ONE TRAIN DAY

PBSKids is having a story writing contest and Will was very excited to join. He is a FANTASTIC story teller and has been for quite some time. I think the earliest one I actually recorded though, was when he was 4 years old. Here's a short vlog of one from when he was 5.

And now he's 7! Where has the time gone??? ... but that's a different post in itself. :)

To prepare for this contest, we talked about the parts of a story. The characters are introduced in the beginning, something exciting happens (like a problem) in the middle-ish section, and then the problem is solved at the end.

His brain works faster than his hand can write, so he told the story and I typed it out. Then, I found the word limit for his age group was only 200 words. Let me tell ya, we had to CUT and CUT and CUT some more!!! His original story was much more involved than the submitted story, but what can ya do? Ya gotta follow the rules, right? :)

So without further ado... here is ONE TRAIN DAY completely written and illustrated by Will (you can click on the pictures to get a closer look if you like):

Once there was a forgotten train station. It was covered with dirt, ivy, and strawberry bushes. It was discovered when a man ran into the chimney while plowing!

The old station was cleaned up and a driver, Samuel, was hired. Samuel's steam engine, Angel, and her coach, Alex, run the station now. There is also a breakdown train, Donald, in case of trouble.

One day, the Electric Crew came to fix the shed lantern because the wires were cut. They boarded the coach. Angel began huffing and chuffing until they were moving out slowly and steadily.

They were having a wonderful ride until Samuel saw logs on the tracks! He quickly screeched the brakes on. Angel stopped an inch from the logs!

Angel put Alex onto a siding and then hitched up to Donald. She pushed and steamed behind Donald, shifting him into place. There were nine logs on the tracks and Donald could lift three at a time so it only took minutes to clear the tracks.

After the logs were gone, Donald was returned and Angel coupled with Alex again. They got to the shed before dark and the Electric Crew was able to fix the lantern wires.

THE END.

Final word count? 200.

Pretty good, huh? :)