telling child Elf on the Shelf isn’t really

[toastofthetown]

Academic for me at the moment because mine is still a baby, but I really don’t want to do Elf on the Shelf. I hate the surveillance aspect of Father Christmas anyway without bringing an elf snitch into the house. But they are so popular, I’m sure my child will ask at some point why we don’t have an elf so would I be unreasonable to say that we don’t have an elf because the elves aren’t real and it’s the parents doing it all? I’d say not to say anything but children do talk among themselves. I don’t want to spoil any other family’s magic who love it, but ultimately it’s the reason we won’t have an elf and it’s something that won’t make my child feel lesser for not having one.

We don’t do it. We just say we don’t and the kids are happy with it.

I’ve never done it. My eldest did ask why we didn’t have one as most in his class do. I just said FC checks with mums and dads if they’re wanting an elf to come for surveillance/high jinks and we said no. He found the concept a bit creepy anyway so that helped!

Well that’s just a straw man argument.

No, I am directly comparing the people who are performative about doing the elf, with people who are performative about not doing it. As you know. There are also people who are performative about neither.

My boundaries are: my children enjoy the elf, and their view is really the only one I care about.

My dd has always done 🎅🏻 with hers (now 10, 9, and 5), but never elf on the sodding shelf, and AFAIK the Gdcs have never asked for it, or shown any interest.

I'd never heard of elf on the shelf until maybe 15 years ago if that. Seems like a bit of an odd concept, and to me honestly, unsustainable.
I love setting up little displays of seasonal things and toys, whimsical and cute, but I think it would be hell to have to do this for 25 days straight no matter how busy I was what else was going on in life, every year for how many years? 10 at least?

Honestly, it seems to be a tradition that was born around the same time as people taking photos of everything and then posting them to their social media, like if you make a really nice cake, and you take all these pictures and then you post it to say look at this beautiful cake I made. Well that's great it's great to show something that you're proud of, but it seems like a awful lot of people are doing this for the performative issue and I hate using that word because it's overused but it is true.

And the whole idea of the elf being like "big brother is watching?" So This creepy little doll who sits still during the day but comes alive and is mischievous at night honestly it sounds like the plot of a horror movie... And the fact that he's always watching you and he's going to snitch on you to santa? To me that sounds like a really good last minute / month of December tool to force your children into good behavior. I've heard people year-round use the threat of "Santa is watching, I'm going to call Santa if you don't go to bed now, I'm telling Santa that you were bad..." And that's what this reminds me of. So, if you don't want to do the elf, don't worry about the elf. No elf for you.

And anyone out there who loves doing the elf tradition and the creativity of it ... That's great. Cuz really, it comes down to whatever you're comfortable with, and not being forced into doing something that you don't really want to do. Just be happy. Christmas is supposed to be about being happy, not more work, not more stress.

I’ve never done it (kids are 9 and 5), if they’ve ever brought it up I’ve just said we don’t do that. That’s been enough of an explanation, the nursery elf did fun things and they enjoyed that but even then, Santa brings the magic here and that’s enough. Given they see them in all the shops it’s pretty obvious they’re just tat toys!

Just tell your child that not every house has an elf.

YABU to overthink this. He won't feel 'less than anyone for not having one, and if he does, it would be a good opportunity for you to point out that we are all different and that's ok.OK.

How are you going to explain the massive piles of presents some kids get compared to the packet of crayons others receive, when the time comes? Teach your child from an early age that comparison is the thief of joy.

Never say never! I never planned to. I might have told people they were idiots, when they moaned about it. DC1 had no interest at all.

However, DC2 started asking when he was 6, and clearly wanted one. It was around the same time DC1 confirmed he didn't believe in santa, so i thought it would be nice for DC1 to take charge of an elf for DC2. I have to admit, it was a few years of fun.

This year, DC2 doesn't believe and now wants to do a "revenge elf" to prank DC2. I have no idea how that will work, and am now still doing an elf no one even believes in.

what the man that leaves them loads of presents … yeah that’s terrifying !!!

I've never done it. my ds never ever asked. I just felt there was plenty with the traditional Santa stuff without throwing more at it.

EVERY year this topic comes up. And every year there are MNetters commenting that they didn’t like it when they found out their parents had been lying to them. Or the difficulty of explaining to their kids they have been lying. As parents we teach our kids to tell the truth, don’t tell lies but then at Christmas as adults….. parents tell lies to their kids. Crazy logic.

We never did with our kids. They are in their 20s now. They still get super excited about Santa coming, gifts under the tree, etc. It’s a very special time in our house. So much fun and joy. But without the lying!

Im not at all miserable btw. Just not into teaching kids it’s wrong for them to lie but fine for adults to do so.

You do whatever you want to do in your house. And please don't worry about "ruining" it for others. We have a non-traditional approach to Christmas and have always used it as a way of teaching tolerance of other people's beliefs - essentially I tell my children that we no more go around telling other children Santa isn't real than we go around telling Christians/Muslims etc that god isn't real. It's upsetting and disrespectful and we have to be respectful of other people's beliefs, even if we don't agree with them. This also has the added beneficial (in my view) effect of putting "Santa, elves, fairies etc" in the same category as "god". Made up things that people use as methods of behavioural control.

We absolutely don't all have to participate in the Christmas stories if we don't want to!! We are atheists that celebrate Christmas but talk about how there has long been a celebration at this time of year, since pagan times. We enjoy our family time and games and food and keep our gifts low-key. There seems to be so much pressure to conform at Christmas, so many people worried about keeping up with gift spends, Santa visits, performative social media decorations and elves. You do it how YOU want to do it! The stupid surveillance elf has only been a thing for about a decade!

Lots of kids will tell your children santa isn't real. My children went to a very multicultural school where many of the children don't do santa either because they celebrate other religions or a quite evangelical Christians and it wasn't the done thing.
I told my children (who are somewhat ironically atheists, though given FC is naff all to do with the bible not that ironic) that we believe in FC the same way other families believe in God or Allah. They were fine with their mates saying he wasn't real.

It’s a commercial idea, not a long-held tradition. We’ve never done it. We have our own Christmas traditions.

You know Christmas is getting close when Elf on the Shelf threads arrive!

No elf on the shelf here but we do have a refillable advent calendar that the elves fill each night in December.

Surely you just say no? If you don’t want to, this is a massive amount of work, why would you do it because they’ve heard about it at nursery. My eldest hears about loads of stuff at nursery/school that we won’t be doing.

This is what I don’t understand, will people just keep accepting new traditions imposed by retailers?

Yes, I also strongly dislike the elf for this reason and wouldn’t consider doing the elf at all. But if other people tell the child it’s true and you, rather than saying something like ‘we don’t have/need/want one’ say that it’s a lie and the parents move it around, you’re accelerating this tendency rather than neutralising it. I’m not particularly fussed about that either, but it is a pain to manage a child that doesn’t believe at an age when most do through Christmas activities in the community.
Don’t lie, don’t tell is a much simpler approach.

We have an elf (but he's a cute one not the creepy looking one) but we don't tell our children he's here to spy or reporting to Santa, he's just for fun and he leaves little treats or makes jokes. I wouldn't tell children that the other parents are behind it, id just say something vague like "Oh, Emma has a elf at home? That's interesting" and not comment too much, if you choose not to do it

They are incredibly clever. That’s why, if you tell them parents move the elf, they figure everything else out too.

Are there really developmentally normal children over the age of 3 who genuinely believe that what is obviously a toy is actually a real elf??

It literally didn’t appear until some woman self published a book of a story they made up in their family in 2005 and it gathered pace. Hardly an age old tradition.

Newsflash. Many many many people don’t have an elf on the shelf and cope. It’s not compulsory. See also Christmas Eve boxes and matching pyjamas.

No you don’t.