Quotes from Laura Ingalls Wilder

Flags were everywhere, and in the Square the band was playing "Yankee Doodle." The fifes tooted and the flutes shrilled and the drums came in with rub-a-dub-dub. Yankee Doodle went to town, Riding on a pony, He stuck a feather in his hat And called it macaroni!

The barrels of salted fish were in the pantry, and yellow cheeses were stacked on the pantry shelves. Then

with which he carved the pictures. Laura and Mary were allowed to take Ma's thimble and make pretty patterns of circles in the frost on the glass. But they never spoiled the pictures that Jack Frost had made in the night. When they put their mouths close to the pane and blew their breath on it, the white frost melted and ran in drops down the glass. Then they could see the drifts of snow outdoors and the

This year the teacher was a slim, pale young man. His name was Mr. Corse. He was gentle and patient, and never whipped little boys because they forgot how to spell a word. Almanzo

Then Father said: "If the teacher has to thrash you again, Royal, I'll give you a thrashing you'll remember.

It is still best to be honest and truthful; to make the most of what we have; to be happy with simple pleasures and to be cheerful and have courage when things go wrong.

Do you know, Caroline," Pa stopped singing to say, "I've been thinking what fun the rabbits will have, eating that garden we planted." "Don't, Charles," Ma said. "Never mind, Caroline!" Pa told her. "We'll make a better garden. Anyway, we're taking more out of Indian Territory than we took in." "I don't know what," Ma said, and Pa answered, "Why, there's the mule!

Haste makes waste, but a lazy man'd rather get his work done fast than do it himself...all it saves is time, son. And what good is time, with nothing to do? You want to sit and twiddle your thumbs, all these stormy winter days?

She liked the enormous sky and the winds, and the land that you couldn't see to the end of. Everything was so free and big and splendid.

We crossed the James River and in 20 minutes we reached the top of the bluffs on the other side. We all stopped and looked back at the scene and I wished for an artist's hand or a poet's brain or for even to be able to tell in good plain prose how beautiful it was. If I had been the Indians I wold have scalped more white folks before I ever would have left it.

When Pa went into the Big Woods, he always made sure that the bullet pouch was full of bullets, and that the tin patch box and the box of caps were with it in his pockets. The powder horn and a small sharp hatchet hung at his belt and he carried the gun ready loaded on his shoulder. He always reloaded the gun as soon as he had fired it, for, he said, he did not want to meet trouble with an empty gun.

It beats me," he said, "why they call a south wind a norther, and how a wind from the south can be so tarnation cold. I never saw anything like it. Down here in this country, the north end of a south wind is the coldest wind I ever heard of.

Mid pleasures and palaces, though we may roam, Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.

Rome wasn't built in a day

They did not gather thickly any more on Silver Lake. Only a few very tired flocks settled late after sunset in the sloughs and rose to the sky again before the sun rose. Wild birds did not like the town full of people, and neither did Laura. She thought, "I would rather be out on the prairie with the grass and the birds and Pa's fiddle. Yes, even with wolves! I would rather be anywhere than in this muddy, cluttered, noisy town, crowded by strange people." And she said

Kansas City Sunday, August 22, 1915 The country is flat and I can see as far as my eyes will let me.

On the train from Denver to Salt Lake August 25, 1915 Manly Dear, I wish you were here. Half the fun I lose because I am all the time wishing for you.

beside the shells. There were three shells. The man pointed to the same shell that

Father always maintained that a man would do more work in twelve hours, if he had a rest and all the egg-nog he could drink, morning and afternoon.

Yankee Doodle went to town, He wore his striped trousies, He swore he couldn't see the town, There were so many houses.

Gather ye roses while ye may

A big boy nine years old is old enough to remember to mind,' he said. 'There's a good reason for what I tell you to do,' he said, 'and if you'll do as you're told, no harm will come to you.'" "Yes

I have learned that if the mind is allowed to dwell on a circumstance more and more details will present themselves and the memory becomes much more distinct.

A body makes his own luck, be it good or bad.