10 Dec Happy Everything!

It’s that time of year again! Susanna Hill’s fabulous Holiday Story Contest!  Shopping? Nope. Wrapping? Nope.  Slashing words? Why, yes. Read on to see why I must slice and dice all those pesky little extraneous words.

Here’s Susanna’s challenge: Write a children’s holiday story  using the basic format/concept of The Twelve Days Of Christmas!
But here’s the bigger challenge: It can be no longer than 300 words. 

But I’m game, so I held my breath, jumped into the deep end, and came up with this. At exactly 300 words. (Whew!)

HAPPY EVERYTHING

On the first day of Hanukkah, a truck drove up to my house, slammed on its brakes, and out came a

shiny bright Menorah.

I didn’t know who sent it, but I brought it inside, put it on the mantel, and lit the candles.

On the second day of Hanukkah another truck appeared. The driver hauled out a

brightly decorated Christmas Tree

Must be a mistake, I thought.

I sent it back.

On the fourth day of Hanukkah, the mailman lugged his bag up the front steps and dropped off a

 beautiful Diwali lamp.

I looked at it, admired it, but sent that back too.

On the fifth day of Hanukkah, there was a knock at my door.

I opened it.  I couldn’t see anyone.

But I did spy a

Kwanza Kinara with seven candles.

Again, wrong house, but who dropped it off?

I left it on my porch with a note.

Beautiful Kinara, but probably not for me.

On the sixth day of Hanukkah,

I heard beeps and bangs and a pounding on my door.

I flew to the window and peered outside.

I’m not sure how it happened, but sitting on my porch was a

 fully decorated Christmas tree,

a brightly shining Diwali lamp,

and a Kinara filled with red, green, and black candles.

I shrugged my shoulders and dragged everything inside.

On the seventh day of Hanukkah,

I scratched my head, looked around, and got an idea.

I grabbed my phone and dialed. This would work.

On the eighth day of Hanukkah (which happened to coincide with the twelfth day of Christmas),

my house was filled with music, light, food and tradition.

But most of all, friendship.

As the night was winding down, I heard a voice shout,

“Happy Everything, y’all! It’s late now. I’m out!”