My friend Sarah Raymond Cunningham has released a pretty cool book for families at Christmastime. It’s called The Donkey In the Living Room: A Tradition That Celebrates the Real Meaning of Christmas, and it’s like Elf on a Shelf, but with the characters in the manger scene. The characters are hidden around the house; when the children find one, they hear a reading from that character.
You can see her interviewed about it here.