New Christmas Traditions

For the last few years (OK,15 years or so) I've been pretty unimpressed with Christmas. The crowds at the shops irritated me, the carols and songs grated on my nerves (except Wham's Last Christmas, I will NEVER get sick of that cheesy ballad) and a small part of me wanted to yell to kids in line to sit on Santa's knee "HE IS FAKE!" I just detested the busy craziness that accompanied this time of year. Yep, I was a bit of a grinch.

Until now.

Anna is totally pumped about Christmas. Her enthusiasm is completely infectious, and I've found myself taking so much pleasure in sharing it all with her. We play the Christmas radio station on Pandora (awesome, get on it! Lots of vintage songs and Dean Martin) and we talk about Santa and the reindeers. This year is the first year that Lucy is starting to understand what's going on and she is very excited as well.

And...nothing beats being able to play Santa to your own kids. Am I right? My husband and I are having a blast choosing gifts for them.

Last year I bought a Christmas themed book for Anna and included it in her stocking, and she LOVED it. The book was Slinky Malinky's Christmas Crackers. I decided that I would include a Christmas book in their stocking every year.

So this year I bought Spot's Christmas for Lucy - she loves Spot!

The last few months Anna has been trying really hard to learn the alphabet and she is doing really well, so I   thought I would get her an extra special book - The Jolly Christmas Postman.

My siblings and I had a copy of The Jolly Postman when we were kids and we LOVED it. Each page sees the Postman deliver a different letter or card to someone, and you can take them out and read them. So much fun and very interactive, with great humour that entertained us until we were much older. I hope Anna feels the same way about this Christmas version.

Finally, if you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, you will have seen my pictures of our Elf on The Shelf getting up to some cheeky hijinks. I saw the Elf around on few blogs and on Pinterest last year and I knew our kids would love it, so I ordered it a few weeks ago and introduced it to the girls last weekend.

The girls have really embraced it and Anna gets up every morning and searches to find where the elf is and what he has been up to overnight.

I'd love to hear your recommendations for other great kid's Christmas books, seeing as I've started this tradition! Which titles have your kids loved? (and am I alone in loving Wham's song Last Christmas?)