by the Lamberts

The holiday season will soon arrive and we at Five in a Row would like to give you an early gift! It is a short book list of some of our favorite stories that you might like to read now and then throughout the season.

• The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey
  by Susan Wojciechowski
  
• One Wintry Night
  by Ruth Bell Graham
• Tree of Cranes
  by Allen Say
  
• Papa Panov's Special Day
  by Ruben Saillens
  (Adapted by Leo Tolstoy)
  Retold by Mig Holder
  
• The Beautiful Christmas Tree
  by Charlotte Zolotow
  
• All is Well
  by Frank E. Peretti
  
• The Twelve Days of Christmas
  Illustrated by Jan Brett
  
• The Cristmas Box
  by JeAnne Stewart Wetzel
  (There are surprisingly many stories with this same title. The one we have recommended is by Wetzel.)
  
• The Little Fir Tree
  by Margaret Wise Brown
  illustrated by Barbara Cooney
  
• The Christmas Camel
  by Nancy Winslow Parker
  
• Babar and Father Christmas
  by Jean de Brunhoff
  
• Cranberry Christmas
  by Wende Devlin
  (We still love Cranberry Thanksgiving the best, but this story is fun and we made the cranberry cookies--de-licious!! We did add a little orange extract and a few spices.)
  
• The Tree That Stayed Up Until Next Christmas
  by Robert Kraus
  

These suggested titles are not meant to be used for a week at a time (in Five in a Row style), but just to be read and enjoyed with your family anytime during December. We hope you will be able to find a few of these titles in bookstores and at libraries. You might want to use Inter-Library Loan to obtain a title or two, but be aware that they may come in as "seven-day" books which you would need to use and return quickly.

In addition to the booklist above, here is a listing of holiday readings which are small portions of larger works. These passages may be more meaningful to older children and to those who are previously aquainted with these works as a whole.

• "Dulce Domum"
  from The Wind in the Willows
  by Kenneth Graham
  
• "The Crachett's Dinner in the 2nd Spirit"
  from The Christmas Carol
  by Charles Dickens
  
• "The Spell is Broken"
  from The Chronicles of Narnia
  by C. S. Lewis
  
• "Christmas"
  from Little Women
  by Louisa Mae Alcott
  
• "Conscience Pudding"
  from The Treasure Seekers
  by Edith Nesbit
  

We hope that you can enjoy some of these readings as you make holiday memories with your family.

So many times this Season becomes one of fast paced activities and frantic gift searches. We'd like to share the following with you. These are the words to a song we are only quoting from memory. The wording may not be completely accurate, yet the gentle reminder is there:

It's Christmas dear Jesus, please stay close to me.
I'm so tangled in ribbons and tinsel and trees--
That I can't even see you
And I don't stop to see
The poor and the helpless--the ones who need me.

From all of us at Five in a Row may your Christmas season be filled with the love, the peace and the service of the Lord Jesus.