WE all know the story - the one of the heavily pregnant woman who has to give birth in a stable to the world's greatest baby, who travelled a hundred miles on a pony and was visited by three kings and their alpacas...

This might not be the traditional tale people the world over know and love, but a primary school made a few subtle changes to the traditional nativity tale to really pull the stops out this Christmas.

Captain Shaw's Primary School, in Bootle, went above and beyond the norm once again this year as it put on a spectacular display for the whole community.

<strong> Read more about Captain Shaw's here. </strong>

Headteacher Pete Mills said: "After last year's successful nativity where we processed through the streets I announced to the community that I would make next year's bigger and better and the idea has just grown from there."

The idea began last year when a pupil from the school brought in her pet donkey to take part in the procession.

The donkey, called Coco, was unavailable for repeat performances so the starring role was handed over to a pretty pony called Pickles.

Five-year-old Jodie Tyson, from Bootle, is the proud owner of Pickles and was delighted to show her off to the wider community.

She said: "I'm excited. I love Pickles - she never runs away or anything."

In addition to Pickles, the school was also joined by three alpacas called Olympus, Tik Tak and Pebbles from Why Not Alpacas in Sebergh and four-month-old Samuel Kavanagh, who played the baby Jesus.

As the procession made its way through the streets, Bootle residents came out in their finest tea towels to get a slice of the action.

Narrator Bella Jackson said: "Not a lot of other schools do things like this - it's crazy but in a good way. The community can get involved as well, which is good."

Mr Mills added: "As a school we pride ourselves on being at the heart of the community so for our nativity, we stop the traffic and act it out in the street so it is accessible to all the community."

Despite the chaos and fun, Mr Mills believes performing the event in this way sends out an important message to all.

He said: "There is a long tradition of acting out the nativity story. It is important to us because it helps the children to really understand the story.

"As we followed Mary riding through the streets on a pony we were thinking about the journey she took over 2,000 years ago and as our kings walked through the streets leading alpacas, we were able to think about the incredible journey the kings made with their camels.

"By doing our nativity on such a big scale we made the nativity story real in our community - and that made the children and adults think, which is never a bad thing."