What a very charming story Parnassus Bookstore in Nashville shared on their blog this week: A bibliophile in Arizona turned to Parnassus to make long-distance recommendations when his local independent bookstore closed. It’s become a tradition that the booksellers look forward to, and no doubt his family as well!

Of course I always have a lot of books on my holiday shopping list every year, from cookbooks to biographies to novels. And this year I’ve started a new little holiday book tradition. When I was little, I remember getting very excited when my mom started hauling all the Christmas decorations out every year, because the Christmas storybooks were stored with our lights and ornaments – in particular I remember one that was actually in the shape of a snowman that enthralled me year after year. Now that I have a little baby nephew, I want to make sure he builds a collection of holiday stories to look forward to each December! So a couple weeks ago I sent him a package of holiday board books, and was delighted to receive pictures of him happily gnawing on them – no luck finding a snowman-shaped board book yet, but I have a whole year to work on it.

What are your favorite bookish holiday traditions? What are some must-haves for little ones’ holiday book collections?