a button lamp like Laura Ingalls Wilder

We just recently finished listening to Cherry Jones narrate The Long Winter. The button lamp that Laura describes in the story has always fascinated me so I decided to make one for the girls. The girls really got into it and put on their newest LHP costumes. (Some of you will remember the first ones I made from here and here).


The girls wanted to pretend to study by the lamp like Laura and Mary.



We made sure that we had a metal button.


It is rather smoky so when we were done, I turned off the heat and opened up the house for a little while. The day we made the button lamp we woke up to ten below zero Fahrenheit, so the house got cold rather quickly when I turned off the heat and opened up the doors and windows. This inspired the girls to go down to the entry and pretended to twist straw.

Happily, I had just finished baking a Chocolate Beet Cake and so the girls could come warm up by an open oven just like Laura, Mary, Carrie, and Grace.

I wrote detailed instructions at Suite101.