The Speedy Little Munchkin

By Philip L Hayes Jr., age 8

My Cousin Ann was over to my house for a sleep over. After a long day of playing, we fell quickly to sleep.

(Poke. Poke) Stop. (Poke, Poke) Stop it Ann, I said. Much to my surprise, I poked a leprechaun in the eye. (Poke, Poke).  “What?  A leprechaun?” I rolled off the bed and crushed the leprechaun who was sitting on the floor.  I got up off the floor and saw the leprechaun in his real form. The leprechaun had a smile upon his face.  He has  a black belt in Karate., but his suit is as green as grass.  The leprechaun said “play”.  “Alright” I said. “Let me get dressed and eat breakfast”.  I put on my blue jeans and got my red shirt on that had “Go Yankees” printed on it.  I went downstairs to the kitchen and split my pistachio muffin with the leprechaun. “I will name you ‘Hamburger’”, I said.  “Hamburger… do you want to play hide and seek?”  He is as small as a kitten, so he was hard to find as he ran around in the kitchen.

#$%&# CRASH #$%&#

A frying pan hit him in his head as he crawled around in the kitchen cabinets. I could see that he had stars circling his head.  I went over to him and said, “Lets not play that game again”.

“What is that noise?” Ann said as she came down the stairs a bit groggy and scared.  My leprechaun, Hamburger, said, “Play”.  Ann was shocked as she looked at the leprechaun. “Play” he said again.  “Yes, lets play chase the cat” I said.   The leprechaun had to be the cat, because he was the size of a kitten and was as fast as a speeding bullet.   He was so fast that Ann and I decided to make a trap to catch the speedy little munchkin.   We put a dollar under a box that was propped up with a stick that had a string attached to it.  When he went to grab the dollar, we pulled the string and the box fell over the speedy little munchkin. He was caught.

We removed the box from over our friend and there he stood, holding the dollar in front of his face.  We then asked him to take us to his pot of gold.  He said… “OK, but it is very dangerous”.  He gave us a shield and a bronze sword.  We set off in search of the pot of gold.  After a couple of miles we came across a fire-breathing dragon.   I swung my sword furiously and cut of his three heads.  I said “Yahoo!”.   Then a bird came down and started pecking me in the head.  I screamed in pain and started swing swinging my sword at the bird. The bird picked me up by my shirt as Ann and Hamburger held on tightly to me.  He flew us all the way to the pot of gold.

The Leprechaun said, “You passed my test. You earned the pot of gold.  Good work!”  Ann and I decided to take only half of the pot of gold, leaving the rest for our friend.  But our friend said that he wanted us to take it all, because he was going to stay with us for now on.  Hamburger told the bird to pick us up and bring us back home. And so he did.

The end.

There have been thousands of pieces of artwork submitted and hers was chosen from entries from around the country. You can vote every twenty four hours if you want.

There are prizes for the student who receives the most votes in December.

Click the link below to view all the contestants art and to vote for your favorite.

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Merry Christmas!!

One of her most intriguing and wonderful stories comes from a neighbor and good friend of hers when she lived in Larchmont, NY. Her childhood friend was a girl named Patty Coots. Jeanne played almost every day with Patty as a little girl. In fact, we have several pictures of them playing together in the family photo archive. Patty’s father was Jay Fred Coots, better known for a little song he wrote called “Santa Clause Is Coming Town”. Jeanne would often hear Patty’s father playing his piano, composing one of his many well known compositions. One day, Jeanne was treated to a very special memory. Jeanne was there when Patty, at age three, stood on the stage of the Murray Avenue School in Larchmont, New York and sang the first public rendition of the now very famous song; “Santa Clause is Coming To Town” while her dad played the piano.

In the 1940′s, Jeanne began her college career at Syracuse University where she pursued a bachelor’s degree in “Music”. After College, Jeanne was hired by the Oceanside Long Island School System as an Elementary Music Teacher, where she taught grades 1 – 6. In 1949, while teaching in Oceanside, she managed to secure a “Master of Art” degree from Colombia University. Her degree is signed by Dwight D. Eisenhower. It was the only year that he was the President of the University.

Jeanne soon found herself on the other shore of Long Island teaching in the Great Neck School System. While she was at Great Neck, she would occasionally teach at New York University where she helped out with their “Rhythmic Programs” run by the Athletic Department. She soon married John J. Hayes of New Hampshire and moved to Towson, Maryland where John’s work took him.

While in Towson, she briefly assisted at Goucher College. Soon, she moved back to Chappaqua, New York, where she lived for more than 25 years and participated in a wide variety of jobs and hobbies that kept her very active with her music.

In 1965, she became very involved in the Chappaqua Drama Group, playing the piano and coaching vocals for more than 20 musicals covering a span of more than 20 years.

In 1974, she became very involved with helping out with the Senior Class Musicals at Horace Greeley High School in Chappaqua. For many years she helped hundreds of High School Seniors with their first and sometimes only audition for a stage show. Among others, some of her notable students included, Vanessa Williams (Class of 1981) and John Ahlin (class of 1974).

In the late 1970′s, she began teaching private vocal and piano lessons and continues to do so today. In fact, she has taught several people who were on or eventually moved onto Broadway.

Today, Jeanne seldom has to read sheet music, as hundreds of songs and their notes are permanently etched into her memory. If she had ever been given the opportunity to play on the game show “Name That Tune”, she would surely have cleaned up!

- Kevin Ryan Hayes

For my 1988 Christmas gift to Colleen, I gave her a multi-part christmas gift that started with some small articles of clothing (use your imagination), then a beautiful black dress, dinner in new York City at “Top of the Sixes” (666 Fifth Ave) and ended with hard to get tickets to “Phantom of the Opera”. We loved the show so much, we actually saw it two more times since the original trip to new York City.

You will need Apple’s Quicktime to view the video as it is compressed using a higher quality compress than typical “YouTube” videos. You can download it for free at:

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