24 Days of Christmas Books

{ Titles are listed below. }

Last year I saw on Pinterest (of course) the idea to have 24 Christmas books to count down to Christmas.  The idea is that the books are wrapped under the tree and each night the small humans can open one book and we'll read that book for bedtime.  

Our Christmas books only come out at Christmas time, so at most, we read them once a year (some of the more favored books get read two or three times in the Christmas season.).  I have quite a stock-pile of Christmas books, some the kids have received as gifts, some I have collected over the years, and some came from my mom's Christmas book collection.  Last year I headed over to Barnes and Noble for their day after Christmas sale to supplement my supply for this year.  I stock-piled a few books at a deeply discounted price, which was awesome (because I'm cheap and I'm pretty sure our Library would frown upon me wrapping up their books and leaving them under my tree for the month of December.).  I did not buy 24 new books, although I easily could have, but I tucked the special new books away in our Christmas totes and proceeded not to think about them until I started digging around downstairs for some decorations last week.  And then I remembered my plan for this year!

Below is our list of books in no particular order:

1. Froggy's Best Christmas - Jonathan London
2. The Christmas Magic - Lauren Thompson
3. Huckleberry Hound and the Christmas Sleigh - Little Golden Book
4. Little Golden Book: Christmas Favorites
5. The Biggest, Most Beautiful Christmas Tree - Little Golden Book
6. The Last Straw - Fredrick H. Thury
7. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer - Little Golden Book
8. Santa's Toy Shop - Little Golden Book
9. Jingle Bells - Little Golden Book
10. The Night Before Christmas - Jan Brett
11. The Littlest Elf - Brandi Dougherty
12. There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed A Bell - Lucille Colandro
13. How the Grinch Stole Christmas - Dr. Seuss
14. Mooseltoe - Margie Palatini
15. Christmas Trolls - Jan Brett
16. The Wild Christmas Reindeer - Jan Brett
17. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (movie version)
18. Olivia Helps with Christmas - Ian Falconer
19. A Cars Christmas
20. Bialosky's Christmas - Leslie McGuire
21. Bear Stays Up for Christmas - Karma Wilson
22. Room for a Little One - Martin Waddell
23. A Very Mater Christmas
24. The Christmas Baby - Marion Dane Bauer***

The kids always get a book in their Christmas stocking, so December 25th will find a new book for each of them.  This is clearly geared more towards Finneaus, but Abby likes to listen to bedtime stories occasionally,  too.  I have very fond memories of being read to as a child and later of reading the American Girl series to Abby when she was just a small girl.  My favorite time of the day these days is a snuggle and a book with Finn (and it happens often, not just at bedtime!).

There is something about being read to; I think reading out loud is my love language.  

Tomorrow our Elf on the Shelf pal, Reginald VanWinkle, will make his grand debut in the Hefter home, so I will share my calendar of Reginald VanWinkle's events and a few pictures of what I have planned for this season.  Hoping for a Christmas tree hunt this weekend and maybe some snow time outside on the trails if Finn is feeling better...enjoy your weekend!

***This is my most favorite book this holiday season; I can't read it without tearing up.  I will neither confirm nor deny that I cried in the middle of Barnes and Noble reading this.  Obviously with a new small human on the way in a few short weeks (not mine!) it is perfect for our family, so I sent it to my sister.  I believe that she cried, too, but she's pregnant, so her tears are expected.  If you happen to be at B&N, go to their children's section, pull it off the shelf, find a relatively private corner and proceed to have plenty of kleenex handy while you read.  Or maybe it's just me and I'm too emotional when it comes to babies, in which case, ignore the kleenex advice.

{ Titles are listed below. }

Last year I saw on Pinterest (of course) the idea to have 24 Christmas books to count down to Christmas.  The idea is that the books are wrapped under the tree and each night the small humans can open one book and we'll read that book for bedtime.  

Our Christmas books only come out at Christmas time, so at most, we read them once a year (some of the more favored books get read two or three times in the Christmas season.).  I have quite a stock-pile of Christmas books, some the kids have received as gifts, some I have collected over the years, and some came from my mom's Christmas book collection.  Last year I headed over to Barnes and Noble for their day after Christmas sale to supplement my supply for this year.  I stock-piled a few books at a deeply discounted price, which was awesome (because I'm cheap and I'm pretty sure our Library would frown upon me wrapping up their books and leaving them under my tree for the month of December.).  I did not buy 24 new books, although I easily could have, but I tucked the special new books away in our Christmas totes and proceeded not to think about them until I started digging around downstairs for some decorations last week.  And then I remembered my plan for this year!

Below is our list of books in no particular order:

1. Froggy's Best Christmas - Jonathan London
2. The Christmas Magic - Lauren Thompson
3. Huckleberry Hound and the Christmas Sleigh - Little Golden Book
4. Little Golden Book: Christmas Favorites
5. The Biggest, Most Beautiful Christmas Tree - Little Golden Book
6. The Last Straw - Fredrick H. Thury
7. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer - Little Golden Book
8. Santa's Toy Shop - Little Golden Book
9. Jingle Bells - Little Golden Book
10. The Night Before Christmas - Jan Brett
11. The Littlest Elf - Brandi Dougherty
12. There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed A Bell - Lucille Colandro
13. How the Grinch Stole Christmas - Dr. Seuss
14. Mooseltoe - Margie Palatini
15. Christmas Trolls - Jan Brett
16. The Wild Christmas Reindeer - Jan Brett
17. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (movie version)
18. Olivia Helps with Christmas - Ian Falconer
19. A Cars Christmas
20. Bialosky's Christmas - Leslie McGuire
21. Bear Stays Up for Christmas - Karma Wilson
22. Room for a Little One - Martin Waddell
23. A Very Mater Christmas
24. The Christmas Baby - Marion Dane Bauer***

The kids always get a book in their Christmas stocking, so December 25th will find a new book for each of them.  This is clearly geared more towards Finneaus, but Abby likes to listen to bedtime stories occasionally,  too.  I have very fond memories of being read to as a child and later of reading the American Girl series to Abby when she was just a small girl.  My favorite time of the day these days is a snuggle and a book with Finn (and it happens often, not just at bedtime!).

There is something about being read to; I think reading out loud is my love language.  

Tomorrow our Elf on the Shelf pal, Reginald VanWinkle, will make his grand debut in the Hefter home, so I will share my calendar of Reginald VanWinkle's events and a few pictures of what I have planned for this season.  Hoping for a Christmas tree hunt this weekend and maybe some snow time outside on the trails if Finn is feeling better...enjoy your weekend!

***This is my most favorite book this holiday season; I can't read it without tearing up.  I will neither confirm nor deny that I cried in the middle of Barnes and Noble reading this.  Obviously with a new small human on the way in a few short weeks (not mine!) it is perfect for our family, so I sent it to my sister.  I believe that she cried, too, but she's pregnant, so her tears are expected.  If you happen to be at B&N, go to their children's section, pull it off the shelf, find a relatively private corner and proceed to have plenty of kleenex handy while you read.  Or maybe it's just me and I'm too emotional when it comes to babies, in which case, ignore the kleenex advice.

Summer Reading

{Lorna Landvick | Sauk Centre, MN | 5.14.11}

It has been months since I've picked up a book that I couldn't put down.  Partially because my time is so limited and partly because my concentration has been shot to crap (I can't seem to follow a really complicated plot line these days - as evidneced by the fact that the last book I read was The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and it took me about 4 months to complete.).  But a couple of weekends ago, my mom and I went to see Minnesota author Lorna Landvick speak in my hometown. 

I forgot how many fun - and free - things small towns offer.  And before you get your panties in a bundle, I know that living in The Big City has a lot to offer, too, but sometimes it seemed like the drive to whatever event was going on always tipped the scales toward not doing something.  So, we left the kidlets with my dad (who, for his own sanity, I'm sure, rented the Justin Bieber movie for Abby.  She watched it twice before we got back.) and  the two of us ventrued out into the rain for a mother-daughter book adventure.

For the record, I am love to hearing authors speak; I find learning about other authors writing processes helps me to hone my own skills.  And I am partial to Minnesota authors - I think they are some of the best writers out there.  Usually I like to have read at least something by an author before I go and listen to them speak, but on this occassion I have to say that I hadn't read anything.  Not one measly page, not one book review.  I knew who she was; when I belonged to my Mom's book club years ago, they read one of her books (I'm still not quite sure why I didn't participate in that reading/discussion). 

Lorna Landvick was funny...as in, forget that I'm in a cozy coffee shop with 15 other people, laugh out loud (and mabye even snort out loud) funny.  She talked about her acting career in L.A., and while she was waiting for that to take off, her temp jobs (she actually had a temp job cataloguing Hugh Hefner's movie collection - no ears or bunny tail requred).  She talked about a peace march that she went on that lasted 9 months.  She talked about her subsequent move back to Minnesota from the West Coast, her writing career and the charecters in her books.  She talked about some of the famous people who have read her novels (Arnold Schwartzeneger read one after he was recovering from surgery and Ashley Judd called to tell Lorna she wanted to play a charecters in one of her books that had been optioned for a movie.).  Each of her storeis was sprinkled liberally with wit and humor.

So when I picked up Patty Jane's House of Curl last week, a book about two sisters who open a beauty salon in Minneapolis in the late 50s and 60s, I was expecting Lorna's voice to power through.  I was anticipating all the wit and humor she showered on us during her talk. 

I got Lorna's voice; I got the wit and the humor.  But I also got a healthy dose of sadness.  There was an underlying ribbon of melancholia that I had not been prepared for.  It worked, though, that delicate balance between light and dark, without having one overpower the other and making the charecters unbelieveable or their relationship with each other and the charecters around them seem fake.  The relationship between Patty Jane and her sister Harriet withstood the best and worst times in their lives - love and lost husbands and babies and drunk parents and drop-down-drag-out fights and always a sisterly bond that surpasses everything else and the womanly gossip that comes with getting your hair done.   It made me thankful for my own sisters (and my sisters-in-law and my almost-maybe-someday-sister-in-law).  Like Patty Jane and Harriet, their joy is my joy and their pain I feel in the deepest parts of my bones.

So...Summer Reading Reccomendation #1:  Patty Jane's House of Curl by Lorna Landvick. Even though I dragged it out for about a week because I just did not want the story to end, it's a pretty quick beach read.  This afternoon I am off to Hill Avenue Book Co and the Spirit Lake Library to find my next summer read.  And if you'd like to share your summer reading suggestions, I'll take them!

{Lorna Landvick | Sauk Centre, MN | 5.14.11}

It has been months since I've picked up a book that I couldn't put down.  Partially because my time is so limited and partly because my concentration has been shot to crap (I can't seem to follow a really complicated plot line these days - as evidneced by the fact that the last book I read was The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and it took me about 4 months to complete.).  But a couple of weekends ago, my mom and I went to see Minnesota author Lorna Landvick speak in my hometown. 

I forgot how many fun - and free - things small towns offer.  And before you get your panties in a bundle, I know that living in The Big City has a lot to offer, too, but sometimes it seemed like the drive to whatever event was going on always tipped the scales toward not doing something.  So, we left the kidlets with my dad (who, for his own sanity, I'm sure, rented the Justin Bieber movie for Abby.  She watched it twice before we got back.) and  the two of us ventrued out into the rain for a mother-daughter book adventure.

For the record, I am love to hearing authors speak; I find learning about other authors writing processes helps me to hone my own skills.  And I am partial to Minnesota authors - I think they are some of the best writers out there.  Usually I like to have read at least something by an author before I go and listen to them speak, but on this occassion I have to say that I hadn't read anything.  Not one measly page, not one book review.  I knew who she was; when I belonged to my Mom's book club years ago, they read one of her books (I'm still not quite sure why I didn't participate in that reading/discussion). 

Lorna Landvick was funny...as in, forget that I'm in a cozy coffee shop with 15 other people, laugh out loud (and mabye even snort out loud) funny.  She talked about her acting career in L.A., and while she was waiting for that to take off, her temp jobs (she actually had a temp job cataloguing Hugh Hefner's movie collection - no ears or bunny tail requred).  She talked about a peace march that she went on that lasted 9 months.  She talked about her subsequent move back to Minnesota from the West Coast, her writing career and the charecters in her books.  She talked about some of the famous people who have read her novels (Arnold Schwartzeneger read one after he was recovering from surgery and Ashley Judd called to tell Lorna she wanted to play a charecters in one of her books that had been optioned for a movie.).  Each of her storeis was sprinkled liberally with wit and humor.

So when I picked up Patty Jane's House of Curl last week, a book about two sisters who open a beauty salon in Minneapolis in the late 50s and 60s, I was expecting Lorna's voice to power through.  I was anticipating all the wit and humor she showered on us during her talk. 

I got Lorna's voice; I got the wit and the humor.  But I also got a healthy dose of sadness.  There was an underlying ribbon of melancholia that I had not been prepared for.  It worked, though, that delicate balance between light and dark, without having one overpower the other and making the charecters unbelieveable or their relationship with each other and the charecters around them seem fake.  The relationship between Patty Jane and her sister Harriet withstood the best and worst times in their lives - love and lost husbands and babies and drunk parents and drop-down-drag-out fights and always a sisterly bond that surpasses everything else and the womanly gossip that comes with getting your hair done.   It made me thankful for my own sisters (and my sisters-in-law and my almost-maybe-someday-sister-in-law).  Like Patty Jane and Harriet, their joy is my joy and their pain I feel in the deepest parts of my bones.

So...Summer Reading Reccomendation #1:  Patty Jane's House of Curl by Lorna Landvick. Even though I dragged it out for about a week because I just did not want the story to end, it's a pretty quick beach read.  This afternoon I am off to Hill Avenue Book Co and the Spirit Lake Library to find my next summer read.  And if you'd like to share your summer reading suggestions, I'll take them!