I might be biased but I think a Christmas book advent calendar might be one of the nicest things you can give your kids.
Your kids get all excited about Christmas, you get to have some time snuggling together reading Christmas stories and making memories and you have the start of a new Christmas tradition that you could do year after year.
Today I’m sharing some inspiration for 24 Christmas book ideas for stories that you could include, with some classic children’s Christmas books and some new favourites to find as well as some tips for how to make the best children’s book advent calendar.
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Christmas Book Advent Calendar Ideas
Just so you’re aware, this is an old post but I’ve updated it and shared it again as it’s always so popular, having stories to read with the kids everyday is such a great tradition to build into your Christmas and a great way to get that magical feeling!
We haven’t read all of these books, but we have read a lot of them and if we haven’t read them yet that’s because a lot of them are ones we have on order for this year or ones I know my kids will adore (Father Christmas Comes Up Trumps might get read all year round at ours?!)
I’ve previously ordered some Christmas books from our local library but I also don’t mind buying a few new books through Amazon or our local bookstore each year as we do get a lot of use out of them.
I think we read The Jolly Christmas Postman almost every week for a while this year because my daughter loves the letters and games in it so much!
Got a Christmas book you love that I’ve missed? Share your favorite Christmas books to read with kids below, I love getting inspired by other people’s reading list too!
How Do You Create A Christmas Book Advent Calendar?
Making an advent calendar out of children’s books is really simple, just choose twenty four festive books to help you countdown to Christmas sharing one every day with your child between 1st December and Christmas Eve.
Do You Need To Wrap Your Books?
You don’t need to but it can be a nice thing to do. If you want to wrap your books you could place them all under the Christmas tree (if you have it up by 1st December), place the pile in your child’s room or you could just give them a book each day.
Another alternative could be to put a slip of paper in your kids advent calendar with the name of the book on it so they can see what todays story is.
Should You Plan Which Book To Read On Which Day?
This is up to you. If you are wrapping your child’s books then you can put a gift tag or label on each one with the number of the day on it or alternatively you could do it more like a lucky dip where they choose the parcel they like the look of that day.
You might want to choose your Christmas favorites for Christmas Eve though such as The Night Before Christmas so that you don’t end up with something Peppa Pig related though. But if Peppa is your thing then you do you!
Do I Need To Buy 24 Christmas Books?
Absolutely not. Christmas is a really expensive time of year so please don’t feel that once a year you need to buy 24 new books.
We use Christmas books we already own, borrow some from the library, look for Christmas books in second hand shops and buy a few new ones each year.
Of course if you can buy 24 new books there’s nothing wrong with that either! Go for the option that suits your budget.
Easy Alternatives to a Christmas Book Advent Calendar
As with everything Christmas related there’s only so much you can do so if you think that this might become a bit too stressful for you then there are some simple alternatives.
Christmas books are a great idea if you make a Christmas Eve box – just add some hot chocolate, pyjamas and a Christmas film ( we loved The Polar Express) and you’re good to go with that extra bit of Christmas magic. This way you just have one story to read on Christmas Eve rather than trying to fit something in every night.
Something else that my kids loved and have demanded we read again this year is How Winston Delivered Christmas which has a chapter for each night – we were originally given a copy as part of some work I did promoting the book but we’ve read it every Christmas since.
Chapter books are perfect if you love the idea of a book advent calendar but aren’t sure if you’ll manage to find 24 of them.
You could also look for a book of Christmas stories and read one of those every night rather than getting 24 books, you can often find Disney themed ones of these.
We also have a free printable advent calendar to colour with a picture for every day, perfect as a calm activity to calm your kids before bedtime too.
Christmas Book Ideas
1 Stick Man by Julia Donaldson
2. Harry and the Dinosaurs Make a Christmas Wish by Ian Whybrow
3. The Night Before Christmas by Clement C Moore
4. Father Christmas Needs a Wee by Nicholas Allan
5. Ben and Holly’s Little Kingdom: Christmas at the North Pole
6. The Jolly Christmas Postman by Allan and Janet Ahlberg
7. Aliens Love Panta Claus by Claire Freedman
8. The Dinosaur That Pooped Christmas by Tom Fletcher and Dougie Poynter
10. How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr Seuss
11. The Empty Stocking by Richard Curtis
12. Lost and Found by Oliver Jeffers
13. Little Reindeer Finger Puppet Book
14. Father Christmas by Raymond Briggs
15. That’s Not My Snowman by Fiona Watt
16. Santa Flap Book by Sam Taplin
17. My Very First Nativity Play by Lois Rock
18. The Christmas Bear by Ian Whybrow
19. Dear Santa by Rod Campbell
20. Elmer’s Christmas by David McKee
21. Usborne Very First Words Christmas
22. I Love You Father Christmas by Giles Andreae
23. Father Christmas Comes Up Trumps
24. Topsy and Tim Meet Father Christmas by Jean Adamson
More Ideas for Making Christmas Special:
40+ Advent Calendar Activities for Kids with Free Printable
60+ Christmas activities for toddlers
My children get a new Christmas book each Christmas Eve and this year it is the dinosaur that pooped Christmas and we got Father Christmas needs a wee last year.
There are several books I don’t recognise here so I’m going to pin your post and hopefully I’ll remember to look back at this next year.
My kids loved that!! I try and convince them to read The Night Before Christmas but in all honestly they WAY prefer anything that’s toilet related 😉
We love Xmas books! I put them away each year and get them out 1 dec to start getting in the xmas spirit!
This is such a lovely idea! I had some of these books as a child which I used to love. Definitely stealing this idea for the younger ones in my family!
I love this idea, it’s so important to get children into reading young and instill the love for it early
Lovely ideas! We did a book advent last year but they were just regular books, I like the idea of using Christmas books to get into the spirit!
Yes – makes it much more festive!
Thank you so much for sharing these! I am putting together a book advent for my 2 little ones this year for the very first time and will definitely be including some of these!