How the Hansen Girls Came to be and Previous Versions

G'day readers! Thanks for stopping by!

   I had an idea for a blog post that you guys might find interesting. I thought I'd tell you all how my Hansen Girls stories came to be. 

   Originally the Hansen Girls was a play! My siblings and my friends and I loved to make movies together. We'd come up with ideas and film each other. Back in 2012 (I think)...My mother was hosting a party for a whole bunch of my friends. A couple of us friends thought it would be fun to put together a play/movie idea and video tape it with the entire group. We needed some ideas so we each came up with some ideas. I was away at my grandparents' house at the time while my sister and my two other friends were at home together, planning ideas. The movie/play needed a lot of cast members since there would be a lot of us at the party. Having just watched "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers", the idea I came up with was "Four Brothers and Too Many Sisters" (Yes, that was the rough draft name :P) It depicted four brothers and ten sisters who lived on a farm. The boys were mad at the sisters for instilling so many rules so they up and left one day. However the boys ended up returning when they learned their one sister was sick and the siblings work together to get her to the doctor on time.

   I do NOT have the original copy of "Four Brothers and Too Many Sisters" (just the revised copy that went through several changes). While revising the play to fit the cast list of friends who would be attending the party, I had to switch some names around. Here are some other name choices that I considered:

• Frank (instead of Gideon)
• Christine (instead of Danielle. Chris instead of Danni)
• Deborah (instead of Cassandra)
• Emma (instead of Elsie and Faith, merging the characters into one)
• Gideon (instead of Isaac. I really wanted to keep Gideon haha)
• Harry (instead of Kenny/Keith)
• Ivy (instead of Hannah and Jinger, merging those two into one)
• Jinger (instead of Lynn and Megan, merging those two into one. Really liked the name Jinger too)
• Kelly (Instead of Nadia)

However, I decided to stick to all the original names except Kenny. (As you may already know, Kenny was originally Keith but I wanted to use Keith for a different character much later on in the story so I switched it to Kendrick---which is Alice Hansen's maiden name---and called him Kenny for short )

   Ultimately, we didn't use my idea for the movie so I decided to continue writing the play as a book. Since I didn't have my siblings with me while I stayed at my grandparents' house, I busied myself with this new book idea. I spent a lot of time on their computer. My grandparents couldn't believe that I would just sit there for an hour or two and just type and type and type. (My grandfather actually came and sat beside me and watched me type for a while. He was amazed that I could just sit there and type whatever came to mind haha) I came up with ideas on the fly and shoved them all into what became the Hansen Girls.

The Final Book Cover I Made with Microsoft Word

   When I completed the Hansen Girls about a year later, I planned to write a trilogy, adding "The O'Neal Girls", to show the girls getting along with their new lives, and "The Hansen Boys", to tell the tale of what happened to the brothers. I wrote up some good story ideas for the boys...but then I hit writers block, left the book, and focused on "The O'Neal Girls". To this day, I still haven't written the rest of "The Hansen Boys." I do have the basis of where they went when they left and what they did before they returned to their sisters but not in story format. I'll have to work on it and post it for you all someday...*fingers crossed* I do love the boys and I hope to introduce them to you so you can learn more about them and meet their new friends and follow their adventure.

Original Hansen Boys Cover

   I wrote ideas for the O'Neal Girls for a long time. I would write off and on for months. I had other story ideas but I always came back to the O'Neals. I wrote up through Belle and Caleb's wedding and then I did something crazy.

   I don't know what I was thinking but I guess I decided I needed to end "The O'Neal Girls" so I suddenly fast-forwarded SIX YEARS. In a brief paragraph I described how Belle, Cassandra, Elsie, and Faith each were happily married and had families of their own. Danielle was still unmarried (I had a back story on that but I can't tell you because I recycled the idea for later on *evil grin*) and living with the O'Neals. Any-who, I wrote that Belle and Cassandra are summoned to the O'Neal Cabin because Lillian was dying (I had written how she was weaker than most women and I guess I felt she needed to die because of it). I wrote a brief scene between Lillian and her adopted daughters, then I KILLED HER and ENDED THE BOOK THERE.

   I still have not forgiven myself for that...I don't know what I was thinking!! I left the book like that for ages! I wrote a "What Happened to the O'Neals" after I ended the book to explain what happened to all the girls after Lillian died and the book ended. That seemed to suffice me for ending the O'Neal Girls so abruptly.

   A couple months later, I finally I decided that was an awful ending. Truth be told...I got really attached to the family and I missed writing up adventures for them. Soooooo, I resurrected Lillian, rewound six years, and began writing where I left off. I also went back and added in adventures. All the winter time adventures (with the Cories etc.,) were written in during this time. A lot of editing also took place. The girls have evolved somewhat over the years but they have stayed true to their core character.

Some of the characters are modeled after people I know. Cassandra is modeled after one of my best friends, Belle is a combination of a two or three of my friends, Danielle was an "ideal" model of myself. :P I wanted a "tomboy" character (like myself) but I also wanted to show a tender side of her.
Paul and Lillian are based off the Michael Landon and Karen Grassle versions of Pa and Ma Ingalls on the Little House and the Prairie TV series, although Lillian is more of a combination Caroline Ingalls, Livy Walton (The Waltons), and Michaela Quinn (Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman) as well as Marty and Missy from the Love Comes Softly series.

  As you can tell, I enjoy finding pictures on Pinterest and the Internet of actors and actresses who look like my characters. Here are some original pictures of my characters before I changed them:

Audra Barkley/Linda Evans was originally Lillian! I loved this picture of her due to the smile. It was exactly how I envisioned Lillian's warm smile. I used this for a while before I decided the hair was too blonde and she was a bit too young for Lillian.

This actress from Bonanza was an early consideration for Belle. She was blonde and pretty and in the Bonanza episode, she had a blond husband/beau that I figured I could use for Caleb.











Here is a picture of the very early Belle and Caleb. But then I really wanted to use Heath Barkley/Lee Majors for Caleb. (Just so handsome :D) So I ended up not using either of them.













This picture of Elizabeth Walton/Kami Cotler was who I really wanted to be used as Nadia. This picture of her is just so stinkin' adorable!!! I finally told myself I couldn't use this picture because her hair was too dark for fair-haired Nadia.











This sharp lookin' fellow was briefly considered for Charles Wiggins, Cassandra's first beau. I decided against that and settled on using Hank Lawson/William Shockley.