The Day Santa Stopped Believing in Harold by Maureen Fergus and Cale Atkinson

This is such a fun story about what happens when Santa starts doubting that a child is real. He thinks the Mom writes the letter to him, and the dad puts out the cookies. Sure, Harold sat on Santa's lap last year, but that kid didn't even look like the Harold Santa remembers!

At the same time, Harold isn't sure he believes in Santa anymore, He decides to hide on Christmas Eve to catch Santa in the act of leaving presents. Santa decides that he will also hide in Harold's living room, to see if Harold runs out on Christmas morning, excited to open his presents. While both of these sound like good plans, something is bound to go wrong...

This book is fun for children of all ages - and the adults reading it aloud! It's a nice twist on a Santa story, very humorous, and Atkinson's illustrations are amazing as always.

The Twelve Bots of Christmas by Nathan Hale

We've had this book for a few years, so I'm surprised I haven't featured it before. As someone who isn't the biggest fan of Christmas music (several radio stations here start playing it 24/7 before Thanksgiving), having a fresh, silly twist on a classic is a delight to read aloud - and then get stuck in your head!

This is a tech-y, robotic take on the Twelve Days of Christmas featuring a Robo-Santa giving, among other things, a cartridge in a gear tree. The words fit perfectly to the original tune, and the detailed illustrations give you and your kid a lot to look at on each page. I can't recommend this one enough if you're looking for a fun, silly spoof of a Christmas book.

The Great Santa Stakeout by Betsy Bird, illustrated by Dan Santat

I'm biased since he's one of my favorites, but nothing beats Dan Santat's illustrations. Here, his work is perfectly paired with a whimsical story by Betsy Bird about Freddy, who is Santa's biggest fan. Freddy has all the Santa merchandise and Christmas paraphernalia you could think of, but he's desperate for a selfie with the man himself. He hatches a devious plot and draws up plans to delay Santa and make sure he gets a picture.

This story is so silly to read aloud, and as I said, I always love Santat's illustrations. I can't wait to read more picture books by Bird.

As a former public librarian and current school librarian, I'm pretty thoughtful about what holiday books I read to children. I don't want to highlight one holiday and ignore another, so a careful balance is necessary. This book should definitely be added in to any rotation of winter holiday stories, because whether the listeners celebrate Christmas or not, they can enjoy the details of Freddy's Santa-catching plan and relate to loving a famous figure so much, you'll do anything to meet them!

The Worst Christmas Ever by Kathleen Long Bostrom and illustrated by Guy Porfirio

Thanks to the @kidlitexchange network and Flyaway Books for the review copy of this book - all opinions are my own. The Worst Christmas Ever, by Kathleen Long Bostrom and illustrated by Guy Porfirio released September 17th, which gives you time to get your own copy before Christmas!

Matthew's family moves to California in the fall, and as they're getting ready for Christmas, Matthew is sad that there's not much changing of the seasons in their new state. The family gets a Christmas tree and volunteers to be in their church's nativity scene to feel the holiday spirit. Then Jasper, Matthew's beloved dog, goes missing! Matthew is upset about being in a new place that doesn't feel like home OR Christmas, and now he has to hope for a miracle to find his dog again.

This is a lot of story packed into a gorgeous picture book! Even though it's still hot and humid outside with Christmas several months away, my son loved reading this book and asked for it several nights in a row. It's not overly holiday-themed, so don't worry about reading it too early in the year and getting tired of it - this is one you won't mind reading over and over!

12 Days of Christmas Storytime

This year I had it together enough to do the 12 Days of Christmas Storytime with my son. Our bedtime routine lately has been a little rushed, as we get home late from after-school activities or have errands to run, so it's been a race to get dinner, bathe and brush teeth, and get to bed at a reasonable time before we have to start all over again. Sometimes I'd be too tired to wait for my son to pick a book and read it to him, and often it was the same one we'd just read a million times. I know that everyone has favorites, and re-reading books with kids is only good for them, but... I mean, I was really tired, ok? Mom-shame all you want, but some days, there was no way a bedtime story was happening, no matter how much he wanted it. And I'm sure you can imagine how much it hurt my librarian-mom heart to say no, but for sanity's sake, I'd have to.

12 Days of Christmas Storytime helped us make sure we prioritized reading together. My son loved opening a new book every day. The best part is - they weren't all new! Many were bought heavily discounted when our local bookstore closed last year, and I had tucked them away so I wouldn't give my son a ton of new books at once. Others were bought at our school's book fair. Others were bought from a used bookstore or from the library's discard cart. There's no need to break the bank if you want to do this with your kids! It's definitely possible to keep it affordable. I used a patchwork of leftover wrapping paper scraps, so I didn't have to buy or use new resources for that, either. Some were even wrapped in brown kraft paper, or a layer of tissue paper! My son is young enough to not care about presentation (if he ever will?) as much as the opening part!

All of these books were new to us, so they were fun to read. We went to bed knowing what book we were going to read, and my son did his necessary tasks a little bit faster knowing he had a new story to read. (He is usually the king of dawdling, so this kick in the pants was nice.)

I'm definitely going to start stockpiling books to do this again next year! I might even keep an extra stash of new-to-us books to use as incentives when it seems like we're not going to get a bedtime story that night. I think it will inspire both of us to get our chores out of the way and get ready for bed!

Check out the books we read for 12 Days of Christmas Storytime on Instagram - @howifeelaboutbooks.

Happy New Year from Pete the Cat!

We are huge fans of Pete the Cat around here, as you can see from the sampling of our books, the keychain I keep on my bag, and the pouch I use for pens and USB drives.

(Yes, all the cute accessories are mine. Selfish? No - my son can have them when he's old enough to appreciate them. For now, they are mine all mine!)

For several days now, we have been watching the new Pete the Cat show on Amazon Prime. Have you seen it? Only one episode is up right now; it was released on Christmas Day but the story is about New Years resolutions. It's cute to see Pete as a "real" cat, and all his friends are so much fun!

The only negative I can think of, and this is incredibly minor, is that Pete doesn't talk until the very end of the episode. All of the other characters are pretty chatty, and even my three-year-old son said "Pete can't talk because he doesn't have a mouth." Which is true - there is no mouth most of the time, but Pete does talk at the end, so clearly that's not the issue. I just would have like to hear more from him.

I think Pete the Cat books make a huge difference with kids' literacy, reading enjoyment, and vocabulary, based on what I have seen with my son and the kids at school where I teach. Having Pete not talk on the show seemed to be a strange decision. But it's still an enjoyable episode, and we've watched it a few times and it hasn't gotten old. We're looking forward to more episodes.

Amazon does a pretty good job with their kids' shows based on books - we're also huge fans of the Stinky and Dirty Show, based on the books by Kate McMullan and Jim McMullan.