The Blanket That Was Too Small

• 3 minute read
• Ages 4-8
• Bedtime Stories

There was a blanket that had been made for one child, and it fitted that child exactly.

It covered her from her chin to her toes with nothing left over, and it was warm, and she was very pleased with it.

Then her brother was born, and after a while he was old enough to sleep in the same bed, and the blanket had a problem.

The arithmetic

There was not enough of it.

If she pulled it up to her chin, his feet came out. If he pulled it down over his feet, her shoulders came out. If they both pulled at once nobody was covered and everybody was cross, which happened for several nights in a row.

"It is too small," she said.

"It was the right size before," said the blanket, who did not usually say anything.

The fold

Their grandmother came in on the fourth night and sat on the end of the bed.

She did not fetch another blanket, because there was not another blanket.

Instead she made them both lie on their sides, facing each other, with their knees bent up. Then she laid the blanket over them lengthways instead of across, and folded the spare bit at the bottom back under their feet.

It went right round both of them.

There was even a little left over.

Why it worked

"It is the same blanket," said the girl.

"It is," said her grandmother.

"How is there more of it?"

"There is not more of it," said her grandmother. "There is less of you sticking out. You were lying flat and long and far apart. Now you are curled up and close together, so you take up less blanket, so there is enough."

She put out the lamp.

"That works for a lot of things," she said, from the door. "Not just blankets."

And she went out, and the two of them lay there curled up under exactly the same amount of wool as before, warm all the way round, and after a while they stopped thinking about it and went to sleep.