Day 8: Letters to Santa

I did not sleep well last night. I have a hard time falling asleep as it is, but when you throw in coughing fits and worrying about Clyde. It didn't go so well. The good news is that we took the kids to the doctor and no strep! Yay!!!

Why was I worrying about Clyde? Well, I wasn't sure he was going to stay in place. Just as I was about to doze off, I heard a noise. Arrrggghhh!!! It didn't seem loud enough to be Clyde. But I had to make sure. I didn't want the kids waking up and finding Clyde face down on the floor! So, I crawled out of bed and went to go see. The noise wasn't Clyde, but it was part of the set up. I had to add more tape. I also decided to add some tape to Clyde's bum. He was hanging on a nail and I really didn't think he'd stay by himself.

Good news! He stayed!

Our dear Clyde was up on the back of the kitchen cabinet facing the dining room. 

He left a note telling the kids to write a letter to Santa. "But they already wrote out their Christmas lists." Yes, but those weren't for Santa. They were for our Christmas tree. They have to make sure Santa gets their lists, too. :)

I've had these cute over-sized postcards from Macy's for a while. Like, two years! It was time to use them.

Clyde painted some clothespins. Now, they are all nicely striped like candy canes! It was the clothespins that caused the mysterious noise. They were too heavy for just a single piece of tape. Or even two pieces of tape. I had to use extra in a few different places. Clyde also used my cute Santa belt ribbon that I bought last year. He is a very resourceful elf. :)

As I lay awake last night, I thought Clyde looked too Jesus-like in his original position. Since I clipped the string holding his hands together, his arms stick out to the sides. I knew I needed to change his arm position somehow. And I wanted to link his position with the task in some way. I realized adding a pencil would solve both problems. I knew I had some Christmas themed pencils from Dollar Tree in my stash somewhere. So, I crawled out of bed, again. Went into the garage and dug out a pencil for Clyde and three more for the kids. 

By the way, mason jars are great for soooo many things. I bought a dozen two summers ago, because I was thinking of trying to make jam. That never happened. But I have used them in all sorts of way to decorate. I don't care if you hate jam. Go buy some mason jars. They are super useful! I'm going to store marshmallows in them when I set up a hot chocolate station. They won't get all hard. And will look cute, too!

After the arm-incident, I am definitely leaning towards hacking our elf. There is a great tutorial on how to do it on  Dirty Diaper Laundry. I'm not sure about the wire part, but I think I definitely need to do the velcro part.

Day 7: Candyland

The kids are still home sick. And now I feel sick, too. But Clyde is all better and up to his fun tricks! According to the schedule, he was supposed to be knitting a scarf. That's all ready. (I used round toothpicks and embroidery floss. The little toothpicks just looked like the perfect double-pointed knitting needles to me!) But the activity to go along with it was for the kids to donate scarves to a charity. They have a giving tree at their school that I had planned for them to take a bunch of scarves I had whipped up to clear out some of my stash. (Hello, My name is Kristin and I am a yarn hoarder.)

But since the kids are still at home sick, they can't put scarves on the giving tree at school. They also need something to do to pass the time at home. So, I went with the classic elf game set up, Candyland! Almost every Elf on the Shelf idea list has this idea on it, so I don't know who to give the credit to.

 
Clyde went through some of the boxes in our garage to find Candyland and he brought some friends he found in the boxes with him. He also brought out Monopoly: Star Wars Edition and Battleship so the kids could play.

 The kids were very happy to have some of their games brought out. It's hard, when you move, to decided what to unpack and when. the kids have been asking for more stuff to get unpacked. So Clyde was on it! The scarf idea will just get shuffled to another day.

The clever, little elf set up his game on the shelf under the coffee table. And the kids set up their game on top of the coffee table. The kids spent quite a bit of time with their new/old game!

And just for fun, here's some pictures from the park yesterday:

Goof balls!

We have an appointment tomorrow morning at the pediatrician's office to check for strep. Hopefully, this will all pass soon and we can get back to normal!

Day 6: Going to the park

Now, all three kids are home sick! But it's nice outside and and the park is just down the street. So, at some point today, we'll all get dressed and get some fresh air. Clyde was going to be hanging from a homemade tire swing. A toy-tire swing that is! Hanging from the ceiling by gray striped baker's twine. Because I love baker's twine and will find any reason to use it. :) I want to eventually have it in every color!

Anyways, since the kids are sick, Clyde decided to be sympathetic and crashed out on Matthew's little couch.

He's got a little medicine cup and some cough drops. And a band-aid. "Why a band-aid?" Why not? :) He's on a pillow of cotton balls and has a kleenex blanket. I hope Clyde gets better soon. And I definitely hope the kids get better soon!

They really enjoyed making the popsicle stick ornaments and kept making more. They want to make even more today!

And some random good news: Last year, I got the cutest gingerbread chalets from Trader Joe's. But there isn't a Trader Joe's in Flagstaff. The closest one is in Prescott. Which isn't close at all! :( Luckily, hubby had to go to Phoenix for work and is going to stop by TJs and is going to get them!!! Yay!!!! Plus, I asked him to get a bunch of extra TJs paper bags. Their Christmas ones are amazing! The front and back are printed with gift tags and the sides are printed with patterned strips to make a cute paper chain.

Day 5: Popsicle stick crafts

Day 5: Popsicle stick sleds ornaments.

It's difficult to do the prep work for a surprise craft for the kids while they are at school, if they don't actually go to school. Two were home sick yesterday and are home sick, again, today. I had planned to pre-make some popsicle stick sleds like these ones I found at tidbits. But I didn't get the chance. I had finally found some popsicle sticks at WalMart. (They had restocked, because I was there the other day and no luck!) I had to choose between buying a box of 1000 regular sized ones or a bag of 75 jumbo ones. I decided to get the jumbo ones. For two reasons: #1 What the heck am I going to do with 1000 popsicle sticks?! #2 The jumbo ones were half the price. Not per unit, obviously, but 75 will still last me quite a while!

So, there I was last night, wondering what am I going to do now? I decided to consult my best friend, Google. She's always there for me. :) I googled "popsicle stick sled ornaments" to see if it was possible to still get it done or if the kids could do it on their own and I found this great, simple idea. Popsicle stick ornaments! No sleds, just turn the sticks into cute ornaments with paint and scraps! And, it was a perfect craft for jumbo sized popsicle sticks. I already had brand new craft paint for when we're going to paint Christmas bird houses. And googly eyes, because who doesn't have googly eyes! I painted a quick example, I mean Clyde made one really quick to have in the morning. And while it dried, he crocheted a simple scarf to finish it off. He is such a talented elf!

He "hid" on the tree, because where else would you hide with an ornament craft? But he left all the supplies for the kids on the dining room table.

The kids were very excited to get to work. We spread out some newspaper. Okay, it was a Best Buy flier, but it did the trick! Those Black Friday/Cyber Monday adds are thick! Not joking, it was 40 pages long! They were half -pages, but still!

 Excited! 

 Sick kid bed head. Waiting for the paint to dry.

Clyde left 3 popsicle sticks for each kid. They made a snowman one first. I had the idea of making an elf one, too. A few tips: I used a toothpick to apply the glue for the googly eyes. I didn't have brown paint for the elf's hair, so I mixed a little orange with a little green and added one drop of red. It was the perfect brown! I also used a toothpick for the thin, white stripe on the gift the elf is holding. And we used a sharpie for the smile on the snowman and the elf. Also for the black line creating the split between the elf legs.

By the way, we didn't add a string to our popsicle stick ornaments. We just leaned them against some branches. It worked just fine! But you could easily add a piece of yarn if you wanted to.

Matthew's Snowman

Katie's snowman. It's a girl. See the lips. :)

 

Their cool mom might crochet some scarves for the little snowmen. But they look good without one, too. 

 

If you're a little sick of crafts, don't worry. Tomorrow's activity is going to play at the park. We have a great park less than a 1/2 mile away, but we don't go very often. The kids will be very happy that Clyde says we have to go to the park. That way, I can't say no. :)

Day 4: Bird Feeders

Last night, as I went to move Clyde, I found the saddest little note. Our middle child, Katie, has been sick the last two days and couldn't go on the hike to collect pine cones yesterday. She was disappointed that she couldn't participate and left Clyde this little note:

"Dear Clyde, for tomorrow can you think of something I can do and I am sick. <3 Katie"

Luckily, the preplanned idea for today was something sick-child friendly. :)

And that's doubly true, because our youngest, Matthew, woke up with a fever this morning. So, today, I am home with two sickies.

Clyde showed up this morning making a "seed" angel.

I've seen the snow angel in flour or powdered sugar, or even rice, idea everywhere! But I wanted it to be related to an activity somehow and not just a mess on my counter. I came up with the "seed angel" idea. The pine cones, collected on the hike yesterday, can be used to make simple bird feeders.

Clyde left us all the supplies and a little note to tell us what to do.

Mini sunflowers grow wild everywhere around here. And we passed several dead and dried ones on our hike. I happened to point them out to the kids. :) They are very excited to make some bird feeders to help out the little birds now that the flowers have all died. :)

(Plus, Hubby got the exact tree I wanted last night, on sale! So we'll be putting our tree up today!)

Tomorrow: Popsicle stick sleds. Now, if I could just find some popsicle sticks! Seriously! I been to three stores already! No luck!

Day 3: Hiking through the candy cane forest

Clyde is quite the silly elf! He showed up this morning with a backpack on, hanging from some ribbon, next to several hanging candy canes.

He tied up some ribbon on my cupboard doors. Ran it through the straps of his backpack and hung several candy canes along it.

Okay, okay. Maybe he had some help. Like, where did he get that adorable backpack?

I crocheted a simple backpack for him a few days ago. But that's as far as I got as to where and how I was going to pose him for today. Then, last night, as I was writing out his note telling us to go on a hike today, I included a line about how he loves to hike through the candy cane forest. ("Elf", anyone?)

 
And I was inspired! I have a ton of candy canes that I store to decorate the tree with each year. I thought, "I could make some sort of candy cane forest for him to be in!" If I had thought of this idea before 1 am the night of, I would have made it much better. Here's how: get a piece of floral foam from the Dollar Tree. Blanket it with fake snow. Stick a bunch of candy canes in it. And then pose your elf among the candy cane forest!  I'm definitely doing that next year!

Posing your elf can be a problem. His/her legs are not made to stand on. They are really made for sitting. But if you lean the body just right, your elf can appear to be standing. That's why I went with the ribbon last night. Your elf can appear to be doing lots of things if he is held up by string. Some people use a dab of hot glue to get their elf in position, but I don't want to potentially damage my elf. I had a hard enough time deciding to clip the little string that held his hands together! I can always use a little piece of double sided tape for when I need his hands back together.

Well, I've got to go now. We have a hike to go on! :)

The 2012 Elf on the Shelf Ideas and Activities.

Day 2: Making ornaments

Clyde showed up today with a cute little ornament in his lap. He wrote out his Christmas list and put it in the ornament.

I saw the idea of creating an ornament with your child's Christmas list on Pinterest. And I combined it with this idea of decorating a clear glass ornament. I love the Santa's Belly Ornaments from A Crafty B! They are so cute! I bought extra clear ornaments and I might make those, too.

Clyde's ornament says: "Dear Santa, For Christmas I would like, * a sled * elf-sized snowshoes *candy * an elf-pod <3 Clyde"

Clyde's handwriting is a little swirlier than mine. And he always writes his "y"s backwards. :)

He hid in our bookshelf with the glass doors. That made it easy for him to leave instructions for the kids to make their own.

(The kids left him a note yesterday thanking him for the donuts. They gave him some pennies to show their gratefulness. I told them that elves don't need money, but they wanted to do it anyways.)

Clyde was also so sweet as to leave three ornaments and three pieces of paper that are just right for the kids to make their lists on! Such a thoughtful, generous elf!

Even though our tree isn't up yet. This is still a good craft to do. It gets the kids to sit down and write out their Christmas lists, if they haven't already. And it's a cute memory to have in the future! Make sure to include the year on the list somewhere.

The kids were very excited to get started! They got out some paper to write out a practice list before they wrote their final choices on the special paper that Clyde left. It's just the "white" paper from a pack of construction paper, cut into smaller pieces. I cut the sides, but ripped the top and bottom edges to make them look more like parchment.

After the kids write out their lists, roll the paper around a pen or pencil to get the "scroll" look. I had to do it a couple times to get it tight enough. To get it in the ornament, I rolled it around the pen again and slid it off the pen into the ornament. It opens up inside the ornament.


Tomorrow, Day 3, is an easy one: Go on a hike and collect pine cones. The pine cones are for Day 4: Make bird feeders.

Merry Christmas!!!

UPDATE: Here are the finished ornaments! I think they turned out beautifully! I love this new tradition and I think it will be a treasured memory when the kids are older.

Clyde's ornament is the little one on the shelf in the background. We are getting our tree today and they will all go on it.

I happened to have this ribbon that I bought last year. It was so cute that I had to have it! I'm glad I waited until I had the perfect thing to use it for.

Make sure to write their name and the date at the bottom of the list. :)

Day 1: He's HERE!!! Elf arrival day!

GOOD MORNING!!! Happy day-after Thanksgiving!!!! I hope you were able to shake off your stuffing induced stupor and remembered to bring out your elf! If you didn't, don't worry. A lot of people wait until December 1st. Seems just as good of a start date as the day after Thanksgiving. Especially if you're one of those cotton-headed ninny muggins who participate in the Black Friday melee. :)

Ours showed up in our dining room light, just like I thought he would! ;)

The plan was to have him leave a note directing us to put up our Christmas tree. One problem, though, we weren't able to get one yet. We're going to have to wait until next paycheck. Luckily, I happened to find another cute idea whilst perusing Pinterest and had it tucked in the back of my mind "just in cases." (From my absolute FAVORITE Christmas movie, Love Actually.)

We had a North Pole breakfast! Our elf, Clyde, brought us a box of munchkins. The authors at Making Life Whimsical went all out and made sure each item at their North Pole Breakfast was white. I thought about trying to find some white powdered Hostess donettes for our breakfast, but it was all I could do to just get the ingredients for Thanksgiving! (My dear hubby even had to stop by a grocery store on his way home from the night shift on Thanksgiving morning to pick up some celery!) Maybe that will happened on Christmas morning. I even have a bucket like the one they used. As luck would have it, last year, I bought a set of Christmas cookie cutters that came in just such a bucket!

After spending a looooooooong day in the kitchen on Thanksgiving, I almost gave up on the idea entirely. But my husband brought up the idea as we were going to bed. (He thought of it all on his own. I hadn't spoken to him about it at all!) He set his alarm for 6:30, even though we stayed up quite late watching a movie. Unfortunately, he set it for 6:30 PM! On a school day, you can't get those kids to crack open their eyes a second earlier than they absolutely have to. But on weekends or vacations, they some how manage to hop right out of bed at the crack of dawn! But by some chance, maybe a little Elf magic, he got up before they did, got the donut holes, and made it back just as they were stirring.

Clyde left us a little note on the box, "Enjoy a North Pole breakfast! <3 Clyde" Except Clyde always writes his "y" backwards. Thank goodness or the kids might think that it is my handwriting. ;)

He also left a fun surprise at the bottom of the box!

The kids had to wait until mid-afternoon for this part. (Even though it's Clyde's big arrival day, we weren't going to let the kids eat 25 munchkins for breakfast!) The hunt was on to find the surprise!

Our son, 6, found the surprise in the hidden kitchen cupboard. It's hidden, because it is on the backside of the counter and only accessible from the dining room.

After a nice nutritious lunch of Thanksgiving leftovers, they each got two donut halves. One of each flavor. 

The kids think that Clyde is the best elf ever! Tomorrow, Clyde will leave us a note to make an ornament. And we'll be back on schedule! :)

Elf magic

"Those who don't believe in magic, will never find it." -Roald Dahl

Every Friday, my two youngest only have a half day of school. We've established the tradition of getting Icees at Target after I pick them up. The kids call them Frosty, Freezy, Freezes. (Thanks a lot Fanboy and Chum Chum! And Netflix streaming for making it possible for the kids to watch Fanboy and Chum Chum over and over and over...) This last Friday, after getting their Icees, (half red, half blue), we browsed through the Christmas section. We oohed and awed at all the beautiful decorations, opened the little doors of the advent calendars, and listened to the Christmas CD samples. (We bought the Taylor Swift CD and the Glee Christmas 2 CD. The Glee one is already on repeat in my car! Love it!)

We also passed an Elf on the Shelf display. I opened the cover of a girl elf to show the kids what she looked like. There's a little hole about the size of a quarter in the inner plastic cover so you can pull it open to get your elf out. My 6 year old son stuck his finger in and touched her. I said, "Oh, no! If you touch them, they lose their magic!" He looked a little concerned, but not too bad. We closed her box and put it back on the display and moved on. Two days later, on Sunday, the kids were chatting and my son brought up the elf incident. He had been thinking about it and was worried that some family was going to pick out this cute, little girl elf and she would be a dud with no magic!

We'd never had an elf-touching incident at our house, so the kids didn't know what happened then. But I know that many of you have had an elf-touching incident, (or two), in your homes. And I've seen a couple good solutions for this via Pinterest. Kendra at Southern Disposition has a great one! Her story is funny and adorable! Basically, you e-mail Santa and he snail mails you a letter and some Magic Elf Dust to sprinkle on your elf so he/she can get their magic back and return to the North Pole. He/she does have to stay in place until the Magic Elf Dust appears in the mail, but apparently, Santa's mail service is very quick and even works on Sundays! ;) So, I reassured my kids that there are things you can do to bring back an elf's magic. I hope their worries are over. :)

Pam at Over the Big Moon has a whole Elf Magical Recovery Kit including printables! A certificate of health from the North Pole should hopefully calm your child's worries and bring the magic back to your house!

I know accidents can happen, but there are some things you can do so they are less likely to happen.  If you think it might be too much of  a temptation for your child to not touch your elf, then consider having your elf only appear in places out of reach. Some of the fun, cute ideas of where to put your elf make it difficult to go about your day. How are the kids going to brush their teeth if your elf is using the bathroom sink to take a marshmallow bath?! So, I try to avoid those. Especially since our house in Oregon only had one bathroom! Now, you are prepared if one of those accidents happen!

KEEP THE MAGIC ALIVE!!!!

It's here! The 2012 Elf on the Shelf Ideas and Activities

OMG! I figured it out on my own!!! The "2012 Elf on the Shelf Ideas and Activities" quick-glance guide is now finished and available to download!!! Sorry, I'm a bit proud of myself for figuring it out. :) I'll have to assume it works, because we don't have a printer right now. A casualty of the move. Our old printer/copier/scanner thing was bulky and awkward. We didn't want to bother trying to figure out how to pack it. Maybe I'll head down to the library tomorrow and make sure it works. But I'm trusting that Google is probably on top of their stuff.

Don't forget that there are some things you will need to pick up that you might not have at home.

Also, make sure you know where your elf is. After stuffing yourself with stuffing, the last thing that you want to do is go hunting through the garage or attic or wherever you may have stashed your dear little elf. I managed to keep his box in plain sight without ruining the magic. "How?", you may ask. Pure laziness! Sometimes, it works in your favor! Last year, after Christmas, (or I guess it was actually earlier this year!), I didn't actually put him away. I stashed him under the unfolded laundry in a basket in my room. (Oops, DOUBLE laziness there! Ignore that, please.) My, (at the time) 5 year old came in while I was scrapbooking or something and said, "I know that Clyde didn't really go to the North Pole. He's back in that box." And I could honestly say that he wasn't! He didn't believe me. SO, I opened up the empty box! The look on his face was priceless! He was shocked that the elf wasn't there. and a little bit of magic was felt in the air. :) So, the moral of the story is: sometimes laziness totally pays off!

Now, after you're done printing off the guide and hunting for your elf, make sure your turkey is defrosting.

The quick-glance guide

I stayed up ridiculously late last night and finished the quick-glance guide to the elf ideas and coordinating family activities. I got the last two ideas nailed down and it's all ready for you. Except, I'm not sure how to post it yet. (I'm new to this whole blogging thing!) I'll get my hubbie to help with that. I wanted it to all fit on one printable page, so it would be easy for you. Print it out, put in somewhere were the kids won't see it, but that you'll have quick, easy access to it. But not in a "safe place"! We're not the only ones who have moved lately. My cousin and his wife moved just last month. She posted on Facebook last night that she couldn't find either of their camera chargers. It was driving her crazy, because she remembered putting them in a "safe place"! I commented that "safe places" are never safe. :) So, don't put it in a "safe place"!

I've also been messing around with the blog's template, so don't get confused if you come back and it looks different. I'm trying to figure out what I want it to look like.

Tomorrow, when the kids are in school, I'm going to set up a photo shoot for our elf. Then, I can get started on the day by day descriptions of each elf idea and explanation of the coordinating family activity.

For now, here's a picture of one of my favorite Christmas ornaments. :)

Be prepared!

I know you're busy hunting down the perfect turkey and googling a recipe for the flakiest pie crust. But your little elf is supposed to be arriving from the North Pole on Friday. Where will yours show up?

Clyde will show up on our dining room light. That's where he appeared the first year he came to our house, (last year.) At first glance, it sounds kinda boring. "Just on the light above the dining room table? They'll see it right away! Where's the fun in that?" That's what I thought when I put him up there. But they didn't notice him AT ALL! They sat down for breakfast. Ate their food. I read the Elf on the Shelf story. And they went on the hunt for their new elf. They hunted and hunted! I couldn't believe it! He was right above their heads! I had to start the hot/cold game to help them out. When they finally noticed him, they couldn't believe that they hadn't seen him either. So it's a funny memory/tradition for us. I think it also ushered in some of the magic of the elf.

Even though, he'll be hanging out in the dining room light, it will still be different. We moved this summer from Oregon to Arizona. I had lived in Oregon for 31 years. (I still write Oregon in my address sometimes!) "Wait! I thought you said you had snow?! But you're in Arizona! Land of cacti and desert! There's no snow there!" Yes, we're in Arizona. In Flagstaff. Elevation 7000ft. We get snow. We'll probably get more snow that we got in Central Oregon. Everything we be a little different this year, no matter what. So, having our elf start out in the same place as last year will be nice. Something familiar in our new place.

 Besides deciding on a place for your elf to show up on Friday morning, you're going to need a few supplies for the activities. I was going to list them week by week. But when I went to Michael's yesterday, one of the items was already on clearance! So, RUN, don't walk, to Michael's and pick up a Christmas birdhouse, (or three, that's how many I'll need.) they were originally $5. Now, they're $3.  They're for Day 24, Saturday, December 16th. But I know that if you don't scoop something up when you see it, you risk the chance of it disappearing!

I think they're pretty adorable. The kids will have fun painting them, (and I'll do my best to ignore that they're not doing it the way I want them to.) 

In light of the fact that these are already on clearance, I decided it might be a good idea to give you a heads up on the stuff you'll need that isn't already in your house. 

1. Birdhouses.
2. Birdseed.
3. Popsicle sticks. (Okay, you probably have those somewhere. I have no idea where mine are.  Time to hunt through some more boxes!)
4. Embroidery floss. (Also have that. Somewhere...)
5. Wreaths. (I'm buying some cute fake ones. If you're super crafty and love the smell, you could make your own real ones. Plus, they'd probably be free. I was going to get the ones at Michael's, but I saw some even better ones at Home Depot for the same price! Of course, at Michael's, I can use a coupon. Hmmmm... Decisions! Decisions!)
6. Cranberries. (We always do popcorn strings for our tree. Last year, I added a cranberry between every 5th or 6th piece of popcorn. It looked amazing!)
7. Gingerbread houses. (I always think it would be really cool, and quite Martha, to make our own from scratch. But, like I said before, my ideas are often quite bigger than what I can actually pull off. Either because of time restraints or my own laziness! Probably the latter. Oops! Trader Joe's has the cutest chalet style ones! The same price as the basic Wilton ones that are sold everywhere.)
8. Clear spherical ornaments. (Michael's has clear plastic ones that are SUPER cheap! Less than a dollar each. And plastic! I won't have to worry about broken glass. Phew!)

 Popcorn chain with cranberries. (Ignore silly child.)

I think that's it. But I still have two spots in the calendar that aren't done yet! I'll get it finished and then post a quick look guide that you can print out and refer to. I'll also post "Day ~" specific detailed descriptions. But not all at once. I do have other things to do, like feed the kids. They want to be fed EVERY day! Can you believe it?!

The Trader Joe's chalet gingerbread house. So cute!

Elf on the Shelf Madness!

It's CHRISTMAS!!!! Well, almost. If almost-Thanksgiving is almost-Christmas, then... it's CHRISTMAS!!!!

Last year, we did Elf on the Shelf for the first time. Some days were great! And some nights were me trying to frantically figure out where to move "Clyde", our elf, for the next day. It was all worth it, though, when the kids woke up and were super excited to run around and find him. I'll never forget the looks of pure joy on their faces.

This year, I've decided to plan it all out ahead of time. That way, (hopefully!), there won't be any crazy-frantic-nights of trying to figure out where to put Clyde. Last year, we started out late. I didn't know until after I read the story in the book that the Elf is supposed to come the day after Thanksgiving. He came to our house in early December. It was hard enough to think of 20-something places/things to do with our elf, let alone 30-something! Thankfully, this year I have Pinterest! (I had it last year, but didn't utilize it to its full potential.)

I have also wanted to do an Advent calendar with activities. I had a flash of brilliance and decided to COMBINE Elf on the Shelf WITH the Advent activities. Each day, Clyde will show up doing something fun and will also have a card with an activity on it for the kids to do that day. Clyde's activity will be a hint as to what the kids will be doing that day.

Yes, this is a lot of work. And, yes, I am crazy! And, yes, there is no way you have the time or energy to figure this all out. But don't worry!!! I already did!! You just have to copy me!! I'm going to post each day's elf position and kid activity. Obviously, you don't have to do all of them, (or any of them), but I hope you have a fun time following along.

I will always strive to post the original link for the ideas I got from someone else. Sometimes, they are hard to track down, because they have been rebloged or reposted so many times. I have also used some ideas as inspiration for my own variation. And, yes, I've come up with some ideas completely on my own.

I hope you enjoy this blog and show all your friends! Or hide it from all your friends, because you want to keep all the great ideas to yourself. :D Hee, hee, hee!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!