The sleeping beauty

Once upon a time there was a King and a Queen who had all the luxury as that money could buy. But their most treasure possession of all was their beautiful baby daughter. In fact they were so proud of her that they invited all the fairies in the kingdom to her christening. It wasn’t every day that the fairies had a chance to get to such a grand occasion, so they made a most of it and made up the beautiful party dresses especially for it.
The christening was such a happy and colourful occasion. The little Princess slept quietly in her cradle and didn’t make a sound.
“I’ve never seen such a beautiful little baby,” said the queen of the fairies.
When the Queen and the King heard this, it made their hearts swell with pride.
“Thank you all so much for coming here,” said the King and then he led them all to the great banqueting hall for a fabulous feast in honour of his little Princess.
The fairies have just picked up their nice forks and they were about to start eating when they heard a terrible high pitched wailing sound coming from the end of the hall: “Stop!”
They looked towards the grand staircase and saw an ugly old fairy storming down the stairs. She had a long pointed nose and was wearing an enormous black satin cloak.
“Stop!” The old fairy looked straight at the Queen and said: “How can you have a party without inviting me? I am the oldest and the wisest fairy in the land!”
The poor Queen was rather frightened of her but didn’t know what to say.
“Leave it to me,” the King whispered.
“Oh, look! I am terribly sorry with offended you but you are welcome to join in this celebrations,” he said in his kindest sweetest voice.
“All right, I’ll stay if you insist, ” said the ugly fairy. But she still was not happy. “I’ll get my own back on my pair for forgetting to invite

me!” she muttered to herself.
The wicked old fairy certainly took advantage of the King’s hospitality. She powered up her plate that they could hardly see her face behind a tall mount of food on it.
The banquet lasted a long time because all the guests had to wait for the old fairy to finish eating. At last, when she did her final mouthful, everybody left the table and came up to stare gifts for the Princess.
Great beauty, a kind heart and a wonderful singing voice – were just a few of the gifts given to the lovely Princess. When it came the old fairy’s turn, she lent over the cradle and said: “You will prick your hand with a spindle and die of the wound.”
All the other fairies gasped at these terrible words. Then Christine, who was the youngest fairy, stepped forward:
“I can’t change the awful spell but I can alter it. You will indeed prick your finger but you will not die. Instead, you will fall into a deep sleep that will last for a hundred years until a handsome prince awakens you.
That night when all the guests had left, the King ordered that all the spinning wheels with the spindles in his Kingdom should be burnt. So his servants went on collecting all the spindle wheels in the land and burnt on a big bomb firing in the palace garden. All his subjects were sad to see spindle wheels going up in smoke but they didn’t complain. They knew this had to be done for the sake of the little Princess.
“I feel so much happier now when all the spindles left our kingdom,” said the King to his wife.
“You are very wise to be so careful,” said the Queen. “But what about our poor subjects? Many of them rely on their spinning means to only living.”
“Don’t worry!