Day 5 - Dashing through the snow!

Okay, okay, there isn't any snow, but sledding is still fun! I have this cute little sled that I painted years ago. I should make some more. They make great Christmas-time knick knacks.I was hoping to put him on the sled on the stairs, but the elves don't sit too well. And I didn't want the kids to find him crashed off the sled at the bottom of the stairs. That wouldn't be a happy elf memory! So, just by the T.V. it is!

In case you can't tell, Instagram is my new favorite thing. It's not new, but using it to display elf pictures is new to me and fun. You can find a bunch of other people's Elf on the Shelf pictures by searching the hashtag #elfontheshelf. It's faster than pinterest. No repeats. Not a link to a list of ideas, just a stream of pictures of elves.  

I also love the filters. You never know which one will make your picture look really good. It's fun to experiment.

Today was the kids' first day at their new schools. So the Hubs and I headed to the beach! Hee hee hee! Okay, it was deathly freezing. I was seriously worried about my fingers, (I now keep gloves in my purse). But I got some really nice photos! That makes it worth it, right?

Day 4 - Ugly Christmas Sweater! (And chocolate!)

You doesn't love a good Christmas sweater?! Clyde found an awesome one! (At Fred Meyer. It was a Christmas ornament, but I thought it looked delightfully elf-sized!)

Yesterday, after church, we went to the Outlet mall in Lincoln City. Jillian and I both needed winter coats. She found a good one. I didn't. Anyways, as we wandered through the all the stores, we found a pretty cool kitchen store. It has all sorts of useful gadgets, useless gadgets, and things I never knew existed, but now I absolute NEED! They also had free samples of chocolate covered pretzels, so it's the kids favorite new store. Actually, I thought the kids would hate the kitchen store and I would have approximately 7.8 seconds to look around before they whined us out of there. But the useless gadgets enthralled them and I had all the time in the world to look around!

Besides the free samples and useless gadgets, the cheapo advent calendars with the crappy chocolates inside caught Matthew's eye. He asked in the sweetest, little voice if I could please get him one. I had been looking for a nice permanent one with the little drawers, but I haven't found one I like, yet. By the time we left the store, I had forgotten. But later that night, the hubs and I were killing time at the laundromat, (we had to buy a washer and dryer set for the new house and they haven't been delivered yet), and decided we needed donuts. To the grocery store! The grocery store had a display of cheapo advent calendars and I thought I'd get them and have Clyde deliver them to the kids. (A day late, but who cares? CHOCOLATE!!!!)

Matthew woke me up the next morning with the widest of eyes!

M: "Remember that thing with the numbers and the chocolate?"

Me: "What?" (It's good to fake ignorance to help the magic. ;) )

M: "That thing with the chocolate at the kitchen store that I asked you to get me."

Me: "Oh yeah, sorry bud! I forgot to get it for you."

M: "Now, you don't have to! Clyde got some for us!"

Me: "What?! Really?! Cool!!"

Happiness all around. :)

Day 3 - Christmas Flair!

So, as promised, Clyde decorated his own tree. The kids forgot that he had little ornaments for each of them. :) I forgot that I had thrown away the tinsel last year after Christmas. Which stunk a little, because I like to cover Clyde in it. Elves can be messy!  ;) Just a good reminder to check to make sure you have everything you need earlier in the day.

I ended up just sticking a bow on his head and calling it a night. 

I'm still working on the exact list for this year, because I keep thinking of, or finding, great new ideas and then I change my mind and move the schedule all around. I think I'll just post what I have and if I do something different, who cares! The list isn't a contract, just ideas. It's all for fun! :)

Day 2 - Hauling tree

During the move, some of the older boxes that we never unpacked while living in Flagstaff ended up in the kids' rooms. Therefore, they found some old toys they hadn't seen in awhile. Among them were some Tonka trucks and Clyde decided to use one to bring his Christmas tree out.

The kids had been having a lot of fun cruising around the empty living room with these trucks. And I was inspired to use one for Clyde. It was the perfect size! His tree fit in the back and Clyde could "stand" next to it. It worked great! Except Matthew was sad that he couldn't play with his truck for a day. 

I got this tree, (on sale), at Michael's last year. The kids love Clyde's tree! They kept asking if we could decorate it while I was adding decorations to our tree. I told them that Clyde would do his tree on his own. 

P. S. Here's an awesome sunset over the ocean shot, the view from our new living room. 

Day 1 - Familiar spot, fun treat

HE'S HERE!!! Elf season is upon us!!!

And I almost missed it! That's right, me, the one who actually has a blog about Elf on the Shelf, almost completely forgot about it! After spending the whole day in the kitchen cooking for Thanksgiving, I went to bed early. I was exhausted. I have been exhausted almost everyday for two weeks. You see, we just moved 1,200 miles. It was a very quick move, too! Started packing our old house on a Saturday, the movers loaded up the van on the following Wednesday, we drove through three states and landed at our new house on the next Saturday. Spent two nights sleeping on the floor. Unpacked, unpacked, and unpacked some more. Then Thanksgiving. I needed some sleep.

Many people decide to start Elf on the Shelf on December 1st even though the official story says that the elves arrive in their families' homes on the day after Thanksgiving. And after this busy Thanksgiving, I definitely understand why starting on Dec 1st is better. But when we started a few years ago, we followed the book. So, we still follow the book.

Thankfully, when my husband came to bed, I woke up. And I remembered about our elf! Day 1 is always easy. Our little Clyde always appears in the dining room. Usually on the dining room light, but that wouldn't work with the one in our new house. So, he chose to sit on the table instead. He's such a nice, little elf! He even brought us breakfast. :)

Lists, lists, lists

I'm a list person. Grocery lists, Christmas lists, fat lists, skinny lists, lists who climb on rocks. So now that Halloween is over and we're all done gorging on our kids' candy, it's time to make our Elf on the Shelf list. So far I have three lists: 1) 2012's plan. (<-- link to printable document) 2) 2012's reality. 3) 2013's plan. This year's plan is still under construction. There are too many great ideas out there!

The big plan last year was to have our elf bring a daily activity for the kids. I thought I had the perfect plan. But the kids got sick, then I got sick, and we got almost a foot of snow, and flying monkeys. Oh wait! Not that last one. Anyways, the magic of the internet saved my butt when I was so sick that I could barely get my aforementioned butt out of bed. There are so many fun/silly ways to pose your elf. And the kids loved them! They also loved most of the activities. Okay, yes, some of the activities bombed. Lesson learned. On to 2013!

I decided that an activity is not necessary everyday. Seriously, the holidays are busy enough. The elf doing funny things brings so much joy on it's own, adding an activity every single day just complicates things. Definitely keeping the favorites, though. Like making the Christmas list ornaments, creating pine cone bird feeders, decorating gingerbread houses, the elf sized paper chain countdown to Christmas, and baking cookies for the neighbors.

I hope to get the 2013 list done in a day or two. I will post it on here as a document so you can print it out for yourself. (Once I figure out how to do it again.) I will also be creating some tutorials for cute accessories for your elf.  Then all the planning is done for you! Okay, not all the planning. You still have to track down Grandma's recipe for green bean-sweet potato-turkey-gravy-cotton candy casserole. And you have to figure out who gets to move up to the grown-up table. Or who will get banished to the kiddie table. Don't think you can do it to cousin Mabel, again. She still hasn't forgiven you for last year! Do you know how hard it is to get cranberry sauce out of white cashmere?!

P.S. I'm a vegetarian, but the rest of my family isn't. It was my decision for me, I'm not going to make everyone else convert, too. You may think that makes Thanksgiving hard, but not really. I'll cook a delicious turkey for everyone else. (Not a nasty Tofurkey!) But all the sides will be vegetarian. Pinterest is FULL of delicious, vegetarian Thanksgiving dishes. It's no problem at all!

P.P.S. Follow my Kristin-mas Pinterest board!

2012 Elf on the Shelf Round-up

32 Elf on the Shelf Ideas

There were 32 days of Elf on the Shelf last year. (It fluctuates each year due to Thanksgiving not being a fixed date.) This is the round-up of all the posts I did last year all in one place. And the links to the full posts. I'll have the plan for 2013 ready soon with a downloadable and printable schedule.

32 days of Elf on the Shelf Ideas. 

Day 1: Elf's arrival. Our elf shows up on our dining room light each year. This year he brought a North Pole breakfast with him, (powdered sugar donut holes).

Day 2: Making ornaments. Our elf brought a clear ornament for each child and told them to write their Christmas lists on the scroll paper he left for them. Then they put the scroll in the ornament and hung it on the tree.

Day 3: Hiking through the candy cane forest. He told the kids to go on a hike and collect pine cones. (Secretly, the pine cones were for the next day's craft).

Day 4: Bird feeders. He put out peanut butter and sunflower seeds and told the kids to make bird feeders with the pine cones they collected the day before.

Day 5: Popsicle stick crafts. Jumbo craft sticks, some craft paint, and googly eyes. Ta dah! The kids LOVED making these. They each made several.

Day 6: Sick day. The kids had been sick, Clyde must have caught the sniffles, too.

Day 7: Candy Land.  Hanging out with his friends, playing one the favorite board games of elves. Duh! It's about candy!

Day 8: Letters to Santa. Time to send your Christmas list to the big guy up North.

Day 9: Nutcracker.  Go see the classic ballet. (Or just watch it on Netflix, if everyone is still feeling kinda cruddy).

Day 10: Christmas music dance party. Christmas music is one of the best parts of the holiday season. "The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear."

Day 11: Reading a story. Elves are such nice guys or gals. They like to read to the other stuff animals and toys.

Day 12: Taking a shower. He accidentally stepped in reindeer poo. He needed to bathe.

Day 13: In an elf sleeping bag. Elves can be confused by some human traditions. He thought the stocking was a sleeping bag.

Day 14: Rocket ship. They definitely don't have giant blenders like this at the North Pole. Clyde thought it was a rocket ship! No smoothies today. :)

Day 15: New friend. An adorable penguin was without a home and Clyde asked if he could come live with us. :)

Day 16: A little elf pampering. I popped some plain popcorn to make strings for the tree, but our silly elf thought it was a spa! Maybe popcorn baths are how the elves stay so young looking year after year.

Day 17: Making gingerbread houses. Clyde brought us three gingerbread house kits for the kids to put together and decorate. He also brought his own little gingerbread house that he made.

Day 18: Two weeks til Christmas. Paper chains are a classic Christmas decoration. Clyde made his own tiny one to count down to the Big Day! The kids checked each day to see if he had taken one off each night.

Day 19: Making crayons for neighbor gifts. It's a fun project and definitely a great gift for younger children.

Day 20: Making cookies for neighbors. Who doesn't love free cookies?! :)

Day 21: ELF!!! Must watch this movie at least three times during the holiday season!

Day 22: Snow. We were buried in snow! Clyde thought it would be fun to bring some inside.

Day 23: Funny looking stockings. I hope he got these out of the clean laundry!

Day 24: Elf houses. I'm pretty sure real elf houses are a little bigger. But the kids loved these bird houses to paint.

Day 25: Pancakes. Everyone loves pancakes! My kids love getting tiny ones on their plates. Clyde enjoyed his "tall" stack of elf-sized pancakes.

Day 26: Elf portraits. Clyde got a little "cheeky"!

Day 27: Elf Christmas tree. Clyde brought and decorated his own elf-sized Christmas tree. It's a little messy. Silly elf!

Day 28: Rice Krispie Treat time! Classic Christmas time treat. And don't feed Rudolph marshmallows!

Day 29: Hot cocoa. Clyde left us some fun snowman marshmallows to put in our hot chocolate.

Day 30: Magic reindeer food. A special treat for the reindeer. Mix it up and spread it in your yard.

Day 31: Cookies for Santa. Gotta do it! Gotta leave cookies for Santa. You could do store bought, but the kids always have fun decorating homemade ones.

Day 32: Clyde's last day. He was up in the light again. And he left a little gift for each of the children.