Kids stories for big feelings - original stories inspired by Pokemon for young children, written and told by Chris Shanku in his own voice.
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A quiet, gentle story for young children about not knowing what you'll grow into yet, and being enough right now. Toby's Eevee is still an Eevee. Down at the pond, Priya's Eevee became a Vaporeon. By the oak tree, another became a Jolteon. By the campfire, another became a Flareon. Toby's Eevee just sits in the grass - soft and brown and small - until a frightened little Pidgey needs exactly the kind of friend that Eevee already is. No peril, no shouting, nothing scary - made to be watched at bedtime or on a slow afternoon. The Little Feather tells original stories inspired by Pokémon - gentle
A gentle adventure for young children about what to do when a feeling gets too big. Elsie's Growlithe has the best nose in the whole valley, and he has promised to find the way home before the lamps come on. Then a Pidgey steals a berry, a sleeping Snorlax blocks the path, and the way home disappears into the tall grass. By the time Growlithe barks at Elsie - much louder than he meant to - the big feeling has grown far too big to carry. Chansey teaches Growlithe four questions to ask himself - Are you hungry? Are you angry? Are you lonely? Are you tired? - and they turn out to work on almost e
A gentle adventure for young children about being brave when you are still scared. Brooks and Cassian are climbing the hill to see the Clefairy dance in the moonlight, and their friend Charizard is carrying the picnic blanket. Then the path crosses a stream - six flat stones, water you could stand up in - and Charizard will not cross it. He opens his wings the way he does when he is going to fly, and his feet stay exactly where they are. Telling him it is easy does not work. Pushing him does not work. What works is Cassian saying he is scared of the dark every single night and goes to bed anyw
A gentle bedtime story for young children about doing your own part. Willa has a whole row of pots to water before the light goes, and Cassian has a bowl to fill with beans. Slowpoke has no job at all, and has put his tail in the water bucket. Then Willa looks over and sees that Cassian is not putting the beans in the bowl - he is laying them out along the top of the wall, one at a time, in a long green line. Willa tries moving the beans for him. She tries telling him. She even goes and finds a grown-up - who listens to every word, thanks her for telling, and then does not fix a single thing.
A gentle battle story for young children about catching a big feeling early. Blastoise wants to win the turn so badly that his shell rattles before the match even starts. When Ponyta's Ember comes skipping down the field, the feeling inside his shell fizzes up until it is enormous - and the water comes out of both cannons at once, sails clean over the flames, over the tall trees, and lands in the pond. Nothing met anything. Then they line up and do it again. Elsie tries showing him her tight fists. She tries the small move instead of the big one. Neither works, and the story does not pretend t
A gentle bedtime story for young children about humming to yourself when it's loud. Jigglypuff has a flat gray singing stone, and she sits on it every single evening. Tonight she wants her song small and low and just for herself - and the meadow will not stop. Two Poliwag splash in the pond, on purpose, over and over. A whole row of Pidgey shuffles for space on the branch. A Bellsprout rustles, a Diglett pops up and down, and behind all of it a Psyduck quacks away to itself. It is a good, loud, ordinary evening, and Jigglypuff cannot hear the inside of her own head. She tries it bigger, and th
A gentle bedtime story for children starting somewhere new this fall - a new school, a new house, a new anywhere - about looking at one real thing at a time instead of guessing at what a new place might be like. Oddish only ever walks at night, and tonight it is moving. Its old patch of soil has gotten too small - nothing has gone wrong, it has just grown, the way small things do. At the end of the path is a grove so big the leaves close over the top of it like a roof, and somewhere deep inside all that dark there is a low honey-coloured light. Oddish can see the light from outside. It cannot
A gentle adventure story for young children about feeling left out - and about what "not right now" actually means. Cassian and his Pikachu come up the hill through the tall grass every day after lunch, and Pikachu always gets to the top first. Today there is somebody already up there - three Raichu, standing in a ring in the short grass, keeping a big round seed pod in the air between them. They are Pikachu's family. He runs straight for the middle of the ring with both paws up, and the biggest Raichu says, "Not right now, little spark. We're almost done. Come find us after!" Nobody is cross
A gentle battle story for young children about what you do next. Psyduck has been ready since breakfast, bouncing on his flat orange feet at one end of the grass. Elsie and Willa have had matches all week and have never once finished one - something always stops them. Today they get two whole turns, one each, the best match of the week. And then Psyduck stops in the middle of the field, puts both hands on the sides of his head, and sits straight down, because sometimes the whole world goes loud and swimmy for a Psyduck and he does not get to pick when. Elsie's own feeling arrives right behind
A gentle bedtime story for young children about being loved when you get it wrong. Cassian is folding paper lanterns on the floor of the little back room, and Vulpix is carrying each one across to the row by the wall. Vulpix has done it a hundred times before tonight and it has always been fine. But tonight he wants to get every single one of them right, and he checks Cassian's face after every trip. Then a tail swings round behind him, brushes the paper, and a small brown mark opens into a hole. Vulpix turns all the way around and curls up with his tails to the wall, and the room goes dim - b
A gentle adventure story for young children about a group of friends growing bigger without anyone losing their place. Charmander, Squirtle and Bulbasaur have shared the warm stone in Viridian Forest for a long, long time. Three in a line on the path, three on the stone, and it fits them exactly. Then Brooks catches a Caterpie, and the stone that always fit starts to feel like it might not. Charmander does not want to share the middle spot. Squirtle sits down in the grass by himself with a small tight feeling. Nobody is being unkind, and it still does not work - until Charmander looks out into
A gentle battle story for young children about the difference between how big a feeling is and how loud it has to be. Mankey is up on the flat stone by the pond before anybody else is awake, shaking out his arms for a match that has not started yet. Across the water there is a second flat stone the same size as his, and nobody ever sits on that one. Beside his own stone the grass grows thin, and the ground under it is soft and loose. Poliwag sends a move down the field and Mankey has to split it in the air. Three times something goes wrong, and three times a feeling arrives - scared, then sad,
A gentle adventure story for young children about being loved for nothing in particular. Brooks comes down to the pond every day with a tin cup, and every day the game is the same. He tips a thin string of water onto Magikarp's back, Magikarp says the word, and the whole shallow end comes up at once and lands on Brooks. Brooks always goes first. Magikarp has never once started it. Every time Brooks says "You're my favorite," Magikarp quietly goes under the water - not far, just until only the top of his head is showing - and Brooks never tries to talk him back up. Then the wind takes the cup,
A gentle bedtime story for young children about choosing to be kind to somebody who was not kind to you. Ponyta walks the little ones to their door every night, and then he walks back on his own. His mane is fire and his tail is fire, and out on that path his fire is the only light there is. Up on the step, Willa is waiting for him with a lantern that has burned down to a stub, and from down on the path nobody can see her at all. There is a Meowth on the fence rail tonight who leans over and puffs at Ponyta's fire, the way you blow out a candle, and for a moment the light on the path goes smal
A gentle battle story for young children about resting when your body asks for it and finding your place still waiting for you. Snorlax has a rule he made up all by himself: he takes every single one of his turns, all the way to the end. So when the game reaches turn seven and his arms come up slow, and he has to sit down in the grass to catch his breath, the thing he is really afraid of is not the stone. It is that the counting will go on without him. Elsie has already said the rule out loud: if anybody stops, the whole count starts over. So Snorlax gets up anyway, and pushes, and stops halfw
A gentle bedtime story for young children about saying the hard part out loud, and about what somebody else can do once they know. Abra has something to say and he never gets to the end of it. Every time he opens his mouth there is a little sound like a page turning, and the flat stone across the fire is empty again. Cassian has counted four of them tonight. He knows the tell now: the ears go flat right before it happens, and it happens soonest when somebody is coming toward him. Cassian tries going slow, one knee and then the other, the way you get up when a bird is on the fence, and it does
A gentle adventure story for young children about trying again after a mistake. Machop turns over a flat stone, sets it down beside the little dark hole where it was, and something gray and quick goes off sideways into the dust. He does not watch it go. He is already climbing again, and Brooks, three steps ahead up the dry creek bed, does not see any of it. Machop does this three times on the way up, and he never says a word about why. Machop likes being the one who carries things - his hands are strong, that is the thing about him people say first, and as long as they are doing something usef
