I love this idea for an advent calendar for the kids (and me!): wrap up Christmas books, your own and borrowed from the library, and unwrap and read one aloud each night. I think this will become a new family tradition. from ohdeedoh
We celebrate a secular Christmas, so we are light on the story of the first Christmas. This is our list:
- A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, illustrated by P.J. Lynch (December 1 is a Saturday, but even so, this is an ambitious start. We’ll see if it takes and do a chapter a night thereafter.)
- The Snowman by Raymond Briggs (I’d like to take the kids to see the movie with the Toronto Symphony accompanying.)
- It’s Christmas, David by David Shannon
- The Lump of Coal by Lemony Snicket
- Merry Christmas, Mouse by Laura Numeroff
- Names for Snow by Judi K. Beach
- The Father Christmas Letters by J.R.R. Tolkien
- Bob by Sandra Boynton (I can recite it from memory.)
- Owl Moon by Jane Yolen
- The Big Snow Berta Hader
- The Christmas Treasury including the letter from the editor of the New York Sun in 1897 assuring us that, “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.”
- Coyote Solstice Tale by Thomas King (Squee!)
- Snow by Uri Shulevitz
- The Olden Days Coat by Margaret Laurence
- The Christmas Miracle of Johnathan Toomey, Susan Wojciechowski, illustrated by P.J. Lynch
- The Latke Who Couldn’t Stop Screaming by Lemony Snicket
- Katy and the Big Snow by Virginia Lee Burton
- Snow by P.D. Eastman
- The Gift of the Magi by O. Henry, illustrated by P.J. Lynch
- Stick Man by Julia Donaldson, illustrated by Axel Scheffler
- Olivia Helps at Christmas by Ian Falconer
- How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
- The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg
- ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas by Clement Moore, illustrated by Tomi de Paola
What would you add?
Nathalie Foy 
If nothing else it is a holiday book list.
Sent from my iPhone
I love this! What a fantastic idea, and a great list of books. What I might add isn’t coming to mind at the moment, but if I think of something, I’ll let you know. 🙂 Enjoy your literary advent!
Thanks, Steph. I love the idea, too. I think I may have been a bit too ambitious with the length of some of them, but we’ll give it a try.
What a great idea! Seeing all of the snow books on your list reminds me of two of my favorite childhood snow books- White Snow, Bright Snow by Alvin Tresselt and The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats.
Damn! I forgot The Snowy Day! It’s such a classic. We may have to double up somewhere…
You’ve inspired me Nathalie! I’m going to make a list of ours too.
Yay! Can’t wait to see it!
This is so fabulous!! Thank you Nathalie. At our house, we’ve been loving for the last several years the tradition of picking Christmas titles from our advent calendar each night through December. This year we’re due for some new titles as The Christmas Treasury we’ve been reading from is for a younger family than what ours is growing up to be, far too quickly with Christmas upon Christmas coming and going. Thank you thank you thank you for making the job of refreshing our list as easy as 1,2,3…24. Now we just have to find our advent calendar and the stories either off of our own shelves or somewhere else. Beautiful as is the suggestion of wrapping each individually, we’ll just be printing off your lovely list and inserting the titles randomly into the calendar again this year, with of course “T’was the Night Before Christmas” always ending up in the right slot. Merry Christmas to all and to all a good read!!
I believe I did a “one for you, one for me” thing with the ones illustrated by PJ Lynch! We’ve got the same collection. I have doubles of some of the books, so let me know if you want any of them.
[…] blogger Nathalie Foy offered a fabulous post today: she plans to make an advent calendar of Christmas books, their own […]
I was just going to contact you for your list – glad you beat me to it. Thanks!
Are you doing it?? I have some Christmas and winter board books that we’ve grown out of if you want them.
I tracked down a copy of The Christmas Birthday Story by Margaret Laurence which is the story of the first Christmas, but told from a pretty secular point of view. It’s mostly about family and it’s pretty great. And yes, I love this idea too. A wonderful list!
Thanks!
[…] originally saw this idea on this blog here through Pinterest. I knew we had quite a few Christmas books already but we collected a few extras […]
[…] of posts about advent calendars, and have now found a version for us! Inspired by posts like this, I made a book advent calendar for the boys – so much […]
You could also include
The House of Wooden Santas (an advent book in itself)
The Quiet Christmas Book
and Llama Llama Holiday Drama
I used to do this when my guys were younger – although not the wrapping! Great list! This year I picked up a DK Books companion to Christmas Carol that looks promising.