I really think this is in-your-face-farming-romanticism, and yet there's no denying that it works, that there's this golden glow of nostalgia wrapped around what is endless backbreaking labour. It helps that the family seems quite well-off, as farmers go, certainly compared to the couple of books I've read that feature Laura as the protagonist. That general prosperity is represented with large and frequent meals - when you do this much physical work, you simply have to stuff yourself, and Almanzo does at every opportunity. Food descriptions are everywhere, and it's honestly making me kind of hungry. I'd like to have some fruit or custard pie right now, but their version of mincemeat pie, which I grant is a traditional version, containing actual meat as well as dried fruit, is less attractive. 

Rather less interesting to my gluttonous self is the almost-as-frequent descriptions of carpentry and so forth, though I do find the rest of the farming life more appealing as presented here. Of course, that presentation is, as I said, given a glossy sheen. Any inclination I have towards nostalgia disappears with the lack of running water and indoor plumbing, and why on earth Almanzo's poor mother and sisters have to wear hoop skirts, of all things, as they go about their daily chores is beyond me. Who wants to make sausage patties and watermelon pickle and black the stove in a hoop skirt? Not me, that's for sure. Roll on jeans and electricity, I say.