An Unseen Angel {Book Review}

On December 14, 2012, a young man by the name of Adam Lanza walked into Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut and opened fire on two classrooms full of first graders.   The victims numbered 27.  Eight little boys, 12 little girls, 6 women who worked in the school and Adam Lanza, who turned the gun on himself in the end.  Among the dead was a beautiful 6-year-old girl named Emilie Parker.  This is her story.

As the mother of one of the children who died at Sandy Hook school in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012, Alissa Parker had her world shattered by a mass murderer's rampage. She was left to make sense of her daughter's life and death and to rebuild, seeking a deeply spiritual path to carry on with her life and find new meaning and purpose.

As a co-founder of SafeandSoundSchools.org, a touring national advocacy group that helps people take action to make schools safer, Alissa has talked to hundreds of parents around the country about her ordeal and how she was able to endure the unspeakable horror of Sandy Hook.

This is the first book about the school-shooting tragedies with a focus on faith and spirituality. As we learn Alissa's story, we are introduced to a special little girl who was wise beyond her years and whose lessons about life and the transcendent power of love continued even after she had passed away."

I just don't even know how to write a review about a book like this.  My throat swells and my eyes fill each time I revisit Alissa's story.   The day that Alissa lost her sweet daughter was a day like any other.  In fact, she was shopping when word reached her that there had been a shooting at school.  Fighting panic, Alissa made her way to the school where she was shuffled to a room with the other parents to wait to pick up their children.  Hours later, she would learn that Emilie would not be getting picked up that day...nor would any of her classmates.  They had all been killed by gunshot wounds.

 How does one move forward after something this tragic and unfair?  The only thing Alissa could do, with her husband Robbie, was pray.  They desperately needed God's guidance and reassurance that everything was going to be ok.  He blessed them with a strong sense of peace and made it possible for the family to put one foot in front of the other.

While her grief made it nearly impossible to function, Alissa still had to learn to live again.   She had to learn that there are some things that even a Mom cannot protect their children from.  She had to overcome the guilt that she couldn't save her daughter...and that she wasn't there to protect her.  She had to learn how to function in day to day living.  How to engage with her other children.  She had to learn how to find a new normal.

This book is a whole-box-of-tissues read.  But, it's not all tragedy.  Alissa & Emilie give you triumph in the face of great odds and demonstrates that love really does conquer all.

You can read a great LDS Living article about the the book here.

You can purchase An Unseen Angel and a big box of tissues from your favorite retailer.

Disclaimer:  I received this book free of charge in exchange for an honest review.  All opinions expressed here are my very own...

What We are Reading {BiblioPlan Week 16 & 17}

We've picked up the pace a bit!  Next week will be a Spring Break for our homeschool and before we get to relaxed we are going to finish up Week 17 of BiblioPlan.  We are studying both India and China this week using our evening to read from both Remember the Days AND our reader.  We are really hoping to finish the year "on time."  Hopefully by the end of May.  That gives us about 10 weeks to complete 16 weeks of history.  Doable?  I hope so!  :)  We have a busy spring coming up and will be constantly reading history even on our days off.  I think we can pull it off!  Luckily, BiblioPlan year 3 will start with a review of Columbus so we can catch up a smidge next year if needed.  

Anyway, here is what we are reading for Week 16 & 17 (which we are squashing into 1 week!)

Our Read Aloud is Marco Polo by Manuel Komroff.  This is an excellent, unfortunately OOP, book that is recommended by Ambleside as a reader.  I managed to get my hands on this book and we are reading it in place of BiblioPlans recommended reader, The Boy and the Samurai.  This Marco Polo is awesome!  We are really enjoying it!  Did I ever mention that the flexibility to tweak is my FAVORITE thing about BiblioPlan?  

Another Read Aloud this week was The Silk Route: 7,000 Miles of History.  Yes, this choice is another tweak!  BiblioPlan scheduled Stories from the Silk Road but our library didn't have it... I did, however, have The Silk Route and I knew it was a good one!  So, we enjoyed this one very much.  It has a great map in the front that we kept turning back to as we traveled along the silk road.

For individual readers this week Maggie is reading another Magic Treehouse book.  I know that many CMers and AOers would say that MTH is "twaddle" I've decided that I don't care.  They are some of the best books for emerging readers that I can find that match up with our history...  A nice thing about these is you can usually find a quiz on Book Adventure and Maggie LOVES taking the little online quizzes. 

Kayley finished up her reader last last night, Whittington.  Since we are just days away from a Spring Break I decided to not assign her another reader just yet.  I never need to encourage her to read though.  Right now she is enjoying The Long Winter (she has read nearly the entire series in the last couple of months) and the American Girl, Smart Girls Guide to Babysitting.  (She has dreams of making some money, so she is getting ready for when she turns 11 and is legally old enough to babysit!) 

And, in case you are wondering about me?  I will (I hope) finish up Persuasion by the end of this week!  It has been a really rough read and I still have 4 chapters to go before I'm done...but I'm glad that I made the effort to do a hard thing.  I am not-so-secretly glad the the next book club reader is our choice...LOL. 

The Plague and Joan of Arc {BiblioPlan Week 14}

We are trying to pick up the pace a little this week and are finishing up BiblioPlan Week 14.  It was a full week since our reading squished in both The Plague and Joan of Arc!  We didn't do many projects since we are kind of getting "summery" and the girls are just staring longingly outside while we are getting our work done.  We did do the plague wheel in Story of the World and we threw together, with tape obviously, a plague doctor mask!  Yeah...we probably should've used glue, but, we were in a hurry.  LOL.

We have read from BiblioPlan's Remember the Days and Story of the World this week.  Remember the Days has been a tougher transition that I would've liked but we are finally getting the hang of it.  Our favorite is Story of the World, but I am really debating on dropping it next year in favor of just 1 spine.

Our read aloud choice for this week is The Door in the Wall by Marguerite de Angeli.  This is a favorite!  We actually read this as a read-aloud a few years ago and it was awesome enough that we decided to read it again!

Our 2nd read aloud is Diane Stanley's Joan of Arc.  Lots of pictures and goes into much more detail about Joan.  It's a great one! 

Kayley's reader for the next 2 weeks is Whittington.  

It tells the story of Dick Whittington from the perspective of a cat!

Maggie is enjoying a Magic Tree House book called The Knight at Dawn.

As for me...I am trying my best to get through Persuasion by Jane Austen.  Thanks so much to an online book group that I joined (I need accountability!) I am getting way out of my comfort zone!  I confess this is my first time reading Jane Austen...and my first, in a really long time...reading a  classic that wasn't designed for small children.  I admit that I have often had to read the Spark Note, read the chapter, and reread the Spark Note to figure out what is going on.  I'm slowly getting the hang of it and I can feel the squeak of my rusty gears.  I am close to the end and I look forward to reading something a little lighter next month! 

Ice Skating Anyone?

We got a chance to go to a birthday party last weekend for one of the girls' friends from church.  She would be having her birthday at the MediaCom Ice Arena where we would get a chance to try something very new.  Ice Skating!

Kayley took to it like a pro.  Well, a pro who fell down a LOT. 

Maggie required a bit more assistance and thank you so much to 2 of my good friends who were willing to schlep Maggie around on the ice...  Because, well, her own Mom wouldn't.  I was WAY too afraid I was going to break something.  Like my wrist, tailbone or head.  (Oh, that is Kayley's legs in the picture, right after she wiped out...  ask her to show you the bruise on her knee.  It's a good one.)

Maggie scooting along the wall. 

Kayley...right after she basically ran into the wall. 

I am so glad that the girls had a chance to do something brand new.  It was so far out of my comfort zone that all I did was basically lace up my skates...slide about 12 feet and turn around and come back.  There were a LOT of people so we are thinking we might try to go another time when it is not so crowded.  And, maybe, Mom will get out on the ice too.  But only if I am wrapped in bubble wrap.  Because, basically, I want to live.  LOL. 

What We're Reading on Wednesday {BiblioPlan Week 12}

This week in BiblioPlan we have started learning about the Crusades.  Remember the Days was a bit rough as we were pretty lost in our readings about the Battle of Manzikert.  Thank goodness we can always jump over to Story of the World when we get a little lost.  We have picked some great books to read and of course, the living books is what really makes history come alive for us.  Here are our book choices for Week 12:

Read Alouds:

Our Read Aloud this week is The Adventures of Robin Hood by Roger Lancelyn Green.  We really debated on this one.  It was between this or Howard Pyle's Robin Hood, but the Pyle book looked a bit tougher to read aloud in the old English and the test run had Maggie lost...  Green's version of Robin Hood has been great!  This book will likely take us through the end of next week.

We also read aloud this retelling of The Pied Piper of Haemlin by Corrin.  Unfortunately it is OOP...in fact I'm not even sure where this copy came from, but it was good.  It had a great fact vs fiction section at the end that discussed the fact that the Pied Piper is possibly a story about one of the Children's Crusades.

Both girls have read You Wouldn't Want to be a Crusader!  The "you wouldn't want to be" book series is awesome.  We have read at least a dozen of theses! 

Kayley's Reading:

Kayley is in her 2nd week of Will in Scarlet.  She is really into it now and enjoying it quite a bit.  She will, hopefully, be finished by the end of the week.

Maggie's Reading:

Maggie is reading Revenge of the Red Knight and Imagination Station Book.  She is only a few chapters into but says it is really good.  This should take her into next week.

Stephanie's Reading: 

I try to keep up by reading a few of BiblioPlan High School level readers.  I am really trying to get a feel for if BiblioPlan is "enough" for High School.  So this week I am going to putter through The Magna Charta by James Daugherty.

Just For Fun:

And our "just for fun" reading...because the girls always have another book going somewhere.

I caught Maggie reading Storytime with the Millers this week...  We have already read this aloud but she really enjoyed the Millers stories and I often find them laying all around the house. 

Kayley snatched up this Lego Fantastic book from the Library a couple weeks ago and has been enjoying reading this one...

Right after the inauguration the girls and I were talking about how mysterious the White House was and I was intrigued...so I decided to grab this book about The Residence.  It is SO interesting!  It has very few pictures, but honestly, they were not needed as the author interviewed people who have worked on the White House staff for years.  They share their stories about the inner workings of the White House and stories of the Presidents and their Families each told from a staffer who LOVES their job.