Our favorite Christmas Books

If your family celebrates Christmas, you probably already have the classics like How the Grinch Stole Christmas and The the Night Before Christmas. It’s safe to safe we also love the Christmas editions in the Llama Llama series, but here are our favorite books that we enjoy each December. As my kids have grown, I’ve definitely been pulled towards books that highlight and focus on the birth of Christ and why Christmas gives us hope-that God sent us a Savior, fully man, to save us from our sin.

Starting from the Top Left:

Just Nicholas We read this book on December 6th which is the Feast of Saint Nicholas. Yes, Santa is a character, but this character is based on a real person-Saint Nicholas. St. Nick demonstrates kindness, generosity, and giving without expecting anything in return. This is a must for your home’s library!

Dream Snow As if every Eric Carle book wasn’t magical enough with his illustrations, his only Christmas book is definitely one that you need to add to your collection!

Bear Stays Up for Christmas You know it wouldn’t be a Children’s Book round-up without a book from our favorite series! We actually have two copies of this book! In this book, Bear’s friends are trying to keep him awake on Christmas night. The focus is that giving is the best gift of all, and I really love that message!

What is Christmas If you’re looking for a Christmas book that fills the need of acknowledging Santa and everything Christmas-y in our secular culture but that actually teaches the real reason for the season. We read it last year during our Happy Birthday, Jesus! party along with The First Christmas Night. This year I am very excited to read The Christmas Promise during the party!

The Snowy Day I fell in love with this book at a local library’s Storytime two years ago. The illustrations are so simple and powerful, and it is no wonder it is a Caldecott Award winner! Fun fact: Amazon Prime Video also has this book told as a short cartoon with Boyz II Men as part of the cast. We watched it A LOT last winter!

The Story of Christmas This book is so beautiful…I love having it on display on the cocktail table. My little ones can easily grab it and enjoy it, so I don’t mind having it left out in the living room. The language is not quite the KJV translation of the bible, but very close.

If you have a mama friend who is getting ready to celebrate their child’s first Christmas, this is my FAVORITE Christmas gift to give: You are My Merry. Warning though. It’ll make you tear up!

Share Some Kindness, Bring Some Light This is a book I could add to a “Winter Books” post, but I think December is a good time to start to read this in our household! The illustrations are beautiful and convey the mood of walking through snow at night while the main character (bear) learns to show kindness. There are a lot of extension activities you can do with this book too…I could write a whole post on that!

Jan Brett’s the Nutcracker Is there anything more nostalgic than a Jan Brett book? Her folk art illustrations are just so beautiful.

A Very Mercy Christmas Mercy Watson is our favorite series! This book is brand new year. I pre-ordered it, and we’ll be enjoying it come December 1st! The Mercy Watson series is so precious. We love the bright illustrations and the humor. The boxed set would be a wonderful gift for Christmas!

You are my love and my joy, a gift I’ll always carry

Through Christmas and Forever, you’ll always be my Merry.

Marianne Richmond, You are My Merry

Happy Reading, and Merry Christmas from the Sloop Household!

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