Pippi Longstocking - Molly's Story

I have been a voracious reader since I was a young child. I used to devour entire chapter books in an entire weekend and would make near daily bicycle trips to the public library. One of the most memorable characters from my childhood was Pippi Longstocking. Pippi Longstocking was developed by author Astrid Lindgren as a way to entertain her daughter. Lindgren eventually wrote the stories down and submitted it to publishing. Although her first attempt at publishing was not successful, she revised the books and resubmitted a year later to a different publishing house and it accepted. Pippi quickly became a beloved children's character--and was the inspiration to my Halloween costume when I was nine years old.

Pippi encapsulated what I wanted to be. She was fiercely independent, amazingly strong, had wit and grit, and chose the nonviolence approach to problem-solving. She lived alone in her home, Villa Villekulla with her pet monkey and her horse tethered to her front porch. I had been envisioning a Pippi Longstocking sessions for months and I had the perfect model for Pippi and the perfect location.

Meet Molly! Molly is going to be the next JoJo Siwa (her words, not mine--but I 100% believe she will be!) Molly has two older brothers and one younger sister. She loves all things sparkly and girly--which is a bit of a contrast to Pippi. Molly is also a dancer and is in the studio for six hours a week perfecting hip-hop, lyrical, tap, and jazz.

Pippi lives alone in a large home. Her mother died shortly after Pippi was born and her father was a lost at sea. Pippi has a chest of gold in the home, and there's always someone trying to get their hands on the fortune. I knew I wanted to recreate Pippi's home. I contact my friends at Hat Trick Renovation about using one of their properties. Tanya was on board! I had been to their rehab property in the Drake neighborhood in December to document the progress, so that temporarily became Villa Villekulla.

The home has a large front porch and a very bright third floor room. It would have been a perfect place for Pippi to hide a treasure chest! I wrote an entire blog post about Hat Trick Renovation and you can read it here.

After grabbing a few photos at the home, we jumped into our vehicles and headed to the Riverbend Neighborhood to Riverside Park. Molly and her mom, Katie, had never been to this park before. I loved showing them this magical place. I instructed Molly to just enjoy playing at the park and I would follow her with my camera and would occasionally throw out some suggestions. Molly is such a natural in front of the camera. She needed almost no direction thinking of poses or facial expressions.

While Molly was riding the zipline her mom had made a comment how it was impressive that she could keep her smile the entire time! Once at home and looking through the photos, Katie was absolutely right. Molly rode the zipline and never broke characters.

Molly had never read the Pippi Longstocking books or had seen any of the movies. I was explaining to her that Pippi had superhuman strength and could lift her horse one handed. Pippi was also a bit of a goofball, so Molly was free to make silly faces and be eccentric.

Molly had to get some tumbling and cartwheeling shots in! She's also perfected the 'sassy snap' that had me cracking up. Molly informed me that "Beauty is pain." when we were discussing her pigtails. Katie attempted several different things to get Molly's hair to stand up, but because Molly's hair is so long and thick, it was weighed down. Katie was able to work some serious magic though and it turned out perfect.

Molly nailed this Pippi Longstocking session from her hair, outfit, and even her freckles. I was nervous that the black and white images wouldn't convey Pippi, but I actually love how these turned out.

What's a literary character from your childhood that you loved?

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