The Planting Stones
by Lauren S. Johnson Illustrated by Susan Lake © Copyright 2018
The Planting Stones
nce upon a time there lived a boy named Jaq who lived with his kind father and kind mother in a small stone cottage at the edge of a wood. Next to their cottage was a field. It had once grown healthy crops of barley and rye, but now it struggled to sustain anything the family tried to grow. Jaq’s family had a friendly milk cow who lived in a stone barn in the back and a sweet cat who climbed trees and caught mice in the wood.
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Their humble cottage once had been cheerful and cozy - but over time, it had fallen into some disrepair. Holes peeped through the stone walls, and the wind whistled through on cold winter evenings. Jaq’s parents worked hard trying to take care of their little farm, but with each passing day, they seemed to have less and less to get by.
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n the old cottage was a beautiful stone fireplace with a sturdy wooden mantle upon which Jaq’s mother and father placed their few family treasures. As the family’s poverty deepened, however, it seemed that the mantle and its treasures did little more than gather dust.
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One day, Jaq’s father and mother told him it was time for Jaq to leave home. They said he should go into the town to learn how to make money to support himself. Maybe he could apprentice himself to a blacksmith or shoemaker -- someone who could teach him a trade. It seemed his future would lead him beyond the little farm and his parents. Jaq was sad to leave his family, but understood that is what he must do.
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