<p>Here is a link to the cookbook:</p>
<p>[The</a> Little House Cookbook: Frontier Foods from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Classic Stories: Barbara M. Walker, Garth Williams: 9780060264185: Amazon.com: Books](<a href=“http://www.amazon.com/The-Little-House-Cookbook-Frontier/dp/0060264187/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1363024564&sr=1-1]The”>http://www.amazon.com/The-Little-House-Cookbook-Frontier/dp/0060264187/ref=tmm_hrd_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1363024564&sr=1-1)</p>
<p>Who else thinks about the Christmas gifts brought by Mr Edwards, the cup & penny, etc. when filling their kid’s lavish stockings? I have, every year.</p>
<p>How many of you are confident you could have a fire with no wood, if need be, by using twisted hay.</p>
<p>I feel like so many of the things that happened to them truly have given me an appreciation for how good we have it, through my entire life.</p>
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<p>I think that’s what drove us both crazy about Pa. By the time he built a cabin square in the middle of an Indian trail, we weren’t even that surprised LOL. Clearly Laura at the time did not realize what dire straits they were in (although sometimes Ma’s frustration could not be contained). Clever and resourceful Almonzo was a breath of fresh air!</p>
<p>I loved these books as a child. I read them over and over. My copies are really beat up nowadays! I actually grew my hair out as a kid so I could wear braids like Laura did.</p>
<p>I think my favourite book was either The Long Winter or Little House on the Prairie. I did get rather frustrated with Pa though, as he kept trying and trying to do farming, and it never worked out. I felt bad for the family getting continually uprooted.</p>
<p>I always thought Farmer Boy was a fantasy written by someone who’d spent most of her childhood starving. It’s nothing but food!</p>
<p>I was not that impressed by The Children of Green Knowe, but I met it later in life. Loved Noel Streatfeild and read a bunch of her adult books and autobiography as well. For fantasy I was a huge E. Nesbit fan, and loved Edward Eager as well and Jane Langton for their American fantasies. (And of course I read the* Narnia *books and The Lord of the Rings - though that came a bit later.)</p>
<p>My boys loved the *Redwall *books - I read the first one out loud to my youngest and then told him he had to read the rest. I hated wading through that dialect! He says he can’t read them anymore either, but I think those books plus Harry Potter are the main reason he became such a good reader.</p>
<p>I got introduced to *The Sherwood Ring *in college from a friend who was writing children’s books at the time. Pretty sure I still have my copy.</p>
<p>I read tons of horse books - though mostly British ones.</p>
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<p>Yes, it’s very food-centric. Probably why I liked it so much. My favorite part is when Almanzo gives Lucy the piglet some candy and her teeth get stuck together. She can’t eat and it takes him a while to figure out why. There is also a scene where he gets hit in the eye by an exploding baked potato. Food can be hazardous!</p>
<p>I’ve always remembered the exploding potato. I think of it every time I bake potatoes.</p>
<p>"“These Happy Golden Years” is another interesting book; it describes how Laura, at 16, had to board with a family (sleeping on the sofa) and teach a country school to make money to send Mary to her special school for the blind."</p>
<p>Laura supporting Mary’s education was a fiction inserted by Rose Wilder Lane, who was a big right-winger and anti-New-Dealer. In addition to editing (and greatly improving) the storyline and tone of the books, she made them conform to her ideals about independence from the government. The state/territory paid for Mary to go to “college” in Iowa, since there was no in-state facility. Laura probably did share her salary with her parents, but the books make it sound like the college was a private institution and the family had to pay for everything. It wouldn’t fit with Rose’s portrait of the self-sufficient pioneers if the Ingallses relied on public funds to educate Mary.</p>
<p>“I’ve always remembered the exploding potato.”</p>
<p>I was hit in the face by an exploding baked bean once. Unlike Almanzo, I was wearing glasses (thank goodness).</p>
<p>^^^Remember the scene in Farmer Boy when Almanzo threw the (I think) stove blackening powder at his sister and it hit the wall in the formal parlor. Then the oldest sister had to find a leftover scrap of the wallpaper and cut it out and paste it over the mark so the parents wouldn’t, hopefully, notice. This was when the parents went away for a week and left the kids in charge. </p>
<p>I am a HUGE LIW fan. Loved the books and and read several biographies about her. The difference between the amount of food Almanzo had and Laura had while growing up was astounding. I remember the scene where he was holding a “cookie in one hand and a donut in the other.” </p>
<p>This summer DH and I are visiting LIW’s house in Missouri. Can’t wait!!</p>
<p>I enjoy rereading the books I loved growing up. Many of my favorites have already been mentioned on this thread. I second these:</p>
<p>Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books (We attended the festival in DeSmet, South Dakota and toured the homestead - my oldest daughter loved the books.)</p>
<p>Edgar Eager’s books</p>
<p>the Anne of Green Gables books (A particular favorite of mine and my girls - I’m currently listening to them on my iPod : I’ve made it to Anne of the Island)</p>
<p>the Nancy Drew series (I’d like to reread them.)</p>
<p>*The Witch of Blackbird Pond<a href=“One%20of%20my%20favorite%20books%20that%20I%20reread%20on%20occasion.”>/I</a></p>
<p>I had lunch with my youngest daughter and mentioned this thread: she asked if anyone mentioned the Boxcar Children series, one of her favorites.</p>
<p>and, of course, all my children liked the Harry Potter books. In future, I know that they will reread those.</p>
<p>Love the Box Car children & Nancy Drew, Island of the Blue Dolphins, Withc of Blackbird Pond, etc.</p>
<p>I should probably ask this crowd about book I remember reading at my cousins and have never found since. It reminded me of the Boxcar Children books because it also involved children living in a railroad car, but there was a baby involved, and maybe keeping it secret from grownups? I can barely remember it now, but it made a big impression then. I read it in the late 1960s, but don’t know if it was new or old then.</p>
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<p>Ironically, the Ingalls and the Wilders made their living homesteading on free federal land. There is quite a bit in the later books about the residency requirement (you couldn’t pay someone to stay on your plot for you; it had to be a family member, etc.).</p>
<p>Wind in the Willows is a big favorite of mine, also Winnie the Pooh of course.</p>
<p>Speaking of Anne of Green Gables, I was really lucky and got to visit the place where the author lived and got her inspiration for the stories in Prince Edward Island. The scenery is absolutely lovely – greenery everywhere. I love PEI in general, too. </p>
<p>I also enjoyed the little house books - the long winter was my favorite! I lived in upstate NY at the time so I felt that I could relate, but I relate even more now 
(points at location).</p>
<p>The girls loved the Little House books (I had missed them as a child so we got to enjoy them together), my son was seriously into Redwall for a long time. Boxcar Children was big, as was Babysitter’s Club, the American Girl stories, and to my disgust we won a set of 20 Goosebumps books at a raffle.</p>
<p>Little Women was big for me as a kid - but more so Little Men. I loved the idea of Jo running a school. Black Beauty. And those irritating Bobbsey Twins, Nan and Bert and Freddie and Flossie. </p>
<p>I got to buy the Narnia books once a month after my trip to the orthodontist, when stopping by the big city bookstore became a ritual. It used to drive me nuts because I’d finish the book in a day and have to wait all that time to get to the next one.</p>
<p>Does anyone remember The Borrowers? Those charmed me when I was young.</p>
<p>2 favorite Louisa May Alcott are Eight Cousins and An Old Fashioned Girl.</p>
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<p>^^^ Yes and a resounding yes.</p>
<p>I forgot to mention two other series my daughter brought up: the Alana series - Tamora Pierce and this one - well-loved - Megan Whalen Turner’s The Queen’s Thief series. Neither series are as old as the Wilder books but were well-loved at the time … and books both she (now young adult) and I reread. </p>
<p>Have to throw in the Ender’s series by Orson Scott Card as one loved in younger and older years both.</p>
<p>Oops, just noticed the thread specifically mentions LIW fans. Oh, well, we count there too.</p>
<p>And Winnie the Pooh and the Wind in the Willows are probably my two favorite children’s movies/franchises ever. I haven’t watched Wind in the Willows since 5th grade but I still love good ol’ Pooh Bear. He never fails to make me smile and I always learn (or relearn an important lesson). We have a Disney store 20 minutes from my house and they sell these giant pooh bear stuffed animals. I want to get one but my parents are resisting so far as they think he’ll be too hard to keep clean. 
I got a smaller one for my friend in HS, too. </p>
<p>I miss being a kid!</p>