Our Advent Bookshelf

I’m not ready for Advent.

Actually, I think I’m still recovering from Halloween and All Saints Day.

I wasn’t even thinking about Advent until I moved a bunch of bedrooms and furniture around in my house last week. (There are nine of us in the house, and we like to play musical bedrooms.) That’s when I remembered this neglected bookshelf in my basement and decided to take my first baby step toward getting ready for the Advent season.

I put these acrylic shelves up several years ago, and they were always supposed to be a place to display beautiful books that would entice my children to read. Instead, they’ve become a place to shove things that I don’t want to put away. So, I finally took all of that stuff down, put it where it’s supposed to go (or somewhere else, anyway), and set out all of our prettiest Advent and Christmas books. Some of these are Catholic, some are more generically Christian, and some aren’t really religious (although, they’re about Christmas, so…) And, couple of them are Catholic but not about Christmas specifically. The main criteria here are that they look appealing, the dog hasn’t chewed on them, and they seem like they’ll help my kids and me contemplate the kinds of things one should contemplate during this season of waiting for Jesus.

Advent Books

If you’re ready to start a collection of holiday books for your kids and you need some inspiration, here’s a list of what’s on our shelf. The links go to the books’ listings on GoodReads, which will tell you all about the books and where you can get them: