I come from a family of book lovers. My parents are avid readers, and my dad has published a couple of books (textbooks on wetlands science…but still). My fiancé, Andrew, and I love walking to the library together and prowling local used bookstores—we have some excellent ones here in Colorado, including the Tattered Cover, the Book Cellar, and the Boulder Bookstore.

So, when I read about Iceland’s tradition of giving and reading books on Christmas Eve, we had to try it.

According to this article, Iceland (the least densely populated country in Europe) publishes more books per capita than any other country in the world—and most of those books come out in the months leading up to Christmas. They call this Jolabokaflod, or the Christmas Book Flood. They also have a charming tradition of giving each other books on Christmas Eve, then spending the night reading.

Andrew and I are spending our first Christmas together this year, and we’re so excited to start our own Christmas Eve book-giving tradition (we’re calling it the Christmas Eve Book Flood). We went to our favorite local bookstore, 2nd & Charles, and covertly picked out books for each other. Tomorrow night, we’ll swap books and spend the evening curled up indoors reading.

And don’t worry, Winnie won’t be left out. She’ll be reading a book shaped like a bone. (Okay, it is a bone, and she’ll be reading it with her teeth. But don’t tell her that. She thinks she’s a person.)

That’s what I’ll be doing tomorrow night. Hope you have a wonderful Christmas and Santa brings you everything your heart desires. (To see my letter to Santa, check out this post.)

Happy holidays, and happy reading!