Contest is now closed!
Book: The Gift Of The Christmas Cookie
Author: Dandi D Mackall
Illustrator: Deborah Chabrian
Description:
This children’s story is written for ages four to seven. It tells a story of a family during the Depression. A young boy named Jack misses his father, who is away looking for work, and wants him to come home for Christmas. Jack discovers his Mother making cookies one day, a treat that they hadn’t enjoyed due to lack of finances. She is making the cookies for the needy people at their church. His Mother tells Jack a story of how people used to use cookies (the symbols on them) as a means to describe the Christmas story to those people who couldn’t read. Jack ends up carrying on this tradition with a homeless man who comes to their home looking for food.
Review
This book is well written in language that is appropriate for the intended ages of four to seven years old. The illustrations depict the story well.
Dandi Mackall writes this story with the theme of the origins of the Christmas cookie. The holidays are a perfect time to tell stories of your family traditions as well as others. The origins of the Christmas cookie is Christian oriented and the book is written with a strong Christian message.
I would suggest that this story is best suited for children slightly older than four as it addresses topics that require some maturity, such as strangers and the Depression.
Having said that, I do believe that this story does provide a good introduction to topics of charity, poverty, family traditions and the history of The Depression.
The book finishes off with a recipe for Christmas cookies that would be easy and fun for children to make for the holiday season.
Contest
This book would make an excellent Christmas gift for children who are ready to be exposed to these topics. It really is a great introduction to family traditions as well as the story of Christmas.
If you are interested in receiving your very own copy of this book to share with your children this holiday season, please feel free to enter this contest.
All you have to do is leave a comment on this post sharing one of your favourite family traditions during the holiday season no later than midnight on Sunday December 7, 2008. Five lucky winners will be chosen by random draw and will be notified on Monday morning via email.
Our favourite family tradition is going to church for the early service on Christmas Eve. I love the music and all the kids. And it really gets us in the spirit of Christmas.
Would love to be a part of any contest you hold, MTM, but, erm, Jewish…. AND, I’m having such a hard time teaching Monkey that we celebrate Hanukkah and not Christmas. She’s SO excited for Christmas! It’s pretty funny. 🙂
This is a great contest and sounds like a good book! My favorite tradition is waking up on Christmas morning to sausage balls and breakfast tacos at my mom’s.
shelcows AT gmail DOT com
Chloe and I have a tradition that started when I was young, we open one presant on Christmas Eve, some pj’s, which we wear that night. It’s nice to snuggle up in new pj’s and save the real magical stuff for the morning!