by Laura Ingalls Wilder
ages: 8+
First sentence: “Once upon a time, sixty years ago, a little girl lived in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, in a little gray house made of logs.”
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I just finished reading this to A last night; her first time meeting Laura and Mary and Ma and Pa. My… I don’t know how many times I’ve read this book. I first cracked the cover when I was about eight, and I fell in love with the Ingalls family. I admired Laura’s spunk, and the fact that she was so not-perfect. I wanted to experience what she experienced, live the life that she lived.

And so, it’s one of those books that is a must read for my girls. (Granted, so far, M and A are the only two that expressed interest. C preferred to read Wizard of Oz, so I forgave her for not being interested in Little House.)

What I noticed this time around — aside from A’s questions about life back then (playing with a pig’s bladder? Making cheese? Really?) and her constant “Is it really real?” — is the affection that Laura had for her childhood and her family. She loved her parents — her Pa especially — and it comes through loud and clear. And — this year at least, I know things get hard once they leave the big woods — she had a wonderfully idyllic childhood. Sure, they worked hard and things weren’t cushy for anyone, but they were happy. And that happiness leaps off the page.

I’m just glad for the chance to share the book with my girls. I don’t know if they’ll be as entranced with it as I was, but at least they got to experience a different sort of life, if only through a book.

On top of that, I got to share a little piece of me with them.