Children’s Book Store Recommended Reads: Traveling in Time through Stories

“If enough people think of a thing and work hard enough at it, I guess it’s pretty nearly bound to happen, wind and weather permitting.”
“If enough people think of a thing and work hard enough at it, I guess it’s pretty nearly bound to happen, wind and weather permitting.”

It’s true, I am one of those who grew up absorbing every word that Laura Ingalls Wilder ever wrote.  Many a summer day was spent under a shady tree, book in hand and lost to those around me.  For I too, was like Laura, traveling along in that rickety covered wagon.

I felt those same fat raindrops wetting my skin at the onset of a giant summer storm, the dust, the grit, I tasted that too.  I heard mama’s “supper time” as my sisters and I ran hand in hand through the endless prairie lands of our burgeoning country.

How wonderful to go back in time and revisit those more simpler days and pleasures, how rich those memories are for me even now.  We are fortunate to still have her words to read and enjoy even in today’s high-tech and computer driven world.

It seems as though many children grow up with a mouse in their hand, navigating the internet, downloading games, those long and reverent days of childhood have been traded for computer screens, ipods and portable devices.  But it doesn’t have to be.  I challenge you to turn off your computer, find a quiet spot to curl up with your child.  Open up “Little House on the Prairie” and watch what happens to your little one.  A whole world envelops–inside her mind!

If your children are anything like my own; they will fall in love with the characters.  Laura, Carrie, Mary and even Nellie Olson become as real as their own family.   That is why you’ll probably end up collecting the entire series.

Don’t fear though, if you’ve gone through all of the books, there’s plenty more to choose from: Little House Cookbook, Biographies, Letters Home from Laura Ingalls, Little House Crafts.  What better way to spend a rainy day inside, while you and your child are crafting away, making pioneer projects, plan a meal that ties in with the whole theme.  Think of those wonderful memories your child will build, simply by visiting those days of the distant past.

“Home is the nicest word there is.”

Here’s a book trailer created by a “Little House on the Prairie” kid fan, should you need a little more encouragement.