Elf on the Shelf but wankier...

[3littlemincemeatpies]

I have a very imaginative 8 year old who still believes and I absolutely love that she does.

We have always had a naughty Elf that visits her and her big sisters sisters in December and they look forward to him arriving and getting up to mischief, he will be back this year but after 10 years of entertaining him I have kinda lost the love for his shit!!

Dd (who is animal mad) and I have been reading Alison Uttley’s stories for Christmas among other books and the imaginative stories of woodland animals celebrating Christmas, enchanted woods and the calm, Christmas traditions that have become a little lost are really sparking my joy and reminding of the the reasons I started Elf on the shelf in the 1st place.

I had bought her a little Maileg mouse in the sales last year for this Christmas, she is very sweet and is a Christmas edition and comes with a little stocking and I’m thinking of moving her gradually in over the course of December until she arrives on Christmas Eve.

While Dd still truly believes, I know there won’t be many more of it being this special and magical for her (and me) and it makes it seem all the more precious that we are going back exploring and enjoying reading about more simple Christmas’s where the joy and excitement didn’t come from things and people came together and were kind and generous despite having not a lot to give and I’d love to be able to reflect this instead of trashing the house with toilet roll and bastarding flour!!

What ideas can I use to make this fun, magical, nostalgic of times gone by and preferably non messy?

I have a little fairy door and thought that could appear and then items from her (the mouse) and also Christmas themed additions to her door and little house (wicker house shape storage tub I have seen in Zara)

Christmas tree appearing (little branch from our own) Mini mince meat pies to hand out, an activity such as stuffing oranges with cloves are some of the things I have thought of, can anyone help me with anymore?

Do you mean ideas for crafts and things? ☺ Like making paper chains together? (if you can crochet or finger-knit a simple chain from tinsel wool, it would look well in any miniature mouse-world)

Cutting snowflakes and stringing them up/dangling them from the ceiling/blu-tacking them to the windows

Making bird seed ball things (bird seed and lard, in a paper cup or mould, leave to set, job done)

How about sorting some toys for the charity shop and taking dd to hand them over? Or doing a shoebox appeal type thing with her for a less fortunate child? Something charitable anyway :)

Wow love the bird ball idea...she would really enjoy making them and the snowflake ideas sounds great too...

I’m quite keen not to start making a rod for my new back and as new tradition setting up the expectation that something will happen every night...

I feel like that’s one of the ways I went wrong with the elf...

Playing games like hunt the thimble...... Or how about devising a little treasure hunt for dd with a story book at the end of it to read together while drinking hot chocolate.....

I miss having youngsters around, can you tell? ☺

I gave this a bit of thought several years ago before I came to terms with the fact that I simply cannot sustain the daily effort in the hellish season of colds, bugs and flus that is December in our house. I’m quite jealous that you’ve managed 10 years!!

One of my ideas was to have my wanky elves move into our doll house and to have miniature versions of items related to activities that we would do that day, eg they would be decorating tiny cards, or decorating a miniature tree, or baking cookies, or snuggled on the sofa under a blanket watching a movie (a scaled down screen shot glued to the dollhouse tv screen). In my delusions there would also be a tiny copy of each of our favourite Christmas books for them to read. And of course, daily letters to read with a magnifying glass. I had even planned to cover the roof with fake snow and build a little snowman if it snowed in real life.

The usual stuff, like writing a letter to Father Christmas, writing out the christmas card list and then the cards themselves (or alternatively getting dd ti design a leaflet to distribute saying that you're not doing cards this uear but are donating to xxxxx instead)..... Or is all that boring? ☺

@Barbararara i like the cut of your jib! Excellent ideas 😁

Is she too old for The Jolly Christmas Postman? (book)

@Barbararara it’s been a long 10 years!!

In all honesty I have mostly loved doing it and he has brought a lot of giggles to our house but do wonder like most things if it’s just ran it’s course, especially as my bigger two girls are 11 and 12, but they do love him so!!

i was eyeing up the jolly christmas postman today in the book shop for myself

i also want a maileg mouse

I got a brilliant book last year called Merry Midwinter which is full of lovely traditions and ideas for celebrating the season without getting caught up in buying lots of things or spending money but instead being close to nature and enjoying time with the family.

I really enjoyed reading it (even though it's not a 'reading' book iyswim) and it might give you some more nice ideas.

I just finished reading Merry Midwinter and I adored it!

I finally had to get an elf because I found a note my daughter had written to the elves to ask why they went to all her friends houses and never hers but I knew I'd rather stab myself in the eye than do all that 'hilarious' moving it about shite every night.

So he appeared on the tree with a christmas card, in which he'd written that he is very shy, so we may not see him often, but he's always around, and when a new candy cane appears on the tree we'd know he had been.

Maybe try something like that, so there is no expectation of it being as full on as in previous years?

@MamaWeasel we have that one and it’s very loved!! I do absolutely love buying a few 2nd hand Christmas books at this time of year though so would love to hear and other suggestions. Last year we bought Christmas at Exeter st, The Christmas Robin, Pick a pine tree and a Shirley Hughes Christmas one.

@MamaWeasel no not boring at all but things we already do, would love this to give ideas for things we don’t always do.

Any ideas could I decorate her house traditionally?

@Nowisthemonthofmaying that sound great
*adds to Amazon basket

You need the Brambly Hedge books.

I was thinking dolls' house stuff too. You can make miniature food items from Daz, paint and varnish. Make mini fans - take the really small post it notes, decorate, concertina and staple one end. Roasting chestnuts or cracking nuts with a nutcracker, or having peanuts as old fashioned monkey nuts. String popcorn onto thread (with a needle) to make decorations for the Christmas tree. Play things like charades or 20 questions the old fashioned way, where everyone writes down suggestions on slips of paper, twists them up and put into a hat. A gingerbread house would be on a good scale (could get an IKEA one) and that could run for a few days with icing it, putting sweets on, decorating the garden, making trees and a snowman from fondant.

I would also second the Brambly Hedge books - i still have one from when my dd was young - - and i get more enjoyment out of it than she ever did--

Strikethrough fail 🤔

Ooooh! How about reading The Tailor of Gloucester, a Christmas story and linked to the little mouse. "nought but tippets for mice" ☺

No ideas but I bought the same maileg mouse for myself this Christmas and DS is 2.4 so next year I'm going to try the Christmas mouse idea, sounds more wholesome than the elf which doesn't match my decor like the maileg mouse

@DreamingofSunshine oh good, I’ll keep this thread updated then, maybe can pinch each other’s ideas! 😂

This the little basket shaped house I had seen, though it could double up as storage for her maileg minis when Christmas is over...

www.zarahome.com/gb/house-shaped-basket-c0p301350742.html?srch=true

Tiny bunting on the roof of the little mouse house mamaweasel gets carried away