Wardrobe Wars

Once Upon a time a Great Battle was raging, day in and day out. The Princess scoured her closet for beautiful clothes and alas, there were none to be seen.

She wailed and howled, crying and weeping over the lack of sparkly dresses and gorgeous gowns.
Every morning the King & Queen of that realm would awaken, dreading the moment when the young Princess would begin to get dressed only to find her wardrobe totally inadequate.

The Queen was at a loss. She had taken the Princess shopping many times, returning with items which seemed so lovely in the shops. Alas! In the cold light of day, nothing was good enough. And so the battle continued day after day, as the Queen attempted to get the Princess dressed. The Princess fired angry words, wounding the Queen and fuelling her frustration: "I have no beautiful clothes!" she wailed.

The Queen retaliated with threats of Time Out, and No Gymnastics. Meanwhile, lovely clothes languished in the Princess's drawers, wasted and rejected. She was simply too fussy, a Terrible Tyrant.

Finally one day the Queen of the Realm had had enough. She woke up to herself and realised that SHE WAS THE QUEEN OF THE REALM!

As the verbal volleys continued, the Queen marched into the Princess's bedroom and took her clothes hostage. She emptied every drawer, every cupboard. She bundled up the clothes and imprisoned them all in her own wardrobe.

The Princess was shocked and startled. All of a sudden those clothes (which had seemed so unattractive) became highly valuable. She wanted those clothes!

The King and Queen called a parley. "Here are our terms..." they told the now-subdued Princess. "Choose now two items of each type of clothing. From now on the clothes remain in our possession, until you have earned them back. How do you earn them back? By appreciating what you have, and making NO MORE FUSS ABOUT CLOTHES!"

From that day on, the Princess wore her clothes without a fuss. Every day that went by without a fuss, she won back another item of clothing. Amazingly, she discovered that her clothes were actually already beautiful! She also discovered that the Queen had some good suggestions that were worth listening to.

What's more, whenever she would start to complain about a lack of beautiful clothes, all the Queen had to do was to remind her... "Remember what happened when you made a fuss? You don't want your clothes back in mummy's wardrobe do you???"

Peace has reigned in the Land of the Wardrobe from that day to this!