A Fox Bedtime Story: The Kite With a Pocket

Read this original fox bedtime story: Fenn repairs a torn kite and finds an unexpected use for the patch when the wind changes. The full story comes with one optional way to add a detail from your child’s imagination.

The Kite With a Pocket

Fenn's kite had a tear shaped like a crooked smile. It had caught on a branch the previous afternoon, and now one corner flapped whenever he carried it across the room.

He laid it on the kitchen table. His grandmother brought a square of thin fabric and a small pot of glue. Together they pressed the patch over the tear. Fenn drew a red tulip on it while the glue dried.

One edge of the patch did not stick. Grandmother lifted it with a fingertip. "A pocket," she said. "Though a kite has very little shopping to carry."

Fenn found a scrap of paper. He wrote, "Hello from up here," folded it small and slipped it under the tulip. Then they walked to the wide meadow behind the house.

The morning wind lifted the kite at once. Its tail curved above the grass. Fenn let out a little more string and watched his red tulip become a tiny spot against the blue sky.

"Who is the message for?" Grandmother asked.

Fenn had not considered that. "Anyone looking up."

But the paper stayed inside the pocket, where nobody could read it. The kite tugged. Fenn imagined a bird stopping to inspect the patch, though none did. The birds had their own morning arrangements.

After a while the wind softened. The kite lowered gently until its tail brushed the grass. Fenn reeled in the string and carried it to the blanket where Grandmother sat with their snack basket.

He took out the note. "It did not deliver anything."

Grandmother read the words. "It brought a message from up there to down here."

Fenn looked across the meadow. From his place on the blanket he could see the long grass bending, but no rooftops. The kite had been high enough to see the house.

He turned the paper over and drew what he imagined it had seen: their roof, the garden path and Grandmother's blanket as a small green square. He folded the drawing and put it back in the pocket.

The wind returned just as they finished their apples. Fenn stood up, holding the string. This time he knew who the message was for.

When the kite came down again, he would bring home a picture for his grandfather, who was waiting beside the kitchen table with another square of fabric.

Choose one familiar detail

Your child can choose the shape drawn on the kite's patch. Keep the pocket and the folded note, because those details connect the repair to the final scene. If you make a paper kite picture afterward, it can stay safely indoors on the page. The note can also become a small drawing made after the reading and saved inside a folded paper pocket.

Day2Tale creates personalized, narrated stories.

Sources: Day2Tale support and product features