AN AFTERNOON IN JUNE - A Rhyming Children's Story

An Afternoon in June

Written and Illustrated

By

Dianna Lynne Wood

© For Squirrel, Designs – (Wood) Kane 2004

Note to the Parent or Educator:  This story book is much more than just a delightful rhyming story   It is an interactive educational book that is designed to increase your child’s vocabulary, improve communication, gain a better understanding of rhyming words and sounds, and promote and develop your child’s natural creative talents.  It is recommended that you first read the story to your child.  Pause at any words that may not be familiar to them and provide a definition only after asking them if they know what a word might mean.  After reading the story through once, go back to the beginning of the story and review the sets of rhyming words out loud with your child.  

One afternoon in June, at the blue lagoon on a sand dune, I speared a prune with my harpoon and ate a macaroon on a teaspoon while holding a balloon and watching a cartoon with a loon, Calhoun the raccoon, and Neptune the baboon.

Calhoun the raccoon began to croon at the harvest moon while the loon (a buffoon, who lived in a platoon, and wore a pantaloon) played a tune on his bassoon.

Can we go at high noon with Calhoun to the saloon to meet the tycoon with the spittoon and the silver spoon?

“No.  He’s on his honeymoon; but, he’ll be back soon”, said the loon.

Let us then go see the Kangaroo named Bartholomew from Katmandu who does Kung Fu and Jujitsu wearing a golf shoe in his see-through igloo.

Perhaps he’ll grant an interview!   I hear he’s quite a buck-a-roo!  He even eats honeydew and Irish stew and cooks a cashew on his barbeque.

Isn’t a barbeque in an igloo, taboo?

“How do you do?” said the kangaroo.  My Shih-Tzu ate glue on a tennis shoe after curfew in Honolulu and has the flu.   I don’t know what to do.  I haven’t a clue.   So, an interview I can’t pursue.

Perhaps my nephew, the cockatoo with the corkscrew hairdo who speaks Hebrew, will know what to do.  Go get the canoe!

“We need a brew for the flu caused by the glue from a tennis shoe.  What can you do?

Well, cock-a-doddle-doo!   I’ll make a brew! 

Take your canoe to Malibu.

I’ll need bamboo, a little shampoo, a rusty screw, some mildew, a tennis shoe, some mountain dew, and an emu.”

Yes that will do.  Shall I review?

No, we’ll take the canoe to Malibu and get bamboo, shampoo, a rusty screw, mildew, a tennis shoe, mountain dew and an emu and bring it all back to you.

So, he made the brew and with it we flew in the canoe with the emu to the Shih-Tzu in the igloo.

This brew is for you!

The rusty screw was hard to chew, but we just knew the brew would do and he would be as good as new.

 “Peek-a-boo and Yippy-ya-hoo” said the Shih-Tzu, “I’m good as new!”.

“Thank You!  Thank You!” said the kangaroo!    What a grand crew, true-blue.  Now he won’t miss his big debut!  He plays kazoo and does soft-shoe with a cockapoo at the zoo in Peru and now they want him in Timbuktu!

We all sat down to Irish stew and honeydew in a see-through igloo with the kangaroo and the emu, while the Shih-Tzu gave a preview of his debut and played his kazoo.  We even had blue fondue!

Even after all of that hullabaloo—we finally got the interview!

THE END