Myrtle the Turtle

Mandy took Mariah and Billy for a hike in a state park. As they walked she pointed out interesting things to them that she noticed. She explained what she knew about the plants and birds, and about other animals.

Up on the hilltops they came across a lovely view of the mountains in the distance.

Down in the forests, they came across other things to look at, like this pond, where a creature was sunning herself, balanced on a log.

As they walked along beside the pond, Mandy explained that the green stuff on the water was probably something called algae (AL-jee), but she would need to take a sample, or a little bit of it, to know for sure. "Algae are neither plant nor animal," Mandy explained, "but something in between." 

After a morning of hiking, the three dolls arrived back at the parking lot where there was a picnic area where they could sit and watch human people run and play with their dogs.

Mandy took the lunch out of the car. She also grabbed the cell phone, so she could let the other dolls know they were back safely from the hike. Mariah took her notebook and pencil from the car, while Billy helped Mandy with the picnic basket.

The three dolls sat down on a quilt to eat their lunch, and Mandy called home. Then she put down the phone. With a sandwich in one hand, Mariah pulled out her notebook and pencil and got ready to write, while Billy helped himself to one of the sandwiches, and Mandy passed around the carrots and blueberries.  

After erasing and rewriting some of the lines, Mariah was satisfied with the poem she had written. She read it to Mandy and Billy while they ate.

"On a log in the pond was a turtle;
She told us that her name was Myrtle;
She had copied a frog
Jumping over a log,
And found herself caught by her girdle."

Mandy and Billy laughed and clapped their hands.
"Very good, Mariah," Mandy said, "and funny! That's a limerick, and it's a good one."

"What's a limerick?" Billy asked. 
"I want to know, too," Mariah added. "I didn't know I was writing a limerick. I must have read one of them along with the other poems I've read. I must have copied the rhyme and meter."

Mandy explained that a limerick is a short poem with five lines. The first two and the last one rhyme, like "turtle," "Myrtle" and "girdle." The other two lines are shorter and rhyme with each other. "Limericks are usually funny or silly," she said. "Sometimes they are rude, but I really like yours, because it isn't rude, just funny."

"What's a girdle?" Billy asked.

"It's something worn around the waist," Mariah said. "I think people used to wear a special girdle to hold in their tummies long ago, so they would look thinner," she added.

"That wouldn't work for us," Billy pointed out. "Our tummies are firm vinyl. They are what they are."

"Mariah is right," Mandy agreed, "but a girdle can also be a belt or a sash, and you're right, too, Billy. There's no way to make our tummies smaller than they are, and it wouldn't be good for you if there were."

"That's an interesting turtle," Mariah mused. "It made me wonder what turtles are like. This one was out in the middle of the pond, where we couldn't get close to look," she added.

"Is a turtle like a frog wearing armor?" Billy asked Mandy.

Billy and Mariah thought Mandy probably knew all about turtles, because she knows so much about the world.
"Frogs and turtles are only distantly related, Billy," Mandy explained, as she picked up a juicy blueberry. "They both have backbones and they both lay eggs, but a frog is something called an amphibian (am-FIH-bee-an) because the eggs hatch in water and the frog starts out sort of like a fish."

"A baby frog is called a tadpole. It can breathe water, just like a fish," Mandy explained.
Mandy found a photo on the cell phone and showed it to them. "Here's a tadpole," she said.

"See, it looks like a fish," she explained, "but you can just see the hind legs starting to grow, and if you look carefully, you can see through the skin where the front legs will be."

Billy and Mariah thought this was interesting. Mandy explained that the tadpole grows legs and then when it's ready, it comes out of the water, able to breathe air. Then it can hop and sing and swim, just like an adult frog.

She found this photo to remind them of what a grownup frog looks like.

"A turtle, on the other hand," Mandy continued, "is a reptile (REHP-tile). The mother lays her eggs on the land, and the babies hatch out already able to walk and breathe air."

"Does the baby have to go and look for a shell to wear?" Billy wanted to know.

"No, Billy," Mandy said, "they grown their own shells, but there is a creature that does that. The hermit crab doesn't grow its own shell, but instead looks for an empty one and climbs in. As it grows, it has to find bigger and bigger empty shells to use. Each time it leaves its old shell behind, perhaps for another hermit crab to use."

She showed them this photo of a hermit crab on her phone.

"So how does a turtle get a shell?" Mariah asked.

"They grow them," Mandy replied, "the same way children grow hair and fingernails. In fact, their shell is made of the same material as hair and fingernails."

Mandy found a photo of a turtle, so Mariah and Billy could see what they look like close up.

"What's it for? The shell, I mean." Billy asked.

"It's protection," Mandy explained,  "from animals that might want to eat them."

"So it IS like wearing armor!" Billy cried. 

"Yes," Mandy agreed, laughing, "but a turtle can pull his head inside his shell to protect it, so he doesn't need a helmet."
"Do all turtles live around ponds?" Mariah asked.

"No," Mandy replied. "Actually, the turtle family is divided into true turtles, who have flippers or webbed feet to swim with, and tortoises, who have feet."

"Tortoises live on land," Mandy went on, "like in the desert, where there is very little water, and turtles spend their lives in water. The sea turtles have flippers instead of feet."

"They only come out on land to lay their eggs," Mandy continued. "They bury the eggs in the sand and then go back into the ocean."

Mandy found another photo, this time of a sea turtle under the water. "They breathe air, like porpoises and whales. They come up for a breath, then they swim down in the water to look for food."

"I would love to see a sea turtle!" Mariah said. 
"You can," Mandy replied. "We have a sea turtle at home. It is just a toy turtle, but it looks a lot like a real one. We can look at it when we get back."

As soon as the dolls arrived home, Mandy found the stuffed toy sea turtle and showed it to Mariah and Billy.

"Let's name her Myrtle," Mariah suggested. Then she looked at Myrtle's face and sighed. "I'm not sure she likes her name," she said. "She looks disgusted. Look at her face!"

Billy laughed. "Maybe Myrtle is really a boy!"
"Or maybe," said Mariah with another sigh, "Myrtle didn't like my limerick!"

"I think Myrtle just misses the ocean," Mandy suggested.

Cast--
Mandy: Götz Happy Kidz Katie 2015
Mariah: Götz Happy Kidz Mariah, "Chosen" from My Doll Best Friend
Billy: Götz Happy Kidz Lily at London
Myrtle (the real turtle): Herself
Myrtle (the toy): Sea Turtle from The Nature Conservancy

Tadpole photo: Scienceprofonline.com

Common map turtle: Photo by Peter Paplanus, Animal World 

Grey tortoise: Photo by Luca Ambrosi on Unsplash

Hermit crab: Photo by Jehu Christan on Unsplash

Sea turtle: Photo by Wexor Tmg on Unsplash

Frog: photo by henry fournier on Unsplash
Mountain view and turtle pond photos were taken on location at L.L. Stub Stewart Memorial State Park in Washington County, Oregon. 

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.

Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook, Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook and Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook are available from BookBaby and other booksellers worldwide, such as Amazon and Barnes & Noble. 

Author's page on Amazon. 

Royalties (net proceeds) go to support pediatric cancer research and treatment. If you don't get free shipping elsewhere, buy from Book Baby. Half of the price goes to charity (specific information available upon request). Autographed copies of all three books are available from the author. (Multiple books to the same address have a discount on shipping.) To inquire, email thedollsstorybook@icloud.com.

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Copyright © 2019, 2024 by Peggy Stuart

Time on the Beach

"You're going to like the beach, Pauly," Pippa told her friend as they sat in the car, riding along the road. "You've never seen so much sand in your life!"

"Jeffy has a sandbox," Pauly replied. "There's enough sand in it for him to dig holes and fill his pail. Sometimes he takes me to his sandbox and lets me watch him play." Pauly thought Jeffy's sandbox had an awful lot of sand. How could the beach have more? He didn't want to disagree with Pippa, though, until he had seen how much sand there was at the beach.

Pippa just smiled to herself. The Writer's backyard had a sandbox, too. The Writer's grandchildren liked to play in it. Pippa played in it too and knew that the amount of sand in the sandbox was very small when compared with the sand on the beach. She would just let Pauly see for himself.

After a pleasant ride, The Writer parked the car and helped the two little dolls get out. She told them she would sit in the shade near the small parking lot where the beach started. She could keep an eye on them. She said that they should have a good time. She would call them when it was time to go home. The two little dolls looked at the beach. It was big. It was very big!

The two dolls took the bucket and the ball they had brought with them, and their bottle of water, in case one of them got thirsty. 

"You were right, Pippa!" Pauly exclaimed as the two dolls stood and looked at the beach. This is a lot, a very lot, of sand! This is way more than Jeffy has in his sandbox."

"If seven maids with seven mops swept it for half a year, do you suppose," the Walrus said, "that they could get it clear?" Pippa thought to herself. She remembered that from her favorite book, Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. It is a very big book. It's two books in one, in fact, but she has read the whole thing several times.

They carried the bucket and other things down to a place where some of the sand was still damp from the high tide, but some sand right next to it was nice and dry to sit on. They sat down there in the warm, dry sand. There were gusts of wind, but not enough to make it difficult to stand. There were human people walking on the beach. They didn't fall over, either, but the wind made their clothes move about.

"What's that stuff out there?" Pauly asked, pointing out past where the sand was very damp. Something was moving back and forth.

"That's the ocean," Pippa said. She had wondered about it, too, the first time. "It's water. A lot of it."

"What's all the white stuff on top?" Pauly wanted to know.

"I asked Mandy about that," Pippa said. "The water turns white when the waves get close to the shore, and they get too tall to stand up. The tops of the waves fall over, and all the sloshing makes bubbles. The bubbles make the water look white. I think it's pretty."

Pauly thought it was pretty, too, and he liked hearing the whooshing sound that came and went.

There were some birds on the shore, walking around.

"Those things look like birds," Pauly said, "but I haven't seen any like that before."

"Those birds are called gulls," Pippa told Pauly. They live mostly on or near the ocean. Mandy told me about them.They're finding something to eat in the sand."

"Mandy said that the ones that are smaller and splotchy grey-and-brown are young ones," Pippa explained as they watched the birds. "The grownup ones are white all over except their wings."

The gulls were far away. Pippa remembered the photo Mandy had shown her at that time. She wanted to show it to Pauly. She concentrated very hard on the photo of the gull in her memory to show it to Pauly. She hadn't thought to bring a telescope or binoculars, which help you see things that are far away. Pauly saw the gull in his head, and nodded solemnly.

The gull in Pippa's head was standing on a rock, but Pauly didn't see any rocks on the beach. He guessed that this gull was like the ones on the beach but not actually one of them. Maybe this gull lived far away.

Pippa and Pauly played in the sand for a while. They tried to make the sand squish through their toes, but that didn't work, because their little toes are all stuck together. They rolled the ball back and forth on the sand. They found out that it rolled better on the sand that was damp than on the dry sand. 

Then Pauly dug into the sand with his fingers. (At least most of his fingers aren't stuck together!) It was fun to feel the sand. He remembered it from Jeffy's sandbox.

Then he remembered something Jeffy had done in the sandbox. Pauly filled the pail with sand that was slightly camp. Then he got Pippa to help him turn it over, so the sand came out again, but it didn't spill all over; it stayed in one place, shaped like the pail. He patted the top smooth.

"It looks like a table," Pippa said, as Pauly patted the top.

"Yes," Pauly agreed. "We can use it like a table."

He put their water bottle on it, and they sat on each side of it, like vacationers at a beach-front hotel. They watched the birds and the human people walking on the beach. No human people were swimming, because the wind made the water too rough. It would be dangerous and not fun.

After a while they heard The Writer calling them, and they knew it was time to go. Pippa picked up the pail. She was a little sad to have to leave, but she knew the fun time they had had would stay in her mind for a long time. She gazed at the ocean, so she could remember it.

"Here," Pauly said, "Let me help carry the pail." 

Pippa was happy to let Pauly help. The two dolls carried the pail between them back up the beach toward The Writer. Suddenly, Pauly stopped. This made Pippa stop, too. He looked down and saw something in the sand. "Oh, look at this!" he exclaimed. What a funny thing it was!

"Let's ask the Writer what it is," Pippa suggested. So they did. They had trouble telling her what it looked like, and she can't see pictures in their heads, so she came back to that spot with them and looked at it. She told them it was an empty crab carapace (KA-ra-pace). She took a photo with her phone and suggested maybe Mandy could tell them what kind it was.

They talked all the way home about the fun they had had and the things they had seen at the beach.

Home at last, the two dolls washed the sand off of their feet in the bathroom sink and dried them off with a towel. 

Then they went to find Mandy. She was in the workroom, looking at the tablet. 

She smiled when they came in. "Hi!" she said. "Before you left the beach, The Writer sent me a text with the photo of the crab carapace you found in the sand. I've been looking, and I think I've found the right kind of crab. It's hard to tell for sure, because there are two kinds of crab that look a like this." 

"We would need to have the legs to know for sure." Mandy explained. "We just have the carapace. If we had the underside or the legs, we could be certain." She showed them the photo on the computer. "This is the one I think it is. It's called a Pacific Rock Crab."

Pippa and Pauly looked at the photo.

Then Mandy found another photo on the computer. "Here's our crab in the water where it lives."

"It looks sort of like a spider," Pippa said.

"Yes," Mandy agreed.

"Crabs and other sea animals like this are related to spiders," Mandy told them. They don't have a skeleton on the inside like human people. They have an exoskeleton (EX-o-skel-eh-tun) instead."

"An exoskeleton is what it's called when it's on the outside." Mandy explained. "A skeleton is the framework for all their muscles, so their bodies can move around." Mandy demonstrated by moving her arms and legs up and down a bit.

"What happened to the rest of it?" Pauly asked. "I mean, what we found didn't have legs or any of these other parts. It was just a piece of it."

"Yes," Mandy agreed. "The carapace is just the part that covers the top of the crab. As to what happened to the rest of it, it was probably eaten by a gull or some other creature. They don't eat the shell, just what's inside. The shells from the legs and underside were probably in the sand somewhere else or still in the water."

"Do we have an exoskeleton" Pippa wanted to know, "or do we have a regular skeleton, since we look like human people."

Mandy had to think. "Well," she said, since we are supposed to represent real human people, I would say that we have a pretend skeleton inside, but our vinyl is made to be like an exoskeleton. It's hard and on the outside, and it lets us move around."

The dolls all had to think about that.

An exoskeleton with air and connectors inside. Interesting.

Cast--
Mandy: Götz Happy Kidz Katie 2015

Pippa: Götz Little Kidz Lotta

Pauly: Götz Little Kidz Paul

Adult Gull photo Photo by Meritt Thomas on Unsplash

Crab photo by Darrell Cassell on Unsplash

Photo of crab in ocean from Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife.

You can follow The Doll's Storybook here.

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.

"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.

Mariah: Stories from the Doll's Storybook and Emil: Stories from the Doll's Storybook are available from Amazon worldwide. Also available from Barnes & Noble,  BookBaby and other booksellers. Royalties go to support pediatric cancer research and treatment. If you don't get free shipping elsewhere, buy from Book Baby. Half of the price goes to St. Jude.

<a href="https://www.bloglovin.com/blog/19832501/?claim=j3fj3mbb8kt">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

Copyright © 2022 by Peggy Stuart