It's called nonfiction.

I mentioned earlier in the week that Gracie & I have begun reading the Little House series. Since she doesn't have school tomorrow, I suggested we watch Little House on the Prairie together. She readily agreed.

This particular episode was of Pa telling Albert about Grandpa (Pa's father). It was mainly flashbacks to when Pa's mother died and the hard time Grandpa went through when that happened. There were a few things I felt I needed to try to explain to Gracie as we watched. The episode seemed to be "heavier" in issue than I remember from when I was little. I guess alot of stuff just went over my head~as lots of stuff will with Gracie~but I did try to explain some of it and tried to "gloss over" some things.

For example, Grandpa set fire to the house while he was still in it to try to kill himself! I just said something about the house being on fire and Pa was trying to get Grandpa out so he wouldn't die. I made no mention of the fact that Grandpa had deliberately set it. She seemed to accept that okay. I also had to explain about how when a horse would get really hurt, sometimes they have to be shot. She wanted to know if they then would be okay. I told her that no, they would die but otherwise they would be in too much pain. Thankfully, she accepted that okay as well. No further questions. *whew* You never know what will upset them.

I'm getting off subject, but when we were reading the other day, it said something about their pig and "butcher day." It talked about how Laura would plug up her ears so she wouldn't hear the pig squeal. I wasn't sure how Gracie would take this, so I asked her, "Why do you think Pa wanted to butcher the pig?" She looked at me and said, "so they could have meat?" *whew, again!* I don't think we have a vegetarian on our hands here, and she seems okay with that, too!

Anyway...back to tonight's show. At the end, Ma was tucking Laura into bed. Laura commented on how when they're all old, their great-grandchildren won't know any of these stories that Pa was telling them tonight. (Of course, in my head I'm thinking that I know where this is going and sentimental fool that I am, I start to get teary eyed for some reason.) Ma assures her that typically people will pass the stories down from generation to generation. Laura says, "Well, if I write them down, then we'll know for sure, won't we?" (I just love this series and the fact that they're family stories! I know there has probably been some "embellishment" along the way, but they're based on real people!)

I told Gracie, "See, that's where we get the books from. They're based on true stories that a girl named Laura Ingalls Wilder wrote."

Gracie said, "True. That means they could really happen?"

I said, "They did happen. They're true stories from when she was growing up." (I didn't explain about the probable embellishments. I may try that another day.)

She replied, "Miss S says that's called nonfiction."

Oh! For some reason, I thought that was so sweet and so smart of her to know that! I just love how we can read the books and then watch the show and find similarities between the 2. This is a fun thing for she & I to do together and I'm having fun just like when I was a little girl! I'll have to find the picture next time I'm in Atlanta from when I dressed up as Laura Ingalls for Book Week!

I told Gracie maybe she could write down the stories of our family. She said she didn't know how, so I told her maybe not now but when she was older. I know she'd do a great job!