Once upon a time, in a faraway forest, there lived a poor woodcutter, his wife and their two young children. The boy's name was Hansel and the girl's name was Gretel.

 The woodcutter was so poor that the family had very little food to eat. So one night, the woodcutter's wife said, "We cannot take care of the children anymore. You must take them to the middle of the forest and leave them there."

After hearing this from the woodcutter's wife, he responded, "No..no.. they are my children. There should be another way to solve this problem".

The two children heard their parents talk and they were very scared. "We don't want to live in the forest!" they said to each other. So, the clever children came up with a plan to save themselves. That night, they quietly filled their pockets with tiny rocks.

The next morning, as the woodcutter agreed to what his wife said, he took them to the middle of the forest, Hansel and Gretel  dropped the tiny stones all along the way.

When their father left them, all they had to do was to follow the line of the tiny stones back home!

The woodcutter and his wife were surprised to see the children back home. "You have to take them back to the forest tomorrow," argued the woodcutter's wife.

Hansel and Gretel were very worried now. " All our pebbles are gone! What do we do now?" cried Gretel.

"I have an idea!" said Hansel."We can drop bread crumbs this time!"

So, the next morning, when the woodcutter took the children deep inside the forest to leave them there again, the children dropped crumbs of bread all along the way.

But sadly for the children, the animals and birds had eaten up all the crumbs!

Now, Hansel and Gretel walked and walked but couldn't find their way back home.

Suddenly, hidden between the trees, they saw a stange house made of candy, cookies, chocolate and everything delicious.

"This is a gingerbread house!" cried Gretel happily.

The children were so hungry that they started gobbling up the house at once.