The First Christmas Mystery at Mudpile Wood.

 The week before Christmas everyone was busy .  

Tulip met Hamish. He was wearing a white apron and a chef’s hat.

“Where did Breeze go?” grumbled Hamish. “He promised to help me cook my pudding. He must be lost.”

Tulip twinkled at him, “you are silly, we can’t lose a seven foot Ogre. It just can’t be done.”

“Well he has vanished.” Lovisma shouted wobbling by on her broomstick.

She was practising a new trick. Riding her  broomstick while standing on her head and spinning. So far, it wasn’t going well. Minutes ago she demolished the Gingerbread  house, and put a hole in the giant Christmas cake, Mrs. Groundsel had made. It resembled a very large donut with sprinkles on top.

“I hope he’s shopping.” Matt said. “Maybe he will buy me a pet crocodile.”

“No, he doesn’t like shopping, he gave me the list. I did his shopping months ago.” Tulip said.

They decided to search for him. Mrs Groundsel and Mat searched the caves. The witches flew to the mountain tops. Tulip and Hamish decided they would go and sit in his favorite tree. He was bound to show up soon. It was getting close to lunch time.

“It must be something awful if Breeze missed second breakfast.” Hamish whispered.

“Hmm…” Tulip said flying high above the trees. “Snow is coming tell the others we have to get the sleds ready.”

Hamish said, “we broke them last year when we had that crazy race off the frozen waterfall. ” He sighed. “But it was good fun. We forgot about the sleds till now.”

Everyone came out of their houses to watch the snowflakes dance and  twirl their way to the ground. It happened in minutes one minute there was no snow and the next there was buckets of it falling from the sky. But today nobody was smiling, they loved sledding.

Matt raced back inside and returned with an old wooden tray. “This will have to do, come on everyone.”

They trudged to the top of the hill field and took turns at flying down the hill on the tray. “It’s  not great but it’s better than nothing,” Matt said.

Suddenly they heard a rumble. It was growing louder.

“Thunder?” Mrs Groundsel  wondered. She didn’t like thunder or lightning.

“No,  but it is growing louder,  we should take shelter in the trees, hurry.” Tulip ushered everyone into the trees and flew upwards.The ground was shaking. Everyone was hopping about on the ground as the rumbling noise grew louder. Mrs. Groundsel  wanted to run and hide.

Suddenly above the rumbling noise they could hear Breeze laughing.  With a swoosh of snow he raced past them on a giant sled.

Everyone abandoned the wood. They chased after him, “wait for us.”

He applied the brake and the giant sled shuddered to a stop.

” Where did you get it?”  Tulip asked him.

“Borrowed the idea from the elves.” He told them. “It took a bit of work but it’s great come on lets go.”

They piled on big and small. “Oooh watch out for the waterfall,” they cried as they zipped along scattering snow as they went.

Breeze smiled and kept going.  The women closed their eyes, the children held their breath because they could see the end of the frozen waterfall. Suddenly they were flying high above the valley. “we wil die this time, ” Hamish grumbled thinking of his uncooked christmas pudding.

There was a soft jolt and looking up they laughed. A parachute had opened. They floated to the ground.

“You should go missing more often I had a third breakfast today.” Matt said rolling a huge snowball and throwing it at Breeze.

“A long chase from this giant snowball will help you get hungry,” Breeze said and rolled down the mountain after Matt.