Elf on a Shelf

We jumped on the Elf on the Shelf bandwagon for the first time this year.  To be honest, I had no idea what to do with the thing after I purchased it, but I had a ton of people tell me that it was right up my alley, and I caved.  Thankfully the children's book it came with was enormously helpful in clueing me in to what exactly needed to be done. 

The basic premise is that the elf arrives from the North Pole (where else?) on the same date every year - we chose December 1, though the day after Thanksgiving is rumored to be another popular choice.  The elf will disappear each night to report on the child's (or childrens') behavior, reappearing in a new spot the next morning.  I may have taken liberty here with the author's intent, but in our case, we told the girls that if their behavior was less than desirable, the elf would stay in the same place.  On Christmas Eve, the elf returns to the North Pole with Santa until the following year.

We (of course) had a girl elf.  She appeared first in our playroom - see below.  The girls absolutely LOVED her.  They named her Sparkle Teddy Bear, which was a group effort (Megan contributed "Sparkle" and Hannah came up with "Teddy Bear").  They were SO excited to get up each morning and see exactly what she was up to.

Here is a peek at the various places we found her:

She had a tendency to be kind of naughty, this elf.

We took the girls to Chicago in December for a pre-holiday weekend getaway.  Megan's big wish from Santa was for an American Girl doll.  Since we were going to be so close to the store, Sparkle Teddy Bear thought it would be a good to idea to arrange for an early delivery of these gifts from Santa.  Here she is with the gifts - straight from the North Pole - and all packed and ready to go to her friend Zeze's house while we were away for the weekend.

Hanging out with Zeze - Claire's elf

She stowed away in the girls' bags when they spent the night in Fremont -
they caught her the next morning enjoying the hot tub

We got to host Zeze for an overnighter when Claire's family went to Chicago. 
Zeze is a rather handsome boy elf, so Sparkle Teddy Bear wanted to look her best.

Zeze's here!

Alas, the time came when we had to say our goodbyes. They were so bummed to see her go, but thankfully they had a small mountain of Christmas presents to ease the blow. We are looking forward to having her back next year!!

She left the girls a special goodbye note - being sure to include Hannah's current
 favorite expression, "see you 'round like a doughnut!"