Is anyone’s DC too frightened for an elf on shelf?

[pinok]

Just curious because every kid I know seems to love it or be unphased.

Yet I know as a child I would have been really upset and scared by it! When I first heard of elf on the shelf when it was becoming a thing I honestly thought it would not take off because kids would be petrified, but nope!

Are kids just not as easily scared nowadays? 😅

Ours just hides in silly places. No watching, no stupid pranks, no expensive gifts.

@Nidan2Sandan I like this. We don’t have one as I don’t like them either but have been wondering what to tell DS about the reason why not as he’s in Reception and will soon be exposed to it. Pinching your line 😂

It's bollocks. I have a hard enough time keeping my flat tidy. I'm not going to deliberately mess it up to give me more to do. Never started it. Never will.

We have a polar bear who arrives with the advent calendar on 1st Dec. He hides somewhere different each morning with the advent calendar chocolates. I buy the bags of small foil-wrapped Christmas chocolate shapes from Aldi and tuck one between his paws.

years ago my dd came home from nursery upset that she didn’t have an elf. I got one, but never made a big deal about it being real or it watching. We just treated it like a fun Christmas game where the toy got hidden each day, sometimes in funny places. We did Father Christmas the same way . There
were presents, but we didn’t do the whole naughty or nice thing and I never claimed he was real.

DD2 would have been terrified of this as a child & has made it clear to her sister that DGS is not to have one ever!

She's also terrified of Coraline, lalaloopsy dolls (big thing when she was a kid so lots of gifts for birthday parties which had to be re-gifted or donated to charity shops) & can't have bedding with any sort of creature with eyes on it or she has nightmares - she's almost 21 & these things still freak her out!

If you think your dc might be frightened of the whole elf thing don't do it. Dgd (6) doesn't have an elf at home and hasn't mentioned it, ever. I've only ever heard the elf thing on here or on social media but not irl in our bubble. Perhaps it does, but I thought the elf thing was a modern tradition that seemed to be dying off.

My 5 year old son was terrified! I left the elf sitting on his book shelf and he woke up in the night for a wee. I’d already moved the elf downstairs and when he saw he was missing my son started screaming that the elf was running all over the house 😆😬 he made me throw it in the outside bin as he hated it so much lol