Counting the 12 Days of Christmas

Here's a fun tradition you can do with your kids.  Combine the thrill of opening a "gift" with the fun of reading a bed time story every night.  Any kind of Christmas story will do, so long as you have 12 of them.  {Good Will is a great place to buy books if you don't have enough Christmas books for children.}

photo credit

Here's how it works:
Wrap 12 Christmas themed Bed Time stories in Christmas wrapping. {To keep Christ in Christmas, you can read a different part of the Christmas story each night. Don't forget about Elizabeth and Anna and Simeon!} Put them in a basket or under a tiny Christmas tree.   Explain to your children that you will read one book each night from the December 11th until Christmas Eve.  {The last Christmas story will be read on Christmas Eve}.  Your children will know how many days are left till Christmas based on the number of books left in the basket.

Each night you can choose one kid to pick a book and open it up.  Read that book that night.  Do the same thing the next night.  We have 4 children so, mine get to take turns choosing a book and each of them get to choose and open 3 books in the 12 days leading up to Christmas.

It's a fun little tradition that is fun and costs little to nothing.  {You can buy the cheap wrapping paper at the dollar tree.}  And unwrapping a gift - even if you know it's a book - just increases the excitement and thrill of waiting to open all the unknown gifts under the tree!

Don't forget to join the fun at our "Treasured Traditions" Christmas Party this week!  It's over tomorrow night at mid-night.  You still have plenty of time to link up a post or enter your name in the free drawings!

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