Beware of a T-Rex with Ice Cream

It was a busy day - and Daddy was still pretty exhausted from last week. Madison has these toy dinosaurs - I think you may recall that her favorite is the stegosaurus. With that in mind, tonight's bedtime story had that sort of slant.

Ever since January, these bedtime stories have become mandatory for Madison. She has to hear a bedtime story each night before bed. Obviously, I don't have time to type them all up. But here's tonight's bedtime story, which has an important moral to it as well.

Once upon a time, there was a Mommy Stegosaurus and her little daughter, Cindy - they had some friends over, Freddy the Dimetrodon and Veronica the Lambeosaurus (we just call them Freddy and Veronica).

Anyway, Mommy and the kids had a great time this one evening: they played Candyland, and ate some pizza as well. But soon, Mommy was ready to go to the Dinostore, so she told the kids to have some fun playing video games, but do not under any circumstances open the front door from anyone.

So she went on her way to the Dinostore to pick up some groceries, and maybe rent a movie. And the kids had a great time playing video games - that is, until they heard the doorbell ring.

"Hello?" a voice called out from outside. Cindy, Freddy and Veronica ran to the door and peered out the window. It was a T-Rex.

"Hello," he said. "Can I come in for a few minutes? I am an ice cream salesperson and I wanted to give each of you some delicious free samples!"

Freddy was sorely tempted. That sounded wonderful!

But Cindy obeyed her Mommy. She told the T-Rex, "Maybe sometime later, sir."

The T-Rex was insistent. He said, "Oh, but it's the most tastiest ice cream of all. And, I've also got some free tickets to Dinoland, USA for you. That's just for tasting the ice cream and telling me how much you like it."

At this point, the two dinosaurs thought that perhaps Mommy's rule about not opening the door was there only to keep them from having fun.

"Wow," Veronica cried out. "What an incredible opportunity! Free ice cream and free tickets to Dinoland!"

"Let's go!" Freddy said.

But Cindy was quite hesitant. "No," she told them. "Mommy said to stay inside. We shouldn't get the door."

The T-Rex continued, "Please let me in. It is so warm out here, and besides, your ice cream is going to melt!"

And that's when Veronica and Freddy made a bad decision: they opened the door and went outside. And that's when the T-Rex roared!

Oh no! The T-Rex really didn't have any ice cream! And he didn't really have tickets to Dinoland! He only wanted them to open the door and come out - so he could eat them!

Cindy screamed, but there was not much she could do. The T-Rex chased Veronica and Freddy all over the front yard, knocking things over and making quite a bit of noise. All hope seemed to be lost - until suddenly, Cindy's mom got home. The station wagon pulled up into the driveway and Cindy's Mom got out of the car as fast as you can say micropachycephalosaurus! The T-Rex stopped chasing the children just in time to see Cindy's Mom bearing down on him - and she did not look happy at all!

She lashed her tail out at him - and everyone knows that isn't a good thing: for a stegosaurus has spikes on it's tail. That's what we call "the business end." And business was bad for the T-Rex! He screamed and cried and jumped up and down. And then... he left. He ran as fast as he could, jumping over the old picket fence and fleeing down the street.

Mommy was very disappointed in the children for opening the door, but she was also very happy they were safe.

"I hope you've learned a valuable lesson," she told them. "When Mommy tells you not to do something, there's a reason for it. It's not that she doesn't want you to have fun. Sometimes she's just trying to protect you."

And with that, she led the three into the house - and locked the door tight. She brought the groceries in - and to everyone's delight, she had purchased ice cream. Everyone knows that dinosaurs love ice cream.

They all had a good night's rest that night, and Mommy seriously considered getting a new state-of-the-art T-Rex alarm system with an electrical fence.

But more important than that, she knew the kids learned a big lesson that day that would keep them much safer. And she knew that they realized that rules aren't there to keep them from having fun - they're there to keep them from getting hurt.

The End

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