Never bet your money on another man’s game.

Snow as fine and grainy as sugar covered the windows in and sifted off to the floor and did not melt.

Politicians, they take pleasure a-prying into a man’s affairs and I aimed to please ’em.

Persons appear to us according to the light we throw upon them from our own minds. -Laura Ingalls Wilder, author (1867-1957)

If only I had some grease I could fix some kind of a light,” Ma considered. “We didn’t lack for light when I was a girl before this newfangled kerosene was ever heard of.””That’s so,”...

We had no choice. Sadness was a dangerous as panthers and bears. the wilderness needs your whole attention.

Some old-fashioned things like fresh air and sunshine are hard to beat. In our mad rush for progress and modern improvements let’s be sure we take along with us all the old-fashioned things worth while.

Ma had been very fashionable, before she married Pa, and a dressmaker had made her clothes.

Our hearts grow tender with childhood memories and love of kindred, and we are better throughout the year for having, in spirit, become a child again at Christmas-time.

Laura knew then that she was not a little girl any more. Now she was alone; she must take care of herself. When you must do that, then you do it and you are grown...

Ma!” she cried. “There is a Santa Claus, isn’t there?””Of course there’s a Santa Claus,” said Ma. “The older you are, the more you know about Santa Claus,” she said. “You are so big now,...

A good laugh overcomes more difficulties and dissipates more dark clouds than any other one thing.

set and think.” She lay at full length, every muscle and nerve relaxed and her mind as quiet as her body. This always relieved the strain and renewed her strength.

It was muskets that won the Revolution. And don’t forget it was axes, and plows that made this country.- Father Wilder

Home is the nicest word there is.

As the years pass, I am coming more and more to understand that it is the common, everyday blessings of our common everyday lives for which we should be particularly grateful. They are the things...

There is no comfort anywhere for anyone who dreads to go home.

The real things haven’t changed. It is still best to be honest and truthful; to make the most of what we have; to be happy with simple pleasures; and have courage when things go wrong.

These times are too progressive. Everything has changed too fast. Railroads and telegraphs and kerosene and coal stoves — they’re good to have but the trouble is, folks get to depend on ’em.

The true way to live is to enjoy every moment as it passes, and surely it is in the everyday things around us that the beauty of life lies.

Mr. Edwards admired the well-built, pleasant house and heartily enjoyed the good dinner. But he said he was going on West with the train when it pulled out. Pa could not persuade him to stay...