Growing up, one of my favorite Christmas traditions was to read through all of our Christmas books each December.  My parents kept these packed away with our Christmas decorations, so they only came out once a year.  Seeing the stack come out of the box each year sent a little tingle of excitement and anticipation through me.  (I've always been a book lover!)  

To my delight many of these same books have now become part of my children's Christmas memories.  We bring out our stack each year after Thanksgiving, and spend all of December reading through them.  Our stack doesn't just include my old books though.  It has grown to be a large collection of diverse books, and I'd like to share a few of our most recent additions with you! 

Pablo's Christmas is a story of a young boy who lives with his parents and two younger sisters in a small village in Mexico.  His father needs to leave for America to find work in order to provide for them, but promises to be home for Christmas. Young Pablo is left to be the man of the house, taking care of all of the chores his father normally does and helping his mother with extra ones as she is nearing her time to give birth.  When Christmas is days away and Papa still isn't home, Pablo realizes that it's up to him to provide the Christmas gifts for his family members this year.  This sweet story about the love and care of family members for one another will warm your heart with the beautiful ending.

The Road to Santiago follows a family on their journey across Cuba to grandma's house in Santiago on Noche Buena, the night before Christmas.  It's set in the time period just before Castro came into power.  Alfredito and his parents travel to abuela's house each Christmas Eve, but this year when they arrive at the train station they find that the trains aren't running.  Through the kindness of many strangers they experience unforgettable travels that lead them to their family late in the night, where they are surprised to discover their family has been waiting for them before eating the Christmas meal.  This is a wonderful story that celebrates the love of family and the beautiful traditions they create.

Cobweb Christmas is a retelling of the traditional German folktale about how the tradition of tinsel on Christmas trees came to be.  Tante is a very kind old woman, always giving to the people and animals she meets.  Everyone is welcome in her home, except the spiders she continues to sweep out the door.  One Christmas Eve a special visitor invites the spiders into Tante's house in the night, and when she awakens the next morning, her tree is dazzling with beautiful strands of webbing.  This book is a new edition of the story Shirley Climo first wrote in 1986 entitled The Cobweb Christmas.

Babushka is an adaptation of a Russian folk tale about a very orderly old lady who is too busy to go and see the baby who's been born that three kings tell her about.  An angel appears to her in a dream however, and she decides to set off on the journey.  On her way she meets many people who are in need of the items she had brought with her to give as gifts to the baby.  She happily shares what she has, but then arrives at the stable with nothing to give as a present.  The child's mother lovingly assures Babushka that whatever she gave to those in need, she gave to her son as well.  This is a beautiful story of generosity transforming a heart into one filled with love.

The Miracle of the First Poinsettia tells the traditional Mexican tale of why this beautiful native plant has come to be associated with Christmas.  Juanita's family is struggling since her father lost his work this year, and she has nothing to bring as a gift offering to the baby Jesus during Christmas Eve mass. Searching throughout the day, she winds at the church doors at midnight empty-handed. As her family goes in, Juanita sadly holds back.  As she silently walks forward, a stone angel on the wall catches her eye.  She hears the angel speak to her, instructing her to bring a sprig of greens in as her gift.  Unsure but trusting, Juanita does so, and discovers a Christmas miracle!

The Dreidel That Wouldn't Spin: A Toyshop Tale of Hanukkah is the story about a greedy toy shop owner who was presented with the most beautiful dreidel, which he quickly purchased to resell for a high price.  Although this dreidel was exquisitely made, it would not spin for the ungrateful and demanding children whose parents bought it for them. Each time the dreidel was returned to the shop, the shop owner was confused, and worried since Hanukkah was now just days away. When a poor man and his son entered the shop, they were so happy just to enjoy the sights and sounds around them, filling their hearts with warm memories of time spent together.  When the little boy sees the beautiful dreidel, the shop owner allows him to try it.  When it spins for this boy, the message of the peddler who presented it to the toy shop owner finally rings true: "The miracle of Hanukkah cannot be bought!"

...and a Happy New Year is a delightful winter holiday album combining music of Christmas, Hanukkah, and winter, created by award winning children's recording artists Danny Adlerman, Kevin Kammeraad, and Yosi.  This is one of our family's favorite musical CDs of the season!   

Christmas Around the World contains twelve songs from around the globe: from Haiti, Cuba, Barbados, France, Martinique, and the USA.  This is a very fun album that our family really enjoys!  

I'd love to hear what multicultural children's books and music you and your children enjoy during the holidays, especially Hanukkah tales as I'm not as familiar with those!  Let's learn from and share with each other!  Happy reading and happy holidays!

Adoption is a beautiful way to form a family, and I get so excited when I hear of other families coming together and growing in this way!  It's not for the faint of heart; there are lots of extra challenges and things to think about when parenting a child who was born without your DNA, as all children who've been adopted have experienced significant loss, but it is beautiful none the less.

Since November is National Adoption Awareness Month, I wanted to take a moment and share with you some of the adoption-themed books that I recommend:

Gugi Gugi by Chih-Yuen Chen
When a crocodile egg rolls into mother duck's nest one day, she's too busy reading to notice. Although Gugi Gugi looks remarkably different than his siblings, they all grow up and learn to do the things that ducks do.  One day Gugi Gugi is teased by some mean-spirited crocodiles who then try to trick him into betraying his family to feed their duck-hungry bellies.  The trick turns out to be on them in this engaging story about family, loyalty, identity, and belonging.

A Mother for Choco by Keiko Kaska
Choco doesn't have a mother, and so he goes off to search for her.  When his search attempts fail, he begins to cry.  A sweet mother bear hears him and rushes over to see what is the matter.  After Choco recounts his tale, the mother bear lovingly tries to cheer him up.  She then asks him if she could be his mother, which at first Choco thinks is quite absurd because she looks nothing like him.  Upon deciding that this doesn't matter, he goes home with mother bear, only to discover her other children, Ally (an alligator), Hippy (a hippo), and Piggy (a pig), don't look like her either!  He's glad his new mother looks just the way she does!

Horace by Holly Keller
Horace does not look like his parents, and although he is well-loved, he decides one day to go and search for those who look like him.  He finds a family at a park who have leopard-spots like he does, and the children invite him to play.  After a fun day of playing together, the leopard family goes home, and Horace is left missing his parents very much.  Thankfully they find him just then, and together they go home.  At bedtime they talk again about his adoption and how they chose him, and he decides right then to choose them, too. :)

Bringing Asha Home by Uma Krishnaswami
Arun's family is adopting a baby girl from India, where Arun's dad was born.  The wait feels unbearable at times as the year goes by, but Arun and his family find ways to stay connected to Asha while they wait for her to come home.  

Yafi's Family by Linda Pettitt
Now I have not actually read this book yet, so it's a risk for me to recommend it to you; however, it received great reviews from School Library Journal and Booklist, two of the most respected children's book review organizations.  Here is a book that finally acknowledges the loss and sadness that an adopted child experiences.  For that reason in particular, I am including it. 

And Tango Makes Three by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell
This is the true story of two male penguins who made a life commitment to one another in a New York Zoo. They watched as all the other penguin couples made nests together and had an egg, so they too built a nest together, and found a rock that looked like an egg, but the two penguins looked longingly and confusedly when their "egg" ceased to hatch.  The attentive zoo keepers noticed all of this, and so when a baby penguin was rescued and needed a new set of parents, they brought them to this childless couple, and Tango made their family into three!

Let's Talk about It: Adoption by Fred Rogers
An oldy, but a goody!  In this book, Mr. Rogers gives children the loving assurance that they belong in a family, and helps them to explore their feelings about having been adopted, both the positive and negative feelings.  This is a straight-forward, simple, and very well done book. 

Motherbridge of Love by Xinran
A beautiful poem about the love of a child's birth mother and her forever mother for her.  

There are lots of other adoption-themed books out there, but what other ones would you recommend?  Leave your suggestions in the comments below.