Autumn in Little Chestnut

It was a mild but windy early Autumn day, and Mortimer Bramble the hedgehog was doing some last minute re-potting and pruning before Winter came.

Then suddenly, a gust of wind came. One minute Mortimer was watering his tulips, the next him and his lovely neat garden were covered in leaves!

"Oh no! The garden looks so untidy now!" Mortimer exclaimed. I better sweep it up, he thought to himself.

They must have all come from that tree from the Dappledawns' garden next door, Mortimer thought.

Soon, all the leaves were in a nice pile ready to be cleared up. Mortimer smiled with satisfaction.

Then, another gust of wind brought lots more leaves, and sent the leaves in Mortimer's nice, tidy pile all over the place!
"Oh for goodness sake!" Mortimer said, slightly crossly.

"What's wrong, dad?" Asked Maxwell. Maxwell and Abigail, Mortimer's children, had come to see what he was doing.
"I just swept all these leaves up and now the winds messed it all up again!" Mortimer explained.
"Oh dear!" Abigail said as they laughed.
"There's always going to be leaves in the garden in Autumn!" Maxwell said, and Abigail nodded.
"No matter how often you sweep them, they'll always come back. There's no point worrying about it," Abigail said, wisely.

Later on, as Mortimer and his wife Eleanor were getting into bed, Eleanor said "Darling, why are there so many leaves in your prickles?".
Mortimer sighed and started to explain, but Eleanor had already dropped off to sleep...