Kingdom of Knuffel

Alright this one's difficult so bear with me. I'm looking for a book I read in middle school in English class. It was an old fashioned prairie setting, and the main character is one of three daughters living with their single father. The youngest daughter plays with paper dolls- that's literally all I remember about her. The main character I think is the middle daughter? And the oldest daughter is like a really pretty blonde girl but she's not very bright. Not like, stupid, but like she has a learning disability or something like that. And so the middle sister kind of takes on the mother role. At one point their father has a stroke- it's never specifically stated that it was a stroke, but the symptoms are all well outlined so it's heavily implied- and the main character is left taking care of her sisters and father, and they start to go under financially. And there's a sort of side plot where the older sister is being courted by a man, but the father didn't want to marry her off because of her being a little slow, but after the stroke and they start going under, the sister suddenly makes the decision to marry the man anyway because she loves him and because he has money, and she wants to help her family, and they realize she was never stupid at all, just different. The blonde sister I think had a flower name, but I'm not sure. I can't remember the names of any of the other characters, or the title of the book, or the name of the author. If anyone can help I'd greatly appreciate it!

Do you remember if it was historical fiction or based on a true story?

I'm fairly sure it was historical fiction, not based on anything that really happened.

Okay, one more question you don't have to answer if you don't want to give away your age, but... how long ago was this middle school English class? Are we talking about a book that's been out for decades or something that may have come out as recently as two years ago, or... ?


... actually, a couple more questions. What country was this book set in? I was guessing either Canada or America from what you were saying, but I'd like to double-check.

And weirdly enough, if you can remember the color of the cover that could be an avenue to help find it as well.

(And was this one of those books assigned because they're considered 'classic' or a book that was assigned because the teacher wanted kids to like reading? Those are different areas to search, too... one would be genre "classic" and one would be "YA", I suspect)


(It reminds me a little of the Little House series and a little of the Witch of Blackbird Pond, but doesn't really match either of those)

To answer your questions in order:

I was in middle school from 2003 to 2006 but idk how old the book was even then

The country was America

I have a vague memory of the cover having long grass and a wooden house but I really don't trust my memory since I've read so many books

And I don't think it was a "classic" I'm pretty sure it was just that our teacher wanted to use it for a specific lesson or something