Teeny Weeny Zucchinis Read online

  Published by

  Bantam Doubleday Dell Books for Young Readers

  a division of

  Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.

  1540 Broadway

  New York, New York 10036

  Text copyright © 1995 by Judy Delton

  Illustrations copyright © 1995 by Alan Tiegreen

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law.

  The trademarks Yearling® and Dell® are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries.

  eISBN: 978-0-307-83290-0

  v3.1

  For Aunt Snooze and Aunt Maybelle and

  Mama’s firstborn

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  1 Molly’s Good Deed

  2 Pass the Potatoes, Please

  3 New Badge News

  4 Who Knows What the Future Will Bring?

  5 Zucchinis Aren’t Pumpkins

  6 Only the Gypsy Knows

  7 Teamwork

  8 “What Good Deed?”

  CHAPTER 1

  Molly’s Good Deed

  “Now, are you sure you’ll be all right while I’m gone?” asked Molly’s mother.

  Molly and her dad nodded. Mrs. Duff was going out of town to visit her friend Roxie for the weekend.

  “I’ve got Molly here to take care of me,” said Mr. Duff.

  Molly giggled. She was seven. She knew that her dad was supposed to take care of her!

  Molly carried her mother’s suitcase to the car. Her dad put it in the trunk.

  “There are TV dinners in the freezer and fresh fruit in the fridge. Be sure to feed Skippy and put the recycling bin out and—”

  Mr. Duff held up his hand. “I’ll be sure and put Skippy out and feed the recycling bin,” he said. “Have a good time!”

  He and Molly gave Mrs. Duff a kiss, and she drove off down the street toward the highway.

  When her dad went to the garage to recycle, Molly went to her room. The house was quiet for a Saturday with her mom gone. Usually on her day off Mrs. Duff tried a new recipe, and the smell of cookies baking or a roast roasting came from the kitchen.

  Suddenly Molly had an idea! She could make that happen! She could cook dinner for her dad. They didn’t have to eat frozen dinners. She could make his favorite dinner. Pork chops and mashed potatoes. How hard could that be? And the best part of doing it was that it would be a giant good deed to report at their Pee Wee Scout meeting on Tuesday! Their leader, Mrs. Peters, heard the same old good deeds over and over, like raking the leaves and carrying packages and helping people across the street.

  Molly would be able to report something big. Something huge. Cooking a dinner was better than any good deed yet.

  She ran to the kitchen. There were potatoes in the bin. All she needed were pork chops! She raced to her room and counted her money. She had $4.62. That should be plenty.

  On the way to the store she stopped in the garage.

  “Hi, babe,” said her dad. “What do you say to dinner out this evening? Just you and me at the Big Burger.”

  Molly was tempted. Big Burgers were very good.

  “I want to cook dinner,” she said. “It will be a surprise. I have to go to the store for something.”

  Her dad looked surprised. He opened his mouth as if he was going to say “It’s too much work” or “You aren’t old enough” or “You don’t know how” or just plain no.

  But he didn’t. He just said, “That will be fun. I’ll bring the wine!”

  Molly laughed. She knew he meant apple juice.

  She ran down the street toward the store. The money jingled in her pocket. Her dad liked the idea! She hoped she wouldn’t disappoint him. Did she know how to make pork chops? Just pop them in the microwave. How hard could that be?

  In the meat department she found four small pork chops in a package. That was just right. They cost $4.50. She paid for them.

  On the way home she thought of something. Mashed potatoes needed gravy. How did you make gravy? She would stop at Mary Beth’s house. Mary Beth’s mother would know.

  Mary Beth was her best friend. And she was a Pee Wee Scout too. There were thirteen Pee Wee Scouts. One was in a wheelchair. And one was a temporary Pee Wee Scout from California. They met every Tuesday in Mrs. Peters’s basement. They earned badges. Like baby-tending badges, skiing badges, and horseback-riding badges. Molly wished there were a “cooking a pork chop dinner” badge.

  When Mary Beth came to the door, Molly told her the plan.

  “Come and help me,” Molly said. “And you can stay for supper. And I’ll share my good deed with you. Does your mom know how to make gravy?”

  “Of course,” said Mary Beth.

  Mary Beth ran to ask her mom and to tell her she was going to Molly’s house for supper.

  “You mix a quarter cup of flour with one cup of water,” Mary Beth’s mom said. “And add it to the pan the meat is in.”

  The girls ran to Molly’s house. “Mary Beth is staying for supper,” said Molly.

  “Good,” said Mr. Duff.

  When they got ready to cook, Molly’s dad came out and asked if they needed help.

  Molly shook her head and pushed him into the living room. “You just read the paper and wait,” she said.

  “You two girls might burn yourselves,” said Mr. Duff.

  “We’ll use the microwave,” said Molly. “And hot pads.”

  “I use our microwave at home all the time,” said Mary Beth.

  Mr. Duff said, “I’ll be right here if something explodes.”

  The girls laughed. What could explode?

  Mary Beth washed four potatoes. She had seen her mother do it. Or did her mother peel them? She put them in the microwave and turned the dial. The oven hummed happily.

  Molly took the chops out of the package.

  “They can go right in with the potatoes!” she said. She put them in. This was easy! When they were done, they’d just mash the potatoes and put everything on plates.

  “I’ll set the table,” said Mary Beth. “And then we have to make the gravy.”

  “I can’t wait for Tuesday to report our good deed,” said Molly. “Wait till we tell them we cooked a real dinner all alone.”

  “And Tuesday we find out what badge we get next,” said Mary Beth.

  Just then the girls heard a loud pop. Then there was another one! The sounds were coming from the microwave!

  CHAPTER 2

  Pass the Potatoes,

  Please

  “What was that?” called Molly’s dad. “Do you need help?”

  “No!” called Molly and Mary Beth together.

  What kind of a surprise would it be if her dad came out now?

  “Our microwave never makes those noises,” whispered Mary Beth.

  The girls opened the microwave. Pieces of potato were all over the oven. They hung from the top. They lay on the bottom. The chops were curled up and gray.

  “Rat’s knees! Why did they do that?” said Molly. She got a spatula and scraped the potatoes into a bowl.

  “At least they’re already mashed,” said Mary Beth. “That will save time.”

  The potatoes were not exactly mashed. But they were in small, soft pieces. The girls worked and worked to scrape them all up. Then they washed out the oven with a wet sponge. It looked smeary. Did this happen every time her mom cooked? wondered Molly.

  “Something smells good,�
� called her dad.

  That was a surprise.

  “Maybe it smells better than it looks,” said Mary Beth.

  “Or tastes,” said Molly, tasting a piece and making a face.

  She went to get the flour and a measuring cup to make the gravy.

  “Did your mom say a quarter cup of water and one cup of flour, or one cup of water and a quarter cup of flour?” Molly asked her friend.

  Mary Beth thought. “One cup of water sounds like too much water,” she said. “It must be one cup of flour.”

  “We have to make a lot,” said Molly. “My dad likes plenty of gravy.”

  Molly mixed one cup of flour with a quarter cup of water. It was hard to stir. Maybe it would get softer when it cooked.

  Mary Beth set the table with three plates. Molly got a hot pad and opened the oven and took out the dish with the chops.

  Her dad was walking back and forth outside the door.

  “Don’t come in,” she called.

  “Are you sure you don’t need help?” he said. He sounded worried.

  Molly dumped the flour-and-water lump into the chop dish. Then she put it back in the microwave oven and turned it on.

  “Did you put salt in?” asked Mary Beth. “Gravy needs salt.”

  “No,” said Molly. She opened the oven and sprinkled some salt on top of the lump.

  “Now we just wait,” said Mary Beth. “This cooking is really easy.”

  Molly put some artificial flowers in a vase on the table. She got out the paper napkins.

  “I think it’s ready,” said Mary Beth, peering through the oven door.

  “I’ll call my dad,” said Molly.

  Her dad came in and sat down. He rubbed his hands together.

  “Boy, am I hungry!” he said.

  Mary Beth put the mashed potatoes in a dish and put them on the table.

  Molly got her mother’s gravy boat out of the cupboard. She would just pour the nice brown gravy into it.

  But when Molly took out the chops and gravy, they were not brown. And the gravy did not pour. It was a big chunk. A big chunk of white gravy on top of the curly, gray chops.

  She took a fork and lifted the gravy into the gravy boat. She set it on the table. She set the chops beside it.

  “You were supposed to take the chops out of the dish before you put the gravy in,” said Mary Beth.

  “You didn’t tell me that!” said Molly.

  “It looks fine,” said Mr. Duff. “No problem.”

  But there was a problem. Molly knew it and Mary Beth knew it. And she was pretty sure her dad knew it.

  But Molly’s dad was pouring the apple juice. Then he said, “This is my favorite dinner! How did you girls know this is my favorite dinner?”

  He helped himself to a gray pork chop. He sprinkled it with salt and pepper just as if it were a normal chop.

  “Pass the mashed potatoes, please,” he said. He took some. The bits rolled around on his plate.

  “They should stick together,” whispered Mary Beth to Molly. “My mom’s mashed potatoes stick together.”

  “Well, they stuck on the oven,” said Molly.

  “They will stick together when we put gravy on them,” said Mr. Duff.

  Molly felt like crying. “This isn’t like Mom’s dinner,” she said.

  Mr. Duff sliced a piece of gravy. “Every cook makes things just a little different. And variety is the spice of life!”

  Molly tasted the food. It was awful! How could her dad sit there and eat it? Even her best friend couldn’t eat it. The chops were like rubber. The potatoes stuck to the roof of her mouth like library paste! And the gravy was as hard as peanut brittle. But it wasn’t sweet and brown. It was white and floury.

  When Mr. Duff finished his dinner, he did a surprising thing. He took a second helping!

  “Was I lucky that you two could cook,” he said, chewing a piece of gravy. “Mom will be pleased to hear about this big surprise.”

  The girls tried to eat, but they had a hard time. It took a long time to chew. Molly’s dad was a good sport.

  CHAPTER 3

  New Badge News

  After dinner Mr. Duff went into the living room to read his paper just the way he did after a regular meal.

  “You girls cooked dinner,” he said. “I’ll do the dishes. Just soak them in the sink and I’ll wash them in a little while.”

  “What did we do wrong?” Molly asked Mary Beth as they cleared the things away.

  Mary Beth looked thoughtful.

  “It must have been one cup of water, instead of one cup of flour,” she said. “We got it turned around.”

  “Do you think it’s still a good deed?” asked Molly.

  “Sure,” said Mary Beth. “Your dad had two helpings. We don’t have to tell them about it. We cooked it and your dad ate it. That’s a good deed.”

  Mary Beth said she had to get home to take care of her little sister. But Molly had a feeling she was hungry and had to hurry home in time to eat dinner with her family!

  The next day, when Molly’s mother came home, her dad told her about the surprise.

  “They did all that work,” he said. “All by themselves.”

  But that night Molly confided in her mother. She told her about the white gravy and gray chops.

  “Chops get browner in the frying pan,” Molly’s mother said, “and the gravy probably needed more water. Then you have to stir it in the chop pan. After you take the chops out.”

  “We couldn’t use the real stove,” said Molly.

  “You did the right thing,” her mother said. “And all’s well that ends well.”

  Molly was not sure it had ended well, but it was nice of her mother to say so.

  “Do you think it’s a good deed?” she said.

  “Of course,” her mother said. “It’s a very good deed.”

  On Tuesday Molly couldn’t wait to get to her Pee Wee meeting. She and Mary Beth had a good deed to tell that no one else had. And they would find out the new badge they would earn.

  Mrs. Peters was there to meet them. Her baby, Nick, was with her. And Lucky, their troop mascot.

  “Hey, have I got a good deed,” said Tim Noon. “I recycled plastic water jugs.”

  “Into what, Noon?” said Roger White.

  “Into water jugs,” said Tim. “I fill them with water again and you can take them on a picnic. Or a bike ride or something. Or you can water the grass.”

  Roger began to hee-haw. “Water jugs into water jugs! Oh boy, what a good deed!” He laughed, hitting his knee.

  “That’s a good idea,” said Mrs. Peters. “It is definitely better than throwing them out. And it is definitely a good deed.”

  It was okay, thought Molly. But not as good as cooking dinner for your dad. Even gray pork chops were better than a water jug.

  Molly and Mary Beth wanted to tell their good deed, but Mrs. Peters had other things on her mind.

  “This is our new badge,” she said, holding something up. “Let me tell you about it. Autumn is here, or fall, and we all know what that means.”

  Hands waved.

  “It means Halloween,” said Lisa Ronning.

  “It means raking leaves,” said Kevin Moe.

  “It means school starts,” said Patty Baker. Patty was a twin. Her brother Kenny was a scout too.

  “It means hay fever,” said Tracy, who had allergies.

  Roger sneezed loudly. “Ker-choooo!” he said.

  “Is our badge for sneezing, Mrs. Peters?” asked Roger.

  Most of the Pee Wees began to sneeze. Over and over and over. Mrs. Peters had to clap her hands and frown.

  “Our badge is not for sneezing,” she said. “And not for raking or going back to school. Our badge is for helping at the Harvest Fest. Fall is the time to harvest vegetables and fruit. Corn and apples and broccoli and squash.”

  “And pumpkins!” shouted Sonny Stone.

  Sonny was spoiled. Even though his mother had married the fire chief, a
nd Sonny now had a father and a little brother and sister, he was still a baby. His mother was assistant scout leader.

  “And pumpkins,” said their leader, laughing. “Fall is definitely the time for pumpkins.”

  “Do we have to harvest the food?” asked Kevin.

  Kevin was one of Molly’s favorite scouts. She wanted to marry him someday. Unless she married Jody George. Jody had a wheelchair. If she married him, she would get to ride in it whenever she wanted. She knew married people shared things.

  “No, the farmers do the harvesting,” said Mrs. Peters. “They cut the wheat and pick the corn and beans and peas and other things. The Harvest Fest is like a party to celebrate all the crops. It’s a sort of Thanksgiving party.”

  “Do we eat turkey and dressing and cranberries?” asked Lisa Ronning.

  “Thanksgiving is in November,” said Ashley Baker, the temporary scout from California. Her two cousins, Kenny and Patty Baker, were in Troop 23, and she was visiting them. “November is winter, not fall.”

  “We won’t eat turkey at the fest, but we will have lots of good food. Corn on the cob and hot dogs and fresh strawberry shortcake,” said Mrs. Peters.

  Some of the boys started to rub their stomachs and make yummy noises. Pretty soon everyone was doing it, even baby Nick.

  “Yum, yum, yum!” he said.

  “Hey, we don’t harvest hot dogs!” said Sonny. “They don’t grow in the garden.”

  “Well, everything at a harvest fest isn’t harvested, is it, Mrs. Peters?” said Rachel Meyers.

  “That’s right, Rachel. But most of the food will be food grown in our own area,” said their leader.

  “There will be rides, and games, and prizes to win,” Mrs. Peters went on. “As scouts, we will all pitch in and help. We’ll wear our uniforms and help at the booths and stands, and afterwards we will pick up litter and clean up the park.”

  “Is that all we do to get the harvest badge, Mrs. Peters?” asked Jody. “That’s not much.”

  Wasn’t that just like Jody! thought Molly. He always wanted to do a little extra. Jody was ambitious.

  “I’d like you each to have a little project of your own for the Harvest Fest,” said Mrs. Peters. “These are some of the things you could do for the badge.”