Joanie loved zebras, everything about zebras. She’s not exactly sure when it started but once it did, her entire life was consumed by everything zebra.

Joanie had a zebra blanket on her bed, and some zebra pyjamas. She even had a stuffed zebra that she slept with ever single night. Her backpack for school was a zebra backpack, and her pencil case, and her lunch box. I think you get the idea.

Joanie was seven and soon she would be turning eight. Her mom asked her what kind of party she wanted for her birthday and, without hestitation, Joanie said “ZEBRA!” Her mom was hoping for something more like a princess tea party, but if Joanie wanted a zebra party, then that’s what Joanie would get.

Joanie’s mom spent a lot of time getting ready for this party. She had cupcakes made up with zebra stripes, that was the easy part. The hard part was basically everything else. It was easy to do a safari theme, but Joanie didn’t care for any of the other animals. She just liked zebras. So Joanie’s mom had to special order some banners and paper plates and cups, some napkins, and little party bags to be used as gift bags.

She planned some zebra themed games too – instead of pin the tail on the donkey, it was a zebra. Thankfully she already had the donkey and just needed to paint it to look like a zebra. She had some stick horses that she also painted to look like zebras so that everyone could gallop around on them.

By the time the party arrived, Joanie’s mom had everything zebraed out. Her backyard looked like zebras had exploded all over the place.

Just as Joanie and all her friends were finishing eating their zebra hot dogs and hamburgers, Joanie’s mom called them all to the front of the house. She had a special surprise for Joanie!

Everything gathered together and went to the front. Out by the front of the house, there was now a little wooden fence in a circle, and inside that circle were two real live zebras! Joanie had never seen a zebra in real life before!

There was a collective “wooooowwww!” from all the kids and a hush that fell over them. Which is surprising for a group of eight year olds. They all slowly walked up to the fence to pet the zebras, and when the trainers asked where the birthday girl was, no one could find her. Joanie’s mom looked through the group of kids to find Joanie but she wasn’t up at the fence. Instead, she was standing back at the corner of the house, in tears.

Joanie’s mom walked over to her and asked “what’s wrong sweetie? Don’t you want to pet the zebras?”

Joanie shook her head no, as tears started to stream down her face.

“Why not?”

“THEY ARE UGLY!!!” Joanie sobbed as she ran as far away from the zebras as she could.

And just like that, A to Z is over for another year! I hope you have liked my fiction theme for this month, and have enjoyed reading my little stories. Come back in about a week and I will have my annual reflection posted!