy bears had indeed been having a picnic, as there were blankets and picnic baskets at the end of the trail, but all the food had gone and the teddy bears were all climbing trees and peering into bushes, as if they were searching for something.

Princess Teddy approached one of the teddy bears and asked, “Excuse me, but what are you looking for?”

The teddy bear looked surprised! “Did you miss the meeting, we discussed this over the picnic!”

“I’m terribly sorry,” said Witch Bear, “but we were late, could you, um, remind us?”

“Well, you know it’s the teddy bear festival today?” All three bears nodded. “Right, well, we wanted to do something special for our friends. We are all very good at hugs, and scaring away nightmares. But we wanted to show them the Teddy Bear Dance. And to do that, we need the Teddy Bear Dance Statue! Which, err, someone lost out here, last time we had a teddy bears’ picnic.”

"Ahh," said Princess Teddy, Witch Bear and Bear Dragon, nodding wisely. “I guess we’d better help you look then, don’t want to leave all those people without their teddies,” said Witch Bear.

Just then, a teddy bear deep in a bush cried “Ah hah!” and held up a golden statue of a dancing teddy bear! All the teddies cheered and then, they all began dancing.

Except for Princess Teddy, Witch Bear and Bear Dragon.

“Oh dear,” said Princess Teddy, “we’ll never get them all home, they just keep dancing!”

“I’ve got an idea!” said Bear Dragon. “Just wait here and I’ll be right back.”

Luckily, Diana’s wings worked, even while she was being Bear Dragon and she quickly flew back to Princess Peasblossom’s room and found the magic ballet shoes in the magic wardrobe, then flew back to the clearing where all the teddy bears were still dancing.

“Quick,” she said to Princess Teddy, “put these on!”

Princess Teddy put the ballet shoes on and started dancing too. She danced so well that all the other dancing teddies started to copy her, and she led them, still dancing, through the woods, over the bridge and back into the village square, where all the villagers had gathered.

The villagers were all there for the teddy bear festival, but they were all sad and crying because all their teddy bears had disappeared during the night. One of the littlest there was a little boy with very red eyes from crying, who was the first to see the teddy bears dancing over the bridge. “Look!” he shouted.

When the teddy bears saw their special people, they stopped dancing and ran to them to give them a big hug. Everyone in the square was laughing and cheering and hugging their teddies tight.

The three friends quickly took off the magic ballet shoes and the teddy bear costumes and went to join in the fun.

“Abra Cadabra!” cried Winnie Witch, giving her bear a big hug.

“Sir Growls-a-lot!” said Diana, snuggling her bear, who growled happily.

Only Princess Peasblossom had no teddy bear. She felt a bit left out.

When things had calmed down a bit, Princess Peasblossom said “Welcome to this year’s Teddy Bear Festival! As well as the usual party and cakes, this year, the teddy bears would like to perform the Teddy Bear Dance for us!”

All the teddy bears moved into the centre of the square, and one put down the golden statue of a teddy bear dancing. They performed the Teddy Bear Dance, and did it very well. Everyone clapped and cheered and then they all went to eat cake.

Princess Peasblossom noticed that there was one teddy bear on his own. He didn’t seem to have a special person to hug and eat cake with. She went over to talk to him.

“Hello,” she said. “I happen to be looking for a teddy bear. Do you think that could be you?”

The teddy looked very shy, and said "Growl?"

Princess Peasblossom smiled, took off her crown and put it on the teddy bear.

“Then I name you Prince Growler,” she said.

Princess Peasblossom hugged her new teddy bear and went to join the party before all the cake was gone.

Previous Story:
The Disappeared
Dragon Back to list of
Princess
Peasblossom Stories Next Story:
Confounding
Cupcakes