Book Bucket List | The Night Before Christmas

When I was a kid, one of our Christmas Eve traditions was that everyone would pick a book from our collection of children's Christmas books and read a story aloud while drinking hot chocolate.  Later, this tradition was interrupted by texting and other distractions as we got older, but it remains one of my favorite Christmas memories.

My dad would always pick The Night Before Christmas to read to us.  It was first published in 1823 anonymously and quickly became one of the most popular Christmas poems.  Later, it came out that it was written by Clement C. Moore.  What is also interesting about this poem, is that it generalized the description of Santa  Claus.  Before the poem, there were many different versions of Old Saint Nick, but the descriptions in The Night Before Christmas quickly caught on to create what Santa is now. 

There are also many adaptations of this story, including A Pirate's Night Before Christmas, The Night Before Christmas, Deep Under the Sea, and Librarian's Night Before Christmas.  

The original, if by some small chance you've never heard or read it, is definitely a must read for this season.  My siblings and I are all in our twenties now, but our dad will probably be reading this to us on Christmas Eve.