Věra Hábová

The Legend of the Silver Fir

According to one Beskydy Mountains legend, if you do a good deed you will see silver trees. Little Ondra knows trees like that. In his family's cottage hangs a picture showing silver firs, a person falling from a height and a watch. In art lessons Ondra paints trees of the same kind. - One day Lojzek Hojgr, a man who climbs fir trees to gather the seeds, comes to see Ondra's parents. Long-ago Ondra's father has had such a job and Lojzek is his long-time friend. Hojgr moves into a half-ruined wood cabin. Ondra's father takes him on a visit to Lojzek and both demonstrate the beautiful but dangerous work of seed-gathering to the boy.

Just Because You're Grown-Up

Eleven-year old Mísa has the temperament of a proper boy and endless problems with the grown-ups. It is no wonder that he longs to become an adult without further delay. Mísa keeps house together with his father and has various duties. After a failed attempt at dish-washing he goes off to the research institute where his father is working on an important invention. He is trying to produce a substance that would make poultry and other animals bigger and thus help the struggle against famine in the world, but so far he has only managed to produce a shrinking substance. After his father leaves the laboratory, Mísa mixes up different ingredients and makes the growth substance. He drinks it and instantly becomes an adult. His father, conversely, turns into a toddler after drinking the shrinking substance with his beer by mistake.