Farmer Boy Book Club

September’s book club pick for our WILD+FREE nature co-op was Farmer Boy by Laura Ingalls Wilder. It was another hit with both the children and the mamas! My oldest son and I had read halfway through Farmer Boy when he was much younger, and he was just not that interested in the book, so we never finished it. This time around, he loved it and we couldn’t wait to read what happened next. I have always loved the Little House series, so it was special to connect over this book together. Our original book club had to be rescheduled because of hurricane Helene, so we had a couple families not able to make the new book club date. We were sad to miss our friends, but we still had a really great time.

If you want some ideas on how to start your own kids book club, check out this post.

This book club was extra special because one of our group members is turning a small old building on their farm into an old-fashioned one room schoolhouse! It is coming together so wonderfully, and she graciously hosted book club in this new space. It was perfection. She has been sharing updates on the progress of the renovations over on her Instagram. Be sure to check her out!

If you have read Farmer Boy, you know that the main character Almanzo is a hungry growing boy that will talk so much of food, you will start to salivate! So putting together a spread of food for a Farmer Boy Book Club should be fairly easy. We had more food ideas than there were mamas attending, but we still had a large lovely table of delicious food.

THE FOOD

• Cider
• popcorn
• apple pie
• pumpkin pie
• homemade bacon
• homemade pork and beans
• apple turnovers
• homemade jams
• pickled beets
• fried potatoes

Other food ideas:

• fried apples n’ onions (Almanzo’s favorite food)
• Birds Nest Pudding (you can find this recipe online that is taken from the Little House Cookbook)
• Donuts
• Raw milk

Activity

For our activity, the kids made tin can lanterns. In the book, a tin peddler comes to town, so I thought this would be a fun thing for the kids to make. We found that some cans worked better than others. Some kids really struggled getting the nail through the can, while others breezed through it. Holding a clean empty tin can, the child uses a nail and hammer to poke holes through the can in any design or pattern. Then they make a hole near the top of the can on either side to thread a thin wire through to make a handle. I got the floral wire from the Dollar Tree and another mama brought beads for the kids to decorate their handles. I also handed out a tealight for each child so they could light their lanterns. They turned out really cute!

I found free Farmer Boy coloring pages online and printed those out for the littles that couldn’t participate in the tin lantern craft.

Another activity I had planned on doing, but forgot… in the book Almanzo talks about how you can fill a cup with popcorn and pour the same amount of milk into it and it wouldn’t overflow. I think that would be a fun and easy experiment for the kids at a book club party.

Dressing up for this book club was too fun! I got my costume from Amazon here. I skipped the bonnet that came with it, it was too humid out! Almost everyone dressed up this book club. It’s so fun!