"And when Hansel and Gretel left the gingerbread house," Ralph said, finishing up his story, "they came to a hill, and then, over the hill, they found their own cottage, and they lived happily ever after. The end."

Ralph heard a tiny snore, and looked down. That story did it. Forest was finally asleep. He got up slowly, and gently put the baby in his crib. Melissa turned off the light, and the three raccoons slowly tiptoed out of the nursery. Bert softly closed the door behind them. Then, the three of them went downstairs and started to relax.

"Finally," Bert said. "Let's hope he doesn't wake up until Cedric and Sophia get back."

Ralph and Melissa nodded in agreement, but the hoping was soon to be short lived. The front door flew wide open, and banged into the wall.

"We're ba-ack!" the three Pigs cried out at the top of their voices.

"Hey, you guys!" Bert shouted. "Keep it down! You'll wake the . . . ."

Too late. The Pigs had woken up Forest, and now he was wailing at the top of his lungs again.

"Baby," Bert groaned, finishing his sentence.

The Raccoons and the Pigs raced up the stairs and into the nursery. Bert pulled Forest out of the crib, and began to walk around the room with him.

"Way to go, you guys," he said sarcastically to the Pigs. "We just got him to sleep and you had to go and wake him up!"

"Sorry," Lloyd replied. "We forgot about the baby."

"How are we going to get him to stop crying?" Floyd said. Bert glared at the Pig, and handed the baby to him.

"Here," he said. "You woke him up, you get him back to sleep."

"But I don't know anything about babies!" Floyd said, passing Forest to Boyd.

"All I know about babies is that they eat, sleep, cry, and spit up," Boyd said, handing the baby to Lloyd. "And you have to change them twenty times a day."

"Uhhh," Lloyd said. "What do you want us to do?"

"First, sit down in the rocking chair," Melissa instructed, handing Lloyd a bottle. "Then give him his bottle, and tell him a story."

"Do we know any stories?" Boyd asked, looking at his brothers.

"Well, I know a little poem," Lloyd said. "There once was a man from Nantucket . . . . ."

"Don't you dare tell him that!" Melissa yelled, appalled at the very idea Lloyd would tell Forest that limerick.

"Yeah, you ding-dong, he's not old enough to hear that!" Bert shouted, bopping Lloyd over the head.

"Besides, the last time you recited that, Mom washed your mouth out with saddle soap," Boyd replied.

"Well, do you guys have a better story?" Lloyd challenged his brothers.

"Oooh! I know a great one!" Floyd shouted. "Mom used to tell it to us all the time! Once upon a time, there were three little pigs, and they went out to build their own homes. One built his house out of straw, the second built his house out of sticks, and the third built his house out of bricks. Then, one day, the Big Bad Wolf came around to the straw house, and he banged on the door and said Little Pig, Little Pig, let me come in! And the little pig said . . . ."

"I already told him that story," Bert said. "Tell him another one."

"I know a good story," Lloyd said. "It's all about a little girl named Goldie Pig."

"Goldie Pig?" Ralph said. "This I've got to hear."

"Now, once upon a time," Lloyd said, as he started to rock with the baby. "There was a little house in the woods, and inside this little house lived three Raccoons."