We are
one of “those families”. Our elf is Sam
and yes, December nighttime conversations focus on where to position Sam for
the kids to find in the morning. Although…I’ll
admit to having several “oh $h!t, I forgot to move the elf” moments when I wake
up and have to scramble to throw Sam in a new location before the kids wake up
and notice that he’s in the same spot. Parenting
fail narrowly escaped.
Getting ready for a soak in the tub...
Just hanging around...
For
those not familiar with the elf, he’s one of Santa’s agents, as all elves are. The little (some say creepy looking) doll “watches”
the children during the day and flies to the North Pole each night to report on
their “naughty or nice” rating du jour.
This is the logic behind him landing in different places when he returns
to home. The elf must not be touched by
human paws because he will “lose his magic”.
He will fly back to the North Pole on Christmas Eve, to return the
following Christmas. There you have it,
although I think Sam may have stayed at our house a couple of extra days last
year. Who can blame him? We are pretty cool people and I can totally
see not wanting to go back to the North Pole in December - brrr.
I’m old
school. I was raised on “be good for
goodness sake” and a healthy fear of a lump of coal in my stocking if I didn’t
meet Santa’s threshold of goodness. For
the truly bad children, there were switches.
I totally ate this notion up when I was a kid. I’m learning that there are an alarming
number of people out there that believe it is damaging to a child’s psyche to
be pressured in to maintaining good behavior so that Santa will bring presents
on Christmas morning. There are those
elf naysayers who think it’s creepy…unhealthy, even…to give kids the idea that
a little elf is watching them and reporting their actions to Santa. To this I say “Bah Humbug” and “overthink
much”? It’s Christmas, people. A little bit of carrot dangling to encourage
good behavior is part of the magic of the season. Anyway, we elf unashamed and are having a
blast with it.
My boys
are very young, and thus, easily entertained.
All I have to do is put Sam in a different spot in the house and they
ooh and ahh over the magic of it all. I
have been out on Pintrest and YouTube to get ideas on different things to do
with the elf, but honestly, these are ideas that are probably best suited to
the older child who can appreciate the cleverness and/or mommies and daddies
with a LOT of spare time on their hands and/or a need to out-elf their friends. There’s always somebody like that. You know what I mean.
Here
are some elf ideas that I think are particularly noteworthy and/or alarming:
“Have the elf
write a message for the child in lipstick on the mirror.” Anyone else find this slightly
unsettling? Besides that, is the elf
going to whip out a tiny bottle of Windex and a miniature roll of paper towels
and clean that crap up? I don’t think
so.
“Switch out
closet clothes (i.e. take chunk of child’s clothes and switch with chunk of
sibling or parents clothes) or switch out dresser drawer clothes”. Yes. Because I am that person with enough spare
time to rearrange our closets and drawers for no good reason. Twice.
“Create a mask
and cape out of paper or cloth – Super Elf!
Perhaps he can be hanging from the ceiling by fishing line.” In spite of my initial response of “ain’t nobody got
time for that” and my lack of craftiness, I actually like this one. I think I will keep this in the files for
when the boys are older and can appreciate the notion of “Super Elf” just a
little more.
“Hang a
child’s unmentionables on the Christmas tree.”
Sure…why
not? We have good insurance. Paying for therapy on down the line won’t be
a financial hardship. I can totally see
one of my kids lying on a couch in a shrink’s office. The question “tell me about your mother” will
bring an anguished “well it all started when she hung my BVDs on the Christmas
tree for all to see…”
“Type/write a
letter listing all of the wonderful qualities the elf has observed in your
child.” Awe.
Very warm and fuzzy, touchy-feely.
I might save this one for later…right now the letter might read
something like “I saw you hit your brother over the head with an all-metal Tonka dump truck but you
did a great job cleaning up your toys after your mom told you to do it
seventeen times. Love, Sam.”
“Turn all of
the kitchen chairs backwards.” Hello? Poltergeist flashbacks, anyone?
“Play
cards”. Sam actually
did this last year. He and several teddy
bears were caught on camera playing spades with chocolate coins. It was only that one time, so I don’t think
Gambler’s Anonymous is in the cards for our elf.
“Have the elf hang out in child’s bedroom
while sleeping; take pictures.”
While this sounded creepy on the surface, we actually did this. We took pictures of the boys after they’d
gone to sleep, printed them and staged them downstairs with Sam and the boys’
toy camera. Yeah…it was a slow night in
the Robbins household. The boys loved it
and carried their pictures around for the entire morning.
And so
on. There are all kinds of crazy elf
ideas out there – from the very simple to the ridiculously time-consuming (building
a “family fort” out of ice in the front yard).
I like the idea of forming new Christmas traditions that my family can
enjoy year-to-year. Some of the things
that I do around holiday time are things that my family did when I was growing
up, so who knows – maybe my grandchildren will have their own elves
someday. I like that thought.
So, to
all of you anti-elf naysayers, the Robbins family will stand tall and be
proudly elf-a-liscious. Merry Christmas
to all…and elf on. 
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