Twenty Winters
20 Classic Christmas & Winter Poems for Children, Illustrated and Explained
The third book in the series, after Twenty Summers and Twenty Autumns. Twenty classic poems that follow one winter, from the first snow through Christmas Eve and Christmas Day to a quiet goodnight. Every poem has a full-page illustration and a friendly page that explains it in plain words.
- 20 poems
- Ages 4–8
- Paperback & hardcover
- Read-aloud
In two editions: a square paperback and a premium hardcover. Compare the editions →
Paperback or premium hardcover
The same twenty poems, the same explanations and the same pictures, in two editions. The paperback matches the rest of the series on the shelf. The hardcover is a larger gift edition.
8.5 × 8.5 in, square
- Matches the series. Same size and shape as Twenty Summers and Twenty Autumns.
- 96 pages in full color.
- Soft cover, light enough for a bag or a bedtime pile.
8.25 × 11 in, tall
- Premium color printing on a hard cover, made to keep.
- Larger type, easier to read aloud.
- Taller pictures. Every illustration is extended to fill the tall page.
The whole of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas
Poem 9 is Clement Clarke Moore’s A Visit from St. Nicholas, printed complete: all fifty-six lines, across three pages, with three full-page illustrations of its own. Picture-book versions often shorten it. This one does not. The explanation page glosses ’kerchief, sash, coursers and droll, and points out that Moore’s reindeer is called Donder, not Donner.
’Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;Clement Clarke Moore · Poem 9 of 20
The poem, the picture, the explanation.
Each poem comes in three steps, the same as in the first two books, so you and your child can simply enjoy it together.
Read it aloud
The original classic verse, carefully set and short enough to share before bed.
Look together
A calm, low-stimulation illustration fills the facing page, giving children something to notice.
Understand it
In plain words, What to notice and Words to know — a companion page that quietly builds vocabulary.
Inside the pages
Twenty-four full-page illustrations, gentle and uncluttered: falling snow, lamplit windows and firelight, never a crowded page.
Twenty winter poems, five gentle sections
A keepsake that follows one winter, with Christmas at its heart: from the first flakes to the last goodnight.
- IFirst SnowThe North Wind Doth Blow · It Sifts from Leaden Sieves · Velvet Shoes · Snowflakes
- IIChristmas Is ComingChristmas Is Coming · Carol of the Field Mice · Jolly Old Saint Nicholas · Up on the Housetop
- IIIChristmas EveA Visit from St. Nicholas · Christmas Bells · A Christmas Carol · Away in a Manger
- IVChristmas DayChristmas Morning · In the Bleak Midwinter · Love Came Down at Christmas · The Twelve Days of Christmas
- VWinter GoodnightWinter-Time · When Icicles Hang by the Wall · Picture-Books in Winter · The Sugar-Plum Tree
Verses by fourteen poets, each with a short biography at the back
- Emily Dickinson
- Elinor Wylie
- Mary Mapes Dodge
- Kenneth Grahame
- Emily Huntington Miller
- Benjamin Hanby
- Clement Clarke Moore
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- G. K. Chesterton
- Elizabeth Madox Roberts
- Christina Rossetti
- Robert Louis Stevenson
- William Shakespeare
- Eugene Field
Plus four traditional rhymes and carols, among them Away in a Manger and The Twelve Days of Christmas.
The oldest words, not the shortened ones
Christmas poems get rewritten more than any others. Where a favorite has changed over the years, this book prints it as it was first written, and says so on the page.
- Every one of the twenty texts is set from a named, dated edition — the book lists them all.
- A Visit from St. Nicholas is printed complete, all fifty-six lines.
- Up on the Housetop in Benjamin Hanby’s own words from 1866, and Jolly Old Saint Nicholas as Emily Huntington Miller wrote it in 1865.
- A “You may know a different version” note on four poems, so nobody is caught out mid-song.
- Longfellow’s Christmas Bells is printed in selected stanzas, and labeled that way.
- A short biography of every poet, and a “Words to know” list on every explanation page.
“Four calling birds”? Not in the oldest printing. Twenty Winters prints The Twelve Days of Christmas as it first appeared, around 1780: four colly birds (black ones, like blackbirds), with the drummers, pipers, ladies and lords in a different order from the song most people know.
The friends are back, in winter coats
Lumi the unicorn foal, Mossy the teddy bear, and Lia, Noa, Rio, Teo and Nyla wander in and out of the pictures, just as they did in Twenty Summers and Twenty Autumns. All seven are introduced at the front of the book.
The other two seasons
Each book stands on its own, and both are available now. For reading this fall, start with Twenty Autumns.
Twenty Autumns
Twenty classic fall poems by Dickinson, Dunbar, Longfellow, Riley, Stevenson, Rossetti and others, from the first golden mornings to the first frost.
Twenty Summers
The summer collection that came first: twenty classic poems by Robert Louis Stevenson, Christina Rossetti, Emily Dickinson, Edward Lear and Eugene Field, in the same three-part format.
Coming soon to Amazon
Twenty Christmas and winter poems, twenty-four illustrations, and a friendly explanation for every poem. Coming soon in two editions: the square paperback and the premium hardcover.