It has been awhile since I have posted about a book I am reading. I finished Between Shades of Grey by Ruta Sepetys a couple weeks ago and I just had to share it. Please don't get this confused with 50 Shades of Grey. It is totally different. This book is from the young adult list of the Utah Beehive Award Nominees for 2013. I am still working my way through the list trying to read all of them before next spring. I think I'm making good progress. I still need to post about some of the others from the list.

So, for Between Shades of Grey. This was one of the most amazing books I have ever read. It was so moving and captivating. I don't remember the last time I have ever felt so pulled in to a book. As I was reading this I could completely block out everything else around me and really feel and see the story unfolding. 

It is the story of a teenage girl from Lithuania during the time that Stalin was invading the Baltic countries and arresting anyone who opposed him. This isn't a piece of history I know very much about. It is during the time of the second world war, but we just don't hear anything about this. Her family is sent to a prison camp, very similar to what the Nazis did to the Jews, and you follow her family through their imprisonment. 

It is a very heavy story, I would not recommend this book to anyone under high school age, but it is told so beautifully and it has such important messages. I found myself holding Sweet Girl tighter and being so grateful that she is safe and healthy. It really is a beautiful story. It left me wanting to learn more about those people and that, in my opinion, is the mark of a great story.

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We have had so much fun this week celebrating Mo Willem's book Hooray for Amanda and Her Alligator. Be sure to check out our other activities. This was our final activity for the week. We usually do one every day, but preschool started this week and it took up some of our play time.

One of my favorite parts in the story is at the end. Alligator is waiting for Amanda to come home from the zoo so he can play dress up with her and sing songs and make discoveries. When she comes home she has brought a brand new fancy stuffed panda. Alligator is not happy about a new toy, but after Amanda leaves again Alligator finds out that Panda also likes to play dress up, sing silly songs and make discoveries. In the end they become great friends as they play together.

So, we decided to play dress up. I have been collecting dress up clothes all summer and it was finally time to pull them out and play with them. We had so much fun.

Sweet Girl has learned how to use her stethoscope. She holds the end over her heart and says "dubba dubba dubba." I think she'll make a great doctor someday.

She has a major obsession with glasses!

This was the best picture I could get of her wearing the clown nose. She loved to put it on, but didn't like the way it felt once it was on, so it always came off really fast.

We had so much fun with this book this week! I'm excited to more activities like this in the future and help Sweet Girl develop a love of reading.

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We are continuing our celebration of Mo Willem's fantastic book Hooray For Amanda and Her Alligator. Again, this is such a cute story, if you haven't read it you definitely should! Today we focused on the alligator. Because alligators are green we had an all green sensory bin. (I know the alligator in the story is kind of a bluish color, but we decided to go with a green alligator.)

For the bottom of the sensory bin I used colored rice. I mixed 2 cups of rice with 2 teaspoons vinegar and about 20 drops of green coloring in a ziploc bag.

Then I just searched through Sweet Girl's toys and gathered a few green items to add to the sensory bin. This was a fun activity for Sweet Girl. She scooped and raked and dug in the rice. She was so fascinated by the rice that at the very end she grabbed a handful and shoved it in her mouth. She quickly realized it didn't taste good and she let me scrape it all out of her mouth. That girl is quick!

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This week Sweet Girl and I are celebrating the book Hooray for Amanda and Her Alligator by Mo Willems. He is one of my favorite authors. He has written  the Knuffle Bunny books, the pigeon books, the piggie and elephant books and many others. His books just crack me up. His characters are so funny. The pigeon books are definitely my favorite. Hooray for Amanda and Her Alligator is a nominee for Utah's Beehive Book Award. This story is so funny. Amanda's stuffed alligator is alive and they play together and surprise each other.

For our first activity we made a thinking cap. In this story Amanda's stuffed alligator needs to think about different things, so he puts on his thinking cap. I folded our thinking cap out of brown paper that I got at the dollar store for another project. I pulled out crayons and a pack or sparkly stickers to decorate with.

Playing with stickers was a great activity for developing fine motor skills. I really had to hold myself back when the stickers got stuck in Sweet Girl's fingers. I did help out a few times, but mostly I let her figure it out. Because the stickers were textured we got to talk about bumpy and smooth, as well as talking about what the pictures were.

Sweet Girl had so much fun decorating her hat, but she was not about to wear it. Every time I put it on her head she immediately pulled it off. This is the best picture I got of her "wearing" her hat. Oh well.

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My latest read from the Utah Beehive Nominee Books was Turtle in Paradise by Jennifer L. Holm. Luckily I liked this book a lot better than I liked the Sherlock Holmes book. This book is definitely written for a younger audience. I think third grade and up could enjoy it. 

This story is set in the Florida Keys during the Great Depression. A young girl named Turtle has gone there to live with family members while her mother works. While Turtle is there she discovers things about her mother's past, and about where she came from. I really enjoyed watching Turtle learn about and connect with her mother's family and past. I was a little disappointed in the end. Although you can pretty much guess where things are going to go, I wish the author would have written just one more chapter to wrap it all up.

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About a month ago I posted about Utah's 2013 Beehive Award nominees. My goal is to read all of the nominees by next spring when Utah's students will vote on their favorites. With a Name Like Love by Tess Hilmo is the first book I have to report on. 

I really liked this book. Let me tell you just a little bit about it. This story is about a 12 year old girl, Ollie Love, who travels across the country with her family while her father stops in little towns the preach the good word. In one town they meet Jimmy Koppel. Jimmy's family is basically the bad news family in town. Jimmy's father has just been murdered and his mother is in jail after confessing to the murder even though she is innocent. Ollie and her family decide to stick around to try to help prove her innocence. 

This is a very captivating story. I really fell in love with the characters right away. They were just so real. There is just so much about learning to be a good person who looks for the good in others and sacrifices for others, but it never felt preachy.

I think this book is best for kids 12 and older. It is a children's book, but it has some difficult stuff in it. For example, Jimmy's father is a horrible, abusive man. There are a few times when the descriptions of what the father does was really heartbreaking to read. I think it would be too much for kids younger than 12.

So give this book a read. I really enjoyed it. I left feeling like I want to be a little kinder to people, because we don't always know what is happening in their lives and their hearts.

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