My *plans* for Advent
This week I’m scurrying about to finishing prepping for the Advent activities I have planned for December. Since we put our Long Story Short devotions on hold before Thanksgiving and are planning to do Truth in the Tinsel starting next week, I was at a loss as far as how to fill our evening Bible Time this week. Then, at long last, the answer arrived in the mail. Old Story New is Marty Machowski’s sequel to Long Story Short, going through 78 stories of the New Testament and pointing to the gospel through each one. As an introduction to Advent, I decided to use the first week from Old Story New, on “The Birth of Jesus Foretold.” (Then it will go on the shelf for another year or so while we finish up with Long Story Short.) That should take us right through the last day of November, and then we’re diving in!
For the last couple years the boys have enjoyed opening the doors on our wooden Advent calendar and sticking the magnetic pieces on the picture of the stable. This year I’m planning to do that each morning and to also read from Advent Storybook: 24 Stories to Share Before Christmas. I also plan to make our Truth in the Tinsel ornaments during the day and then present them to Daddy each night, using the readings for Bible Time. (The boys can’t wait to start this. They’re enjoying falling asleep to the glow of the 4-foot tree with colored lights I set up in their room, and they’re eager to decorate it!)
Finally, we have SO many Christmas books, I was afraid they would all end up in a basket and we would never get to most of them because the boys would keep choosing only their favorites. So I decided to present them with one each day, which we will read before putting it into our basket. My sister-in-law’s family introduced me to the idea of cloth gift bags, so I plan use one to let them “unwrap” a book each day in December. Many of our books coordinated with the topics from Truth in the Tinsel, so I wrote up a list of all twenty-four days and selected books that would be appropriate. For some days there weren’t any good matches, so I used those as a chance to get in some favorites that wouldn’t fit anywhere else. For a couple days I included two, either because they were simple board books or because I couldn’t decide. (Yes, I am a bookaholic, though I only purchased a few this year. Most were treasures I’d picked up at used book stores, gifts, books I bought last year, or oldies either from my childhood or passed on from Grandma’s Kindergarten after retirement.) I haven’t even read some of the new ones yet, but I’m excited to share them all with my children this year. Here’s what we’ll be reading up through Christmas (books in parentheses have nothing to do with the topic of the day):
- Light – The Light of Christmas by Dandi Daley Mackall and A Star for Jesus by Crystal Bowman
- Kingdom – (The Legend of St. Nicholas: A Story of Christmas Giving by Dandi Daley Mackall)
- Zechariah – (The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree by Gloria Houston)
- Gabriel – (Mortimer’s Christmas Manger by Karma Wilson)
- Mary – Baby Jesus is Born by Juliet David
- Mary/Elizabeth – Mary’s Treasure Box by Carolyn Walz Kramlich
- Song – Song of the Stars by Sally Lloyd-Jones
- Sun – (The Light of Christmas by Richard Paul Evans)
- Joseph – Jacob’s Gift by Max Lucado
- Dream – (Mouskin’s Christmas Eve by Edna Miller)
- Jesus’ Name – Jesus, Me and My Christmas Tree by Crystal Bowman
- Census – The Innkeeper’s Daughter by Jill Briscoe
- Bethlehem – Oh Come, Little Children by Anita Reith Stohs
- Stable – This is the Stable by Cynthia Cotton and Tell Me the Christmas Story by Joni Walker
- Manger – Christmas in the Manger by Nola Buck and The Last Straw by Paula Palangi
- Clothes – “The Christmas Spider“ by Marguerite de Angeli, in an anthology called I Love Christmas (The spider’s web covers Baby Jesus. I think it’s a similar story to The Little Spider by Sigmund Brouwer)
- Sheep – The Crippled Lamb by Max Lucado
- Angels – Christmas Angels by Crystal Bowman
- Shepherd – The Littlest Shepherd by Ron Mehl, Jr.
- Temple – Angela and the Baby Jesus by Frank McCourt
- Star – The Christmas Star by Marcus Pfister
- Wise Men – We Three Kings traditional carol illustrated by Gennady Spirin
- Gifts – Baboushka and the Three Kings by Ruth Robbins
- Cross – The Candymaker’s Gift: The Inspirational Legend of the Candy Cane by David and Helen Haidle and J is for Jesus by Crystal Bowman
Just as a final note: these are my plans. This is pretty much all we’re doing for school through Christmas, aside from some Christmas music. Knowing how things go, this probably won’t all happen the way I’m envisioning it. But I have a plan, and that’s always a good place to start, right? 🙂
Merry Christmas!
UPDATE: Each year I’ve tweaked this list a little as I’ve found books that fit the daily themes better. Also, as my kids got older, our library grew and I divided the books for older and younger ones. For more age-specific suggestions, check out my posts “25 CHRISTmas Books for Preschooler” and “25 CHRISTmas books for Older Children.”