Elf on the Shelf

Look who flew in & landed in the Christmas tree last night:

Most of you know who this little doll is & what he does. For those who don't, let me enlighten you.

That is an “Elf on the Shelf”. He is one of Santa's scout elves & is a magical tool for parents & a fun tradition for kids when the holidays come around. He is a creepy, little 12" doll (yes I said creepy) who watches over children during the day & at night flies back to the North Pole to report back to Santa who’s been naughty & who’s been nice. He comes with a storybook that explains who he is, where he comes from & what he does. As soon as he makes an appearance at your house the family has to give him a name. You also aren't supposed to touch the Elf because then he will lose his magic & not be able to fly back to the North Pole.

As soon as Mason saw him he was SO excited. We had watched the movie & read the story book the night before so he knew the Elf would be making an appearance soon. Mase ended up naming our Elf - Jingle Bell which he came up with all on his own. So cute!

Now according to the story the elf is supposed to fly back to the North Pole every night & return to your home sitting in a different spot each & every morning. You can also have a mischievous Elf & the little stinker can get into whatever, whenever &  be a bit naughty or he can be nice.

Now it shouldn't come as a surprise to any of you who know me that I am one of "those" Mama's - by "those" I mean the overachieving Elf on the Shelf Mama. We couldn't just have a boring Elf - we had to have one that was a little bit naughty at times :)

Mase got such a kick out of finding the Elf every morning. He would wake up & the first thing out of his mouth was "where is Jingle Mama?" & he would go searching all through the house looking for him. Even Shane got into trying to find the Elf every morning. The magic of Christmas truly is "believing" :)

For the most part Jingle would show up in random locations around the house just hanging out where he could watch over Mase throughout the day/evening.

Hanging out in the dining room lights

 

Perched up on the banister



See - I told you he was a bit creepy :) Other times Jingle would be a bit ornery or even naughty.

Watching TV while eating some popcorn

 Jingle colored a page in Mason's coloring book

 

One night Jingle got stuck in the M&M's bag while leaving Mase a message. Mase found him like that & freaked out. He got SO upset that Jingle couldn't breathe with the bag over his head (at least the kid has some common sense). So we had to get a pair of tongs & pull Jingle out of the bag so he could breathe.

 

He was busted roasting marshmallows over the candle one morning which Mase informed us that it was dangerous for Jingle to play with matches & he could get burnt. (The kid actually is listening to us :)

Jingle was also known to bring Mason "treats" with little notes if he was a good boy for the week which Mason loved.

Throughout the month Jingle also got into the sugar cookies, drew Minions on the bananas & went "joy-riding" on Mason's remote control car. See I told you he was a little stinker at times!

Ugh - remembering to move this Elf & thinking up things fun for him to do was hard work! Thank goodness for Pinterest which provided many awesome ideas! Amazingly enough there was only one night that I totally forgot to move Jingle & Mason definitely noticed. I told him Jingle probably didn't feel good & just wanted to hang out at our house instead. Thank goodness toddlers are so gullible.

Now I'm not gonna lie - there were countless nights I was laying in bed & realized I forgot to move that damn Elf so I got up & made sure to change his location & honestly by week four I was pretty much over that creepy Elf. But Mason's excitement every morning was definitely worth all the hassle.

Sadly, Jingle left us on Christmas morning & Mason was really sad about it...until he started opening all his presents & then he was like "what Elf"?

Goodbye Jingle Bell - until next year!