Brick the Badger Comes to Visit

Brick is a soft, cozy badger with a friendly striped face and little round paws. And Brick LOVES to visit. When you build a path, Brick comes waddling along to walk on it, happy as can be.

But Brick has one gentle rule, and it is the most important thing to know about him:

“I can hop DOWN a big step - whee! - but going UP, I climb just one step at a time.”

Down is easy. Brick just hops off a ledge, plop, and lands soft on his paws. Down, down, down - Brick can drop as far as he likes.

But UP is different. Up, Brick can only climb ONE little step. One brick high. If you build a step that is too tall - two bricks, three bricks, all at once - poor Brick stands at the bottom and looks up and cannot climb it. He is not sad. He just waits, and tips his head, and says softly: “Ooh, that’s too big a step for me. Can you make it gentle?”

So when you build a path for Brick, you build it to go UP gently - one brick, then one more brick beside it a little higher, then one more. A little staircase, step by step. And then Brick climbs it easily, one step at a time, all the way to the top. Up… up… up… there!

A grown-up can play too! Be Brick together. Find some stairs, or make steps out of cushions. Going UP, take just one step at a time, slow and steady: “up… up… up.” Going DOWN, you can hop off with a happy “whee!” Feel how up is one-at-a-time, and down is a happy hop.

When Brick finally climbs your gentle path all the way to the top and reaches the flag, he does a little happy wiggle and beams at you. “You built it JUST right,” he says warmly. “One step at a time - and up I came!” And he feels the cozy, proud gladness of a badger who reached the top because a friend built him a kind and gentle way.

Up one at a time. Down with a hop. That’s Brick.