Undaunted Joy #188

Stories for Children

Feb 22, 2026

Thank you for reading! I hope you’re enjoying these short cheerful stories.

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two boy's sitting on log — Photo by Robert Collins on Unsplash

Tell me that story again.

Children will say this all the time. They want to hear the story about when they were born or when we found out we were to have a baby. Or the first time they met their siblings or grandma. Or, in the case of my boys, the time they “accidently swallowed” a screw from their dresser drawer. (They are 16 months apart and I have a lot of doubts about this story but yes, we had to take them to the ER to be X-rayed)

It’s in stories that we find out who we are and our place in this world.

Stories can also calm a frantic child who has just fallen on the playground, gotten a bloody nose or even might need stitches on their forehead which just met the corner of their train table.

I used storytelling with both my sons and recently shared my tactics with a newer mommy at the end of her ropes. I thought I’d share three of my favorites with you to tuck in your back pocket for when you might need an extra bolster with a child who needs calming or focusing.

One Word Story

I have one of those kids who gets bloody noses. If you were one of these or have one of these, you know how important it is to stay calm. The bloody nose will not subside until the child relaxes. If you don’t do this quickly, it is a chicken with their head cut off scenario.

If my son got a bloody nose, we had a place in the house, away from carpet and curtains and other things that would get stained, that he would always go to, the bottom step of our stairs. On that step, we’d grab a box of tissues and apply pressure.

To keep him calm, I’d tell him to pick one word and from there I’d tell him a story from my childhood. It didn’t have to be long. Just long enough to slow him down to listen, to get his heart rate down and get the bloody nose to subside. Telling the story very slowly and giving a lot of detail could accomplish this.

If his word was CAT, I’d tell him the story about how when I was 5 years old I took the bus home from school. This is a concept foreign to so many children now and enough to captivate. But on one particular walk home from the bus stop 2 blocks from our house, I saw a kitten up a tree. I am allergic to cats so I wouldn’t have been able to play with the kitten had it not been so very high up. I stayed at the base of that tree and talked to that kitten for a very long time. So long, my mother who was home with my two younger sisters and my 85-year-old great grandmother, began to worry and ran down the street looking for me.

That’s the whole of the story but I could stretch it out with detail of the tree, the cat, my bus, my street, what I might wear to school, until, my goodness, look at that, your nose is clean.

Worked every time.

And although he doesn’t need a story anymore, this kid still might get a bloody nose at nearly 17 and will sit on that step until it is done.

Treasure Chest Story

There were times when I need my boys to calm the heck down. They had too much energy when we were in the waiting room for a well-check or it really was time for a nap or they didn’t know but someone was coming over and I didn’t want them to walk into a hot mess. It was then I told the treasure chest story.

My oldest used to have an imagery friend named Susy. Susy often was responsible for the naughty things he did but she was also fun and kind. Where she was during the great screw incident, I do not know.

I told a story about Susy digging under, what the boys called “The Spooky Tree” in our yard when she found a little treasure box. This story was always the same. She always found a treasure box but what inside would change. There was always three things:

1) A vile or jar of something that looked magical (purple, sparkly, changed color, etc)

2) A photograph of some cherished memory (A little girl learning to ride a bike, a couple looking very in love on their wedding day, a little boy sitting high in a tree)

3) A small antiqued toy (a robot, a horse with moveable legs so it looks like he was galloping, a little clown with a red nose that came off and on)

The boys were captivated to find out what objects might be inside. If they were really unruly I might ask them what was inside and they would tell me and I agreed, yes, it was a Real GI Joe from 1980.

At the end of the story, Susy always put the objects back in the box, put it back in the hole, and packed good dark earth back a top so that some other child could find it.

Band Aid Box

I can’t take credit for this one. Our friend Randi used this story when she noticed every tiny scrape or imagery scrape needed a band aid. We simply could not keep up our band aid supply to match the demand. So Randi always had an imaginary box of band-aids she pulled out. She never said it was imaginary; she simply made a little rectangle shape with her hands as if she was truly holding a box of band-aids, open the lid, thumb through and again, offer three choices.

1) There was always a choice that of course, the child would not want, like for my boys, a pink one or one with Hello Kitty.

2) A choice that is appealing like a band-aid with earth diggers or butterflies or a symbol of whichever holiday is on the horizon

3) A choice with the latest, coolest whatever on it. For my boys it would have been Ninjago or Monsters Inc or maybe Richard Sherman.

Once they made their choice, she “took it out of the box, unwrapped it and placed it on the owie.” This story saved the save and no doubt, millions of dollars.

The trick on all these stories is to go slow, use all your theatrical skills and believe them yourself. Your might need that story too! Stories are just as helpful for the teller, as the hearer.