Patricia and Peti - Pat and Pet - are ten-year-old twins who have regularly spent their winter school holidays in their log cabin in the woods and mountains. Here they are preparing for Christmas, hoping to finally use their sledges and skis this year, as last year - unfortunately - there wasn't enough snow to bring them down from the attic.
Pat and Pet were good brothers, they loved each other, with the ability to get into each other's hair about almost anything, even the smallest thing.
The current argument was about who should decorate the Christmas tree this year? The heated argument - which escalated into Pet pulling Pat's pigtail and Pat attempting to kick Pet in the shin - was put to an end by Mum.
He set the two miscreants in front of him and assigned them tasks: he would go to the Forestry with daddy Pet and, once the right pine tree had been chosen, he would help bring it home. To Pat he said: my little girl, you will come with me to the kitchen and help me make the cakes. Then, when you have both done your part, you can start decorating the Christmas tree together - but only together.
So, Pet went with Daddy to fetch the wood and Pat helped Mummy to make the honeydew dough.
They were nearly finished - the gingerbread was baking, the pine was in its holder - and they could finally start decorating the tree.
First of all, the decorations had to be taken down from the attic. They treaded very carefully on the creaking wooden stairs, as they were not used to this at home, in their house, with the lift. Upstairs, the search began. Where had they put the decorations last year?! Since they didn't find what they were looking for, a fight broke out between them.
Pat blamed Pet for having so clumsily - and, of course, carelessly - stored the box of ornaments that he could not find it himself. They searched frantically until they found the box on a shabby painted stool on top of a three-legged table on a bedside table with its door missing. But here's where things got even more complicated.
The top of the box was badly sealed, so the decorations were peeking out in one piece, and consequently they were very dusty. Pat was responsible for wrapping the ornaments last year, so now Pet could pay his brother back: maybe I packed the ornaments in the wrong place, but you wrapped them sloppily. Now we'll start by wiping off all the gizmos one by one.
They left it at that, loan bread returns. They carefully descended the creaky attic stairs, took down the decorations and immediately set about wiping them clean.
Then the fun could begin, the cutting of the pine tree.
First the snipe candy was hung on the tree, followed by the heavier ornaments, then the lighter glass balls and other appendages were placed on the tips of the branches. Finally, with Dad's help, the candles and sparklers were attached.
All that's left is the usual gold hair, which was always left at the very end of the decoration. Now, however, the gold threads, which were as thin as a hair, were nowhere to be found.
Where could they have gone?! Did they spill out of the box when they brought it down from the attic? Pat put the question to Pet, who immediately replicated it: maybe you threw it out with the pieces of paper the ornaments were wrapped in.
Sure, they checked under the attic stairs, they looked in the trash can among the paper waste, but the handful of gold threads just didn't turn up. This time it was Mum's turn to step in again: children, dinner, then candle lighting and the presentation of gifts. Off to the kitchen!
After dinner, they lit the candles and sparklers with great enthusiasm and excitement. For once, there was no discussion: Pat was in charge of lighting the candles, with Dad's help, and Pete the sparklers.
When the great light filled every corner of the room, suddenly a sparkling brightness broke through the floorboards of the attic. The attic is on fire! - shouted Mum, who never, ever, ever missed a thing.
Dad was already running for the bucket of water, and he hurried up to the attic with great strides. Upstairs he was surprised to see that there was nothing burning, but a handful of nests hiding in the base of a log tree, very close to the broken glass attic window, sparkling with a dazzling brightness.
Well, the mystery was solved: a family of birds moved into the attic, and they built a small nest into the paper box with a badly sealed top, hiding Christmas decorations, and stole the gold threads that made the nest shine.
Behind Daddy, the curious twins were soon crowding in. They were delighted not to have to put out a fire, but to have unwittingly given a family of birds a glorious Christmas nest. At the noise, two frightened baby birds suddenly emerged from the nest, so dad and the twins quietly retreated into the hall.
There, they agreed to provide the family with food and nutritious oilseeds every day for the duration of the break, and to leave food for them when they returned home, even if they had already shared not only Christmas Eve but the whole winter break.
And so it was the twins' most interesting and memorable Christmas.
