The Doll's Storybook

Stories about dolls who live in our world. Although these stories are suitable for children, they should check with their parents before reading and always be careful online. Readers are invited to donate to a charity supporting pediatric cancer treatment and research. Images shown are taken by the author or from a free image website with attribution and appreciation. The author has no connection with Götz Puppenmanufaktur, but gives them credit for the amazing dolls they produce.

Friday, October 10, 2025

Composing Compost, Part One

"What is this?" Emil asked Jolena.

Emil took off his hat and put a napkin around his waist. He had offered to help Jolena in the kitchen, but he had a lot of questions, because there was a lot he didn't know.
Jolena looked to see what he was looking at.

"Used coffee grounds," she said, and continued stirring the sauce she was making. "That's what's left over after The Writer makes her coffee.

"Does it go into the trash or the recycling?" he asked.

Jolena laughed. "Some people put their coffee grounds in the trash, but we don't. We try to recycle as much as possible, but something like this can't go into the recycling bin." Then she thought for a moment. "I don't know much about it," she added, "but I know it needs special treatment."

"Anyway," she continued, "Mandy has a special trash can for it. It's under the sink."
Emil looked at the coffee grounds. "It looks like...dirt," he said.

"Yes," agreed Jolena, "and it will be dirt, or soil, which is a better word than dirt for what it will be. It will be used to make compost (KOM-post), which is like soil when it's done. Compost helps plants grow better."

"Did I hear someone say 'compost?'" asked a voice from the doorway. It was Mandy.

"Yes," said Jolena. "I was just telling Emil what to do with the coffee grounds."

"Good!" Mandy exclaimed. "Emil, you can be my helper, if Jolena can spare you. I was going to empty the compost container today. I need to take it out and put everything into the composter out in the yard. It takes two dolls to lift the can."

"What's compost?" Emil wanted to know. "Jolena said it's some kind of dirt...or soil."
Mandy climbed up to sit next to Emil. "It will be," she agreed, "but compost starts out as plant material that we can't use, like garbage and grass clippings."

"And like coffee grounds," Emil said.
"Yes," Mandy said, nodding, "but even the coffee filter can go into the composter. She pulled out the box of coffee filters, so Emil could see. "That's why we use the brown ones. This is the natural color of the paper. White filters have been made white with something called bleach. Bleach isn't good for making compost."

Mandy put the box of filters aside and got out the box of tea bags. She pulled one of the tea bags out of the little envelope it was in. "We can recycle tea bags, too," she said, "but we take off the little tag, if it has one, and put that into the paper recycling bin."

"What else do you put into the compost?" Emil asked.
"Any vegetable matter we don't need," Mandy said. "Potato peels, vegetables that have spoiled or lettuce that isn't pretty, the stems and leaves that we don't pretend to eat. Here, you can help me with these banana peels," she went on. "We can put in the whole peel, but we need to take off the stickers and the plastic thing on the end." She handed Emil some of the banana peels, and he sat at the sink and removed the stickers.

Then Emil removed the plastic tape from the end of one of the peels.

He put the sticker and plastic tape into the trash.

Mandy had Emil help her pull out the compost container from under the sink. It's where the dolls put things that need to go into the compost bin outdoors. It was very heavy, because it was full.

Then Mandy put the coffee filter and the coffee grounds into the compost container while Emil watched. Emil put the banana peels into the compost container all by himself. He had to step on a little pedal to make the lid go up, the way he had seen Mandy do. That way he could use both hands for the banana peels.

"One more thing," Mandy said. "When I'm ready to take the compost container out to the backyard to dump everything into the compost bin, I get out the eggshells from under the sink, so I don't forget to get them ready for the compost after we dump the container." Mandy reached in under the sink and pulled out a small tub. She took off the lid, so Emil could see inside.

Emil looked at the eggshells. They were sort of smooshed. "Why don't you just put the eggshells into the compost container?" he asked.

"Well," Mandy said, as she put the eggshells up on the counter next to the blender, "eggshells don't break down quickly. We like to run the eggshells through the blender with some water to grind them up first, and add that separately."
Emil climbed up on top of the compost container to try to get the lid to close all the way. "Is there anything else doesn't break down quickly?" he asked.

"Things like orange peels," Mandy said, "and watermelon rind. We chop those things up when we're ready to put them into the compost. We don't put meat or bones into the compost," Mandy explained, "nor do we put nut shells into it. Meat and bones can attract rats and mice."

"It takes too long for things like bones and nut shells to turn into compost, so we just throw them away in the bin for yard waste. We can use grass and leaves, but the big branches don't work in the compost, either. We put those into the yard waste bin, too. The city picks that stuff up for us. They chop it up and use it in their compost."
"So what's the compost for?" Emil asked. "Jolena said it was like soil and it makes the plants grow better."

"Yes!" Mandy exclaimed. "It can be used on the ground in the garden. It gives nutrients (NOO-tree-ents) to the plants.
Emil likes to work in the garden. The Writer had given him a big serving spoon to use to dig with, but he only dug where The Writer's husband said to dig.

He likes to help The Writer's husband dig and pull weeds. He is proud of their garden.

Emil loves the little tomatoes that just fit in his hands.

He loves pulling up the radishes when they are ready to eat.

Emil had been wondering where the radish leaves went, because they never showed up in the salad, and they weren't in the trash. Now he knew! He had seen them in the compost container when they added the coffee grounds.

Now he was looking forward to putting the finished compost down on the garden...compost he had helped make!

"I wonder how the compost gets made," he said to himself. "How does that work?"

To be continued....

Note to children: Dolls are very small, so to work in the kitchen they sometimes have to get up on the counter. They are very careful to wash the countertops after they are done sitting there or walking around on it. Real children should not be up on the counter, though. It is a surface for using your hands to prepare food.

Cast--
Mandy: Götz Happy Kidz Katie 2015
Jolena: Götz Happy Kidz Lena in Aspen
Emil: Götz Happy Kidz Emilia

You can follow The Doll's Storybook here.

Do you have questions or comments for us? Would you like to order an autographed copy of one of our books? You can email us at thedollsstorybook@icloud.com.

Note: No dolls were harmed during production of this blog. All dolls shown are Götz Happy Kidz, Classic Kidz or Little Kidz. If you like these stories and are willing, please make a donation of any amount to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital or any organization that supports pediatric cancer research and treatment. We are not affiliated with St. Jude in any way other than these donations.

"The Doll's Storybook" is not affiliated with Gotz Dolls USA Inc. or Götz Puppenmanufaktur International GmbH.
Watch for the next story each Friday afternoon at 1:00 PM Pacific Time.

Do you like our stories? Some of them are available in print:

The stories in More Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Welcoming a Stranger, The Rescue, Unmasked, Fuzzy Town––A Play and Sky Blue.

Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook. Poems included are Valentine's Day, Keeping Pets, Back to School, Victor the Vulture, The Week Before Christmas, Insomnia and Veronika's Vocabulary Verses.

The stories in Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Little Green Greatcoat, The Boy Doll Who Cried Wolf and Lost in the Woods.

The stories in Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Best Buds, Getting What You Want, and The Boys Cook Dinner.

The stories in Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

Coming soon: Billy: Stories from The Doll's Storybook.

If you don't get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, buy from the BookBabyBookshop, because 50% of the price goes to St. Jude. Other booksellers pay much less, because the vendor gets a cut. My author's page at Book Baby is here. Scroll down and click on any of the books that interest you. Find my books at Barbara's Bookstore as well, or ask your library to get them for you.

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Friday, October 3, 2025

Getting What You Want

Jolena was looking at the photos from last week's story. She wondered why each boy was wearing one pink boot and one plaid boot, so she went looking for them to find out.

Jolena found the boys playing cards with Mariah in the workroom. They looked up when she came in.

"I was just looking at this photo from last week's story," Jolena said, "and I was wondering why each of you boys is wearing one pink boot and one plaid boot. Were you in such a hurry that you didn't notice?"

The boys looked at each other. Then Billy began, "Well, we wanted to wear the boots so we didn't have to worry if we got our feet in the water."

Emil nodded. "It's a good thing, too, because Billy slipped on the edge of the toilet, and his foot went into the water."

"I can understand that," Jolena said, "but why didn't one of you wear one pair of boots and the other boy the other pair?"

"It's because of the color," Billy explained. "We had three pairs of boots to choose from."

"Yes," Emil agreed. "We had the light pink, the plaid ones and the dark pink pair"

"When we picked, we both wanted the plaid boots," Billy said.

"Pink is a girls' color," Emil explained. "We didn't want to argue about it, so we decided that each of us would wear one plaid boot and one pink boot."

"That's a great compromise (KOM-pro-myz)," Mariah said.

"I don't know what a compromise is," Billy said. "Could you explain it to me?"

"A compromise," Mariah said, "is when you don't get exactly what you want but something you can accept."

"It's like when two dolls each want something that they can't both have, so they each give up a little to make the other doll happy but get to still keep a little of what they want," she explained.

"Yes," agreed Jolena. "Like meeting in the middle. It's a way to keep from having a fight over something."

"Do you mean like when we take turns picking which shows we get to watch?" Emil asked.

"Or when we take turns using the boy's bike and wearing the blue bike helmet!" Billy suggested.

"Yes," Mariah agreed, "or when two of us want to ride the bicycles, and there's only one left because two other dolls are already out riding. We did that the other day, Emil, remember? You offered to take the skateboard instead."

"The skateboard is just as much fun," Emil said. "It goes just as fast. So that was a compromise?"

"Yes," Jolena agreed. "Another kind of compromise would be if I wanted blueberry pancakes and you wanted banana pancakes, so I made us blueberry-banana pancakes. That's a compromise."

"So instead of getting something you're thrilled with you get something that's OK, and we aren't fighting," Billy decided.

The girls agreed.

"Or maybe," Billy continued, "you get something just as good, only it isn't what you had in mind, like the skateboard." He thought for a moment. "That's a good thing to know how to do," he added.

"Can you use it every time you and another doll disagree about something?"

"Not always," Mariah said. "If you disagree about whether to do something that's dangerous or wrong, you shouldn't compromise. You should just do what's safe and right."

"Thanks for explaining what a compromise is," Billy said. "I think it will be useful to know how to use it."

"You know," Jolena said, "it was good you figured out a compromise about the boots, but you didn't really need to."

"Why not?" Emil asked.

"Boys can wear pink," Jolena said. "I know you don't have any pink clothes, and we don't think of pink as a boys' color, but there's no rule that says you can't wear pink if you like, or if there's only one pair of boots that aren't pink."

"Right," Mariah agreed. "If girls can build houses and walk around in space, boys can certainly wear pink."

"Your feet will stay just as dry," Jolena added, "no matter what color the boots are."

Cast--
Jolena: Götz Happy Kidz Lena in Aspen
Mariah: Götz Happy Kidz Mariah, "Chosen" from My Doll Best Friend
Billy: Götz Happy Kidz Lily at London
Emil: Götz Happy Kidz Emilia