Koko Learns To Start Small 🐨 ⭐️ Cozy Bedtime Stories For Kids | Rewind

[00:00:10] Hello and welcome back to Koala Moon, a podcast of original bedtime stories and sleep meditations for kids designed to make bedtime a dream. Do you guys know that feeling of having so much to do that you just don't know where to start? Like if you haven't tidied your bedroom for a while and it's got a bit out of hand with all the toys, clothes, books, bits and bobs all over the place.

[00:00:39] And, well, when you're asked to tidy it, it just seems way too messy to even think about. I mean, where on earth do you start? Well, poor Koko is feeling all of that today. I mean, he is stressed out. He has lots to do and he doesn't know where to begin. Luckily, he has a very wise grandma and she gives him a special piece of advice.

[00:01:04] She tells him something that sounds really quite simple, but the more he says it, the more it helps. Maybe it's a gem of advice we can all do well to remember. If you stay awake long enough to hear the advice, maybe try it next time you're feeling a bit overwhelmed and let Koko know because don't forget you can voice note him these days. Just go to the link in the show notes to see how to do it.

[00:01:32] Before we begin, here's a quick ad break. Then we'll start tonight's bedtime story. If you'd like to support our podcast, enjoy ad-free listening and unlock all our premium stories, you can join the Koko Club. To join, follow the link in the show notes. Now then, lie back in your bed and get all floppy and relaxed. Maybe shake out your arms and your legs if you want and have a little sigh.

[00:02:00] Just do whatever helps you to get in the snoozy mood, ready to listen while I get started. This is Koko Learns to Start Small by Jane Thomas. Koko is walking up and down in the garden, muttering to himself. He has his paws behind his back, then keeps reaching up to scratch his head.

[00:02:30] He is deep in thought. Every now and then, he stops, looks up at the sky and seems to ask it a question. The sky never answers, so he goes back to walking up and down. Koko's grandmother is in the kitchen, washing dishes. She looks out of the window at him, wondering what the problem is that he's trying to solve.

[00:02:55] She reaches for the final bowl and washes it in the warm, soapy water, rinsing it beneath the tap and placing it on the side to dry. She empties out the bowl and, of course, finds one final teaspoon lurking in the bottom, giving that a good extra wash and rinse too. She dries her hand on a checkered tea towel and steps outside. Koko's at the far end of the garden and when he reaches the hedge,

[00:03:25] he turns and starts heading back towards the house. His paws, her back behind his back. His head is down and he jumps a little when his grandmother says, What's up, Koko? He hadn't seen her there at all. It's just... Koko feels silly saying it out loud. It's that... He trails off.

[00:03:53] Koko's grandmother sits down on the step and pats the space beside her. Koko sits next to her and they both look out at the garden. Koko says, Koko says at last. And now I have all this homework to do and it's too much. And I don't know where to begin or anything.

[00:04:17] There's history homework and math and English and science and... He stops talking and looks down at the ground. He hadn't meant to be so disorganised this week, but things kept coming up. Fun things. And he didn't want to miss out. And now it all seems a bit much. Koko's grandmother thinks for a moment.

[00:04:48] Koko says, Koko says, Koko says, Do you know what I say to myself whenever I have so much to do? It feels like I don't know where to begin. Koko shakes his head. He doesn't know. Koko says, I just tell myself, Start small. That's it. Start small.

[00:05:15] I find it funny how once I've started, things just seem to get going. And then, before I know it, I'm halfway through the list and it doesn't seem so impossible after all. Start small. repeats Koko. Yes, I can do that, I think. Thank you.

[00:05:44] He leans over and gives his grandmother a kiss on her furry koala cheek, heading upstairs to his room. With every step on the stairs, he repeats the special words. Start small. Take a step. Start small. Take a step. By the time he gets to his room, he's decided to start with the science homework.

[00:06:13] He has to write up all about the time Neil Armstrong went to the moon. and before he knows it, Coco is deep into a story about the moon and stars. He emerges from his room a few hours later, half his homework now finished. He's heading downstairs to the kitchen for a glass of water and bumps into Kira. He's still avoiding your homework, Kira says, she asks, nudging him with her elbow.

[00:06:43] She knows perhaps better than anyone what Coco is feeling. Nope. I'm starting small, he announces, reaching for a glass and holding it beneath the tap. Starting small, Kira says. That's it. If you want to do something, you just have to start small. Coco finishes his water

[00:07:12] and heads back upstairs, repeating his mantra again on every step. Sitting on the step outside, Coco's grandmother smiles to herself. Her little method seems to have done the trick. Kira stays in the kitchen, turning it over in her mind. Start small, she says to herself. She thinks about her wardrobe upstairs

[00:07:40] and the dresser drawers and the boxes under her bed and how she has been promising her mother for ages that she'll go through and sort out all the clothes that she's grown out of. I suppose, she says to herself, I could just start small. She decides she's going to sort out one of the boxes, just one of them, and that will be enough. Kira heads to her room

[00:08:10] and before she knows it, she's sorted through four, five, six boxes and created a little pile of clothes that no longer fit. And now, she's going to go through the drawers. In the next room, Coco continues with his homework. Both of them are deep into their tasks and all because they used a very simple trick. They decided to start small. Somehow,

[00:08:40] now, Kira has finished going through every item of clothing in the room and she has a big bag of clothes that no longer fit. There is a place in the village where she can take the clothes and leave them and they'll pass them on to others who need things exactly like that. And she decides that, since it's a sunny day, she may as well take them there now. She picks up the bag and is about to head out when Coco pokes his head into her room.

[00:09:11] Busy? He asks. She holds up the bag and shrugs. Sort of, she says. I'm going to celebrate finishing my homework, says Coco. I'm off to Betty Badger's bakery. Wanna come with me? Kira shows him the bag of clothes and says they'll need to go via the share and wear store. They each take a handle and carry the bag between them,

[00:09:40] singing a little start small song they're inventing as they go. Start small. Croons Kira. Works for all. Start small. Follows Coco. Have a ball. They bump into Prickles, the hedgehog on their way to share and wear and he asks them what they're singing about. It's our new mantra, they say

[00:10:09] and then have to explain that a mantra is something you say over and over and is a way of focusing your mind in a new way. Start small, repeats Prickles. Is that it? Coco and Kira nod in unison. Yep, they say. That's it. Whatever the task, whatever is up ahead, just start small.

[00:10:38] And before you know it, you'll have made progress and everything seems a whole lot easier. Prickles heads back home, rolling the idea around and around in his mind. Start small, he keeps repeating. He's thinking about the enormous pile of logs that have to be stacked, that he promised his father he would take care of, but he has yet to move

[00:11:07] a single one of them. He supposes, as he walks home, that he could indeed just start small. Perhaps he will do just one or two of the logs today and then at least he's started and the pile will be a little smaller the next time he looks at it. As soon as he reaches home, he heads round the back. He normally likes to go into the kitchen

[00:11:36] and check if there's anything particularly delicious on the stove, but this time he's repeating start small, start small to himself and determined to make a start on that pile of logs. Prickles picks up a log from the pile and carefully places it the right way along the side of the house. He goes back to the pile and takes two logs, putting them alongside the first.

[00:12:07] Then, to amuse himself, he takes two more logs and puts them on the first three and adds another log on top. So now, he has a mini pyramid of logs. It's sort of satisfying to look at. Three logs and then two logs and then one log. And he thinks how much better it would look if he made it an even bigger pyramid with four along the bottom and then three

[00:12:36] and then two and then one. So, he gets more logs from the pile and adds them up, building up his pyramid at the side of the house and before he knows it, he's balancing on the very points of his toes to add the top log to a pyramid that is twelve logs wide and twelve logs high. It takes a couple of hours but then, much to his surprise, Prickles is squeezing

[00:13:06] the final log into the stack by the house and all that's left to do is sweep up the pieces of bark that show where the pile was in the first place and given that he's so nearly finished the job he might as well do that part too. So, he fetches the broom and carefully sweeps up all those tiny scraps of wood and bits of broken off bark and just like that the backyard is back to being tidy.

[00:13:36] Prickles suddenly has a whole lot more energy which is funny because before he started moving the logs he hadn't felt like doing anything at all. It seems that starting small he says to himself has woken me up a bit more than I expected. He hops on his bicycle a shiny red one with a shiny silver bell and decides to head over to the lake for a swim

[00:14:06] because it's a hot afternoon and moving those logs has made him warm. A swim in the lake is just what's called for. On his way Prickles passes a kangaroo lying flat on his back in the park. Prickles comes to a halt and calls out to the kangaroo Kevin he says the kangaroo doesn't move hey Kevin

[00:14:36] Prickles calls again the kangaroo sits up with a start he rubs his eyes then smiles as he sees Prickles good day good day good day he says bouncing onto his feet I was just uh taking a nap finishes Prickles well yes but only because I'm trying to do this new dance move and it's really hard no it's

[00:15:05] impossible so I'm just sort of having a rest for a bit that's all Prickles grins at him he puts his feet back on the pedals and as he cycles off he calls over his shoulder start small Kevin start small Kevin isn't quite sure what this means start small he says to himself over and over

[00:15:35] start small he thinks about the dance move he's trying to do one that involves a lot of spins and leaps and twists and turns that all kind of flow into each other and he tries to think how he could start small with that in the end he decides that if he just takes the first bit of the move and practices that then maybe this

[00:16:04] is what it means to start small

[00:16:35] Kevin thinking then Kevin adds the next bit of the move which is a complicated kind of flip that sees him leap high high into the air and turn right around before he lands he keeps trying it landing on his head with a bump and a thump but then finally he gets it pushing off with his tail with just the right strength to see him launched

[00:17:05] high high into the sky with enough time and space to do a complete flip he adds the move to the first one and soon they flow seamlessly together and wouldn't you know before the afternoon is done Kevin has mastered the complicated new dance move he took each single part and worked out how to do them separately then he wove them together

[00:17:34] and suddenly the time had flown by and there he was able to jump and twist and flip and turn and spin in whole new ways all that he said to himself just because I learned to start small huh Kevin bounced his way out of the park and down the street boinging his way along with a

[00:18:04] determined start small on every hop as he passed heavenly hats he glanced inside to see a worried looking warthog on her head was a perfect little rainbow wiggling and jiggling as she dashed back and forth between empty shelves oh my she was muttering to herself oh my Kevin poked his head through the door and the

[00:18:34] warthog looked up oh my she repeated gesturing towards absolute chaos all the hats were piled up on the floor in a scene of absolute chaos Patrick is going to be furious she said to Kevin although Kevin if he was honest didn't know exactly who Patrick might be whatever it is he said

[00:19:04] with a smile remember to start small that's it just start small he gave a cheerful grin and bounced along his way leaving behind a warthog called Winnie dressed in a trembling rainbow fascinator repeating to herself start small start small she took the instruction quite literally

[00:19:33] and poked around in the pile to find the very smallest hat the store had to offer one that suited the robins at Christmas when they were doing their postal deliveries and she places it back on the shelf where it was supposed to be she felt slightly better about herself for having done something and then decided to put that in its place too a chef's hat for a

[00:20:03] mouse was the next smallest hat and she plumped it up and shaped it nicely and popped it where it needed to be Winnie took a deep breath and then dived in something of a frenzy into the pile of hats her little warthog arms were it until

[00:20:44] she caught her reflection in the mirror and saw that there on her head was the rainbow fascinator after all she had felt so exhausted by her own silliness that she hadn't known where to begin but then the kangaroo had poked his head in and told her to start small and she had realized that was exactly it

[00:21:13] she just needed to think about it one hat at a time rather than all of them together and so she found swimming hats for beavers and returned them to their rightful spots and bowler hats for walruses and top hats for giraffes and boaters for kingfishers and sun hats for lions and before she knew it

[00:21:43] heavenly hats was as organized as it had ever been and the moment Patrick the peacock stepped through the door back from his lunch break he had no idea what chaos there had been inside just an hour before been busy he asked winnie as he handed her a sandwich oh absolutely she said excitedly rainbow jiggling on her

[00:22:13] head you've just got to start small didn't you know that start small in fact i'm just popping out for a moment she handed him back the sandwich and dashed outside leaving Patrick a little confused but shrugging his glorious tail feathers and settling down to read hatters weekly and find out all the latest trends

[00:22:43] in sportswear top of the head must house winnie didn't know who she wanted to tell but she knew she must tell somebody so she dashed over to betty badger's bakery opened the

[00:27:11] and and supposed it probably went on to learning an awful lot and studying hard and he knew astronauts needed to be fit and strong so he had probably exercised for years too and it didn't happen that you could wake up one morning and suddenly be strong

[00:27:42] you couldn't suddenly be an amazing artist or an incredible baker or a brilliant footballer or know everything about cars or plumbing or growing flowers and if everyone in the world who had done something amazing had to start small Coco supposed it must be the right thing for him

[00:28:11] too looking at it that way all the little things suddenly seemed a lot more important as they arrived back home Coco went out to see his grandmother on the porch she was sitting in the late afternoon sun in a rocking chair reading a book Coco waited for her to finish her

[00:28:41] page waiting as she slid in the photograph she used to mark her place a photograph of Coco and Kira eating ice cream at the beach and then putting the book down on her lap before looking up at Coco

[00:29:30] I have ever heard. Coco climbed up and sat on her knee and together they watched as the world turned red and gold with the sinking of the sun. Seeing the birds heading home to their nests, the bees bumble back to their hives,

[00:29:55] the butterflies fold up their wings for the day and settle down to sleep. Start small, mumbled Coco as he nuzzled into his grandmother's shoulder. I really like it, he said, drifting off to sleep in her arms.

[00:30:22] He dreamed of one day walking on the moon, seeing the world from far, far away, floating high in the sky among the stars and drifting slow and peaceful on the edge of the Milky Way.