Are you Little House on the Prairie or 1883?

I have to confess that I am a HUGE Western nerd. It probably started with being brought up on Little House on the Prairie. I'm just a few years younger than Melissa Gilbert and I looked quite a bit like her growing up. I found a couple of pictures from when I was little, so hopefully, you can see the similarity.

Here I am about 7-ish years old in front of the big pine at my grandparents' house. It was enormous by the time they actually cut it down.

This was taken in 1977 (I'm on the right). My hair was growing back out at this time. I was playing by the barn one-night throwing rocks with my brother and I fell into a pile of burdock plants. My hair was so coated in them that all my mom could do was cut my hair about an inch long all over my head. So, for a short time, I looked like a boy.

And here I am about 8 or 9 years old. My waist-length hair must have been up in a bun that day. My dad wanted me to have long hair, so I had long hair. I begged until I was 12 to get my hair cut short. They finally caved and let me cut it up to my shoulder blades. When I was 13- I had it cut into a chin-length bob (gotta love the 80's). I didn't have hair longer than my shoulders again until college.

But, enough about my childhood hair issues! Haha! Let's get back to Westerns. I've always loved the idea of the West, but I really fell in love with Westerns when I watched Lonesome Dove for the first time. I never saw it when it was on TV as a mini-series. I saw it with my husband because his grandmother had bought the series on VHS. It was the most amazing movie I had ever seen. The story, the music, the heart, the acting...it was just magical to me. It made my heart soar and broke it into a million pieces. To this day I still love those characters. And for the longest time, I had a huge crush on Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones. 

Lonesome Dove on Wikipedia

I think the thing I love most about Westerns is that most of them aren't about anything in particular. Each one is a microcosm of the plight of the Pioneers, the American Indians, and the great lands of the West. They tell history one story at a time. Having come from a family of immigrants I am entwined with the American Dream on a personal level. And every Western I watch makes me yearn to be there, to see history, to experience all of it. I know myself and I'm strong and scrappy, but oh Lord...the fortitude our ancestors had to do what they did...that's a whole different level. 

Little House on the Prairie really romanticized the idea of growing up as a pioneer. But, 1883 brought the true grit of it home. What a phenomenal series. I can't say enough good things about it. It was so genuine and authentic in its feel. It's the first time I've fallen in love with a series like I did with Lonesome Dove. It made you feel everything. I could just picture my own German ancestors making the same fight for freedom. Taylor Sheridan is a master screenwriter. When it ended I sobbed like a baby and had about 16lbs of snot in my head. Usually, if a movie makes me cry like that I will avoid it for the rest of my life. But, like Lonesome Dove, this one is in my heart and I will own it on DVD! 

If you haven't seen it- and you love Westerns- it's a must-watch. 

Do you have any favorites?

So, following that cheerful picture, I'm going to tell you about a pattern I designed with a Western theme. About 2012 I was selling finished toy bag sets on Etsy and a customer reached out to me to see if I could design a toy bag with a Little House on the Prairie theme to it for her daughter with Autism. It was her favorite show and made her so happy. 

Prairie Family Adventure Set Pattern is available here.

I created a covered wagon with open space to store the characters. The family that you see is actually based on the family that I created the set for. The sheep was an add-on character later when I wrote the pattern for publication. This is still one of my most favorite sets because of my love for the history of the West. 

If you are American, no matter what your American story is, this history belongs to all of us. May we all embrace it and learn from it.