A reading advert calendar

I saw this idea a while ago when I was searching for activities to do around Christmas time with Tommy and I thought it suited him down to the ground. He absolutely loves reading. He's the type of boy that wants story after story before bedtime and knows many of them off by heart. Since Tommy was a tiny baby, we've always read him a bedtime story, regardless of how late he's ended up going to bed. It's always been part of his routine and we intend to do the same with his little sister. 

The idea of a reading advent calendar is extremely simple: you wrap up 24 books, one for each bedtime before the big day, your child chooses one each night and that's their bedtime story. Now I'm not suggesting that you go out and purchase 24 new books for this, far from it. Books can be extremely expensive and purchasing an entire new set of books solely for this purpose would add considerably to the cost of your Christmas. But if you're anything like us, you've probably got hundreds of children's books on shelves, in boxes, in all rooms of your house, some of which were much loved but haven't been read for a while and even some that might not have been read at all. It's funny how children come across an old toy or book that was once their favourite, and yet they can't remember ever owning it at all. 

I must admit, we did purchase several books for Tommy's advent calendar. If you're looking to buy some new books but keep the cost down, I'd really recommend The Book People or places like The Works. I visited The Works a few weeks ago and managed to pick up four books for £5.

Thinking back on our reading together, I remember there was a time that Tommy would always want me to read 'Dear Santa' to him. Every night. In July or whatever summer month it was. It got to a point where I had to hide it before we gotto bed and claim I didn't know where it was. Doing a reading advent calendar allows you to collect all your Christmas/Winter-themed books together and read them when they are relevant. It also helps the build-up towards the big day and increase the level of excitement and magic. 

You can arrange your books as you wish. Mine are just in a neat pile next to Tommy's bed but other people who've done it have arranged them to make an object, like the snowman or Christmas tree below. I like the idea, but it would require finding appropriate wrapping paper and lots of thought would have to go into choosing appropriately-sized books and plus I wanted Tommy to choose his own book each night, rather than opening them in a specific order. 

As you can see, Tommy's enjoying his advent calendar so far! We've got a chocolate one too of course! 2 advent calendars? That's just greedy!

If you were wanting to buy some new Christmassy/Wintery-themed books, here are a few of our favourites:

1. 'Dear Santa' by Rod Campbell

2. 'The Jolly Christmas Postman' by Allan and Janet Ahlberg

3. 'The Night Before Christmas' by Clement C.Moore

4. 'The Snowman' by Raymond Briggs

5. 'Father Christmas' by Raymond Briggs

6. 'The Snowman and the Snowdog' by Raymond Briggs

7.'One Snowy Night' by Nick Butterworth