Our 2015 Advent Book Basket and Printable Labels {and a Christmas Mosaic Giveaway!}

Last year I had trouble finding the usual purple and pink wrapping paper at our local stores and ended up wrapping our Advent books, for our annual Christmas countdown, in simple (and easy to find!) brown paper, adding labels I created for each day. I loved how they turned out and decided to do the same this year, updating the labels and using purple and pink ribbon instead of the white.

If you'd like to use my little labels too, you can download my Advent Book Basket Labels for 2015 over at Dropbox.

In the past I have filled our basket with Christmas Mosaic titles and our children's 35 Favorite Christmas Picture Books...  (Years ago, when we didn't have enough Christmas themed picture books to wrap one for each day, I would check some out from the library just before Advent, using Christmas Mosaic as a guide.) This year I decided to go through our Advent & Christmas book collection and pull out 26 of MY FAVORITES to wrap up this year!  

Our basket also includes one NEW purchase this year! I usually won't pay full price for a book, but I made an exception for this (expensive but gorgeous!) picture book, since we love the author's other book about St. George (pictures from the feast of St. George here).  I'm looking forward to reading Saint Nicholas & the Nine Gold Coins on the feast of St. Nicholas this year! 

Saint Nicholas & the Nine Gold Coins by Jim Forest

As always, we'll unwrap and read one book each night during Advent, following our family rosary. The rest of the books will be placed in additional baskets for the kids to read whenever they'd like during the Advent and Christmas season.  They will also each receive a new Christmas picture book on the feast of St. Nicholas. I'll be back with that list (and another giveaway!) soon!

Here are the 26 picture books that I am wrapping up for our 2015 Advent Book Basket:

November 29 - 1st Sunday of Advent: The Nativity

November 30 - St. Andrew: The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey* 

December 1: The Year of the Perfect Christmas Tree

December 2: A Wish to be a Christmas Tree

December 3: The Christmas Cobwebs*

December 4: The Nutcracker

December 5: The Baker's Dozen: A Saint Nicholas Tale

December 6 - 2nd Sunday of Advent / St. Nicholas: Saint Nicholas and the Nine Gold Coins (NEW) 

December 7 : The First Christmas Stocking (OOP)*

December 8 - Immaculate Conception: Bambinelli Sunday: A Christmas Blessing

December 9 - St. Juan Diego: The Miraculous Child: A Christmas Folktale from Old Russia

December 10 - Our Lady of Loreto: The Donkey's Dream (OOP)

December 11 - Our Lady Queen of the Angels: Christmas in the Trenches

December 12 - Our Lady of Guadalupe: Our Lady of Guadalupe (Pop-Up Book)

December 13 - 3rd Sunday of Advent/Gaudete Sunday / Santa Lucia Day: Lucia, Saint of Light

December 14: Marta and the Manger Straw: A Christmas Tradition from Poland (OOP)

December 15 - Rose's Birthday: Angela and the Baby Jesus (OOP)

December 16: The Christmas Bell (OOP) 

December 17 - O Sapientia: The Gift of the Magi

December 18 - O Adonai: Saint Francis Celebrates Christmas

December 19 - O Radix Jesse - Bud's Birthday: Mr. Willowby's Christmas Tree

December 20 - 4th Sunday of Advent / O Clavis David: Bethlehem (Catholic Edition)

December 21 - O Oriens: The Miracle of Saint Nicholas

December 22 - O Rex Gentium: The Christmas Bird (reprinted as Katy's Christmas Gift!)  

December 23 - O Emmanual: The Last Straw

December 24 - Vigil of Christmas: The Night Before Christmas illustrated by Tasha Tudor

* = Study Guide Available in Christmas Mosaic

Bonus: December 25th - Christmas Day: A Child's Story of the Nativity (OOP), Such a beautiful book! 

Bargain Priced Books :: Katy's Christmas Gift

Katy's Christmas Gift

I'm always on the lookout for great deals on books and wanted to share one I found on Katy's Christmas Gift. I haven't seen this book in person (I added it to my "possible Christmas books to buy" list when it was published last year) and it doesn't have any reviews on Amazon yet, but for $2.82 (84% off and Free Shipping with with Amazon Prime) I'm willing to take a chance. It sounds sweet:  

Katy sets out in the snow to visit the new baby born in the innkeeper's stable. She is bringing gifts: a loaf of bread, her cat Sasha and, most importantly, her favourite toy -- a wooden bird whistle. But Sasha doesn't want to play in the cold snow, and the animals of the forest eat the bread. Soon Katy's carefully chosen gifts are gone -- except the most special one of all. As the snow gets deeper and she gets colder, Katy wonders whether she'll ever have the chance to give her gift to the baby? Katy's Christmas Gift is a heart-warming and original version of the Christmas story for young children. Bernadette Watt's lively illustrations are full of colour, light, joy and festive feeling.

Amazon prices change frequently so I'm sharing the link now, in case any of you are interested.

For additional Christmas book suggestions you can find some of our lists in the archives: 

Feasts & Seasons :: Advent & Christmas Collection

35 Favorite Christmas Picture Books for Children

New Christmas Books for the Feast of St. Nicholas (2014 Edition)

Stacks of Books on Christmas Morning (2014 Edition)

You can find the rest of our booklists here.

Bargain Priced Books :: Saints of Christmas

The Saints of Christmas Activity Book 
includes fun activities and coloring pages for all six saint books included in the Saints and Me! Christmas Series: Mary and Joseph, Nicholas of Myra, Francis of Assisi, Gianna Beretta Molla, Martin de Porres, and Lucy. With 96 reproducible pages, this coloring and activity book will makes a great resource to use over and over again! The variety of activities enables children to relive the story and learn through activities that correlate to the story (such as word searches containing the words in the story, coloring sheets of pictures from the story, reflective material on the saint as a role model). This is an excellent way to introduce these Saints of Christmas to children, helping them to understand their virtues and desire to live holy lives. Activities are varied enough to be used with preschool (4-year-olds) through second or third grade. An answer key is provided.


I haven't seen a copy of this activity book in person yet, but just ordered a copy for this Advent since it is currently 69% off!  I love that it includes 96 reproducible pages so that I can order one copy for my children to share.  

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I'm slowly working on finding books to give our children as gifts on the feast of St. Nicholas and for Christmas this year.  I'm also working on creating an updated version of Our 2014 Advent Book Basket and Printable Labels and will be sure to share those with you all when they are ready, hopefully in the next week or two!

Holy Heroes is currently offering "3 for the price of 2" on pre-orders of their 2015 Advent Adventure Activity Book. I haven't ordered them for this year, but our children really enjoyed using the Activity Books last Advent.  (You can find a list of our Advent & Christmas Favorites from Holy Heroes here.) 

I also wanted to mention that Regina Martryum Productions just released another new audio download! For today only if you purchase a copy of The Poor Outcast – Blessed Margaret of Castello you can choose another story to download for free with coupon code MARGARET15.

Oh! One more thing. My friend Aleesa just shared a FREE Sts. Louis & Zelie Martin Coloring Page. Could you please offer a little prayer for Aleesa? She is currently on bed rest recuperating from surgery.  I need to go back and add the coloring page link to my post on Commemorating the Canonization of the Parents of Saint Thérèse, Saints Louis and Zélie Martin and print out a few copies for my little ones to color sometime this week.

I think that is it for now... I hope your week is off to a great start!