The story of Nick, our Elf...

Back in the fall sometime, I don't remember exactly when, a friend mentioned this Elf thing. I didn't take too much notice to it...looked it up, thought it was cute but it just wasn't in our plans.

Until....

...we walked into Target one day and saw the endcap with the all of the Elves.
Our son asked what it was all about and so I told him what I knew and he thought it was a great idea...
and so we adopted our Elf on the Shelf.....

We read the book with our Elf and found out that he didn't have a name (or get his magic) until our child/family gave him his name......and our son thought the name, Nick, would be perfect.

What happened the next few weeks became a fun daily game of hide and seek with Nick...you see, the whole idea is that the Elves go back every night to the North Pole to report on their children directly to the big man, the head Elf himself, The Boss.....Santa Claus. They report on the good, the bad, even the ugly if necessary and hopefully there will be more good so that those children don't get coal instead of presents. When they come back - the little buggers hide - somewhere different most of the time, even though once in awhile they get to liking a certain spot. Some of them even get into Elf mischief and do things in homes...making messes being the big one...not all do, but there are some spirited ones that get into things.

There are a few rules that must be followed:
1) The biggest rule of them all - the kids cannot touch their Elf.
2) The Elf cannot talk to their child or children.

The kids are allowed to talk to their Elf, send messages to Santa, secrets, add things to their lists. They just aren't allowed to touch.
There was an adorable TV special and a video to buy and even a plush Elf for the kids to hold and love, but its the traveling Elf that is the most important. There was a Facebook page for posting pictures and for sharing the fun and my did those Elves get into mischief...flour fights, snow angels, teepee-ing trees and rooms, there were even reports of toilets being wrapped in christmas paper and ribbons (in one case - ALL of the toilets in the home) and in the case of that same home on Christmas morning, not only were all of the toilets wrapped up but ALL of the kids presents were taken from under the tree and hidden around the house!

Our Nick was not too naughty thankfully....and he left special presents for The Red Ranger on Christmas morning - an Elf ornament, polar bear christmas pj's bottoms and a grey pj top and black slippers for our son to remember him.

The other rule (which is bent quite a bit, including here) is that the Elves return with Santa on Christmas Eve. Our Nick has stayed with us past Christmas but tonight...
...on New Year's Day Night,
Nick,
will return to Santa and his family and friends.
Nick, has already informed me that he will return soon, our son's birthday is at the end of February, and then he will go back again...maybe to return again during the summer for the shore.....

We have really enjoyed having Nick in our home, we are going to miss looking for him each day. He's added to the magic of the season, kept it alive for another year (our son is 8), who knows how long he will be with us. As long as our son believes.....

Enjoy some of our pictures, I'll be adding a permanent page soon of Nick's days with us but for now...we just had to share the story of .......Nick, our Elf on the Shelf.......

...as we say goodbye....we'll miss you Nick!!


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A surprise package today....

Well we got a big surprise today, presents from a very bad friend of mine in the Boston area.

Yes, I sure did say bad...because she really shouldn't have!!!!
The Red Ranger got the coolest set for him and Daddy to build......

He can't wait to put it together!

DH got a snuggly pair of slippers that massage his feet, perfect after being on his feet for so many hours. As for me.......she's so bad, she really is.........feeding one of my biggest obsessions....

My Boyz, a 2009 calendar and the two new singles and the concert video. Like I said SHE'S BAD!! Although The Red Ranger says she's good because she sent presents........hmmmmmm. So, the first picture with The Red Ranger sitting next to the presents will be for Project 365.

On another note I decided to take pictures tonight while making one of DH's favorite meals.

The sauce is homemade. I make a huge pot of meatballs and then use the rest of the sauce for my homemade pizza's and for making chicken parm. The rest gets frozen for future dinners. It ends up being very economical.

Finally feeling better!

I'm finally starting to feel better, woke up today and I can certainly breathe better and the coughing isn't that horrible muscle-wrenching cough that I've had for days. I even feel like I slept well for the first time in a week. Now of course I have to make sure I don't do everything that I want to do and then end up overdueing (sp?) things to the point where I end up being worse.

Christmas went well considering the little guy and I were both sick, we simply concentrated on things for him and not everyone else. We ended up cancelling Christmas dinner, and I'm so glad I did, because I couldn't see knocking myself out and feeling worse and The Red Ranger not having a pleasant mom and dad to enjoy Christmas with. He has also pronounced this
"the best Christmas Ever" and still thinks that today, so we did something right.
The economy sure figured into our Christmas this year, we cancelled the trip to Disney World at the beginning of December because we didn't see how we could do both, Christmas and Disney. Simply put, there is no way that a 5 almost 6 year old child would ever understand that we went to Disney 'instead' of having a big Christmas. Also, the simple fact that he is totally 'into' the Christmas thing this year. Probably because of school and the other kids being so excited and he's just older now and he's really paying attention to all the details.

Money-wise, I would say that we spent about a quarter of what we did last year. We knocked out some of the adult family presents only having The Red Ranger give them presents he bought himself.
There were no big ticket items like last year's digital camera or Nintendo Ds's, I would have to say the most expensive item my husband and I exchanged was the $50 gift card for the pottery place I like to paint at and since he got it at auction I don't think he paid full value for it.
The gifts in fact were more thoughtful and more needed than just because we wanted them or liked them. I did get a used Zutter Bind-it-all off of Ebay, since it was the blue one I got it a lot cheaper around $25 just need to get the coils now and down the road the tool kit. Can't wait to use it.
I'm so terribly glad that we did all of the stuff leading up to Christmas because we got so sick during it. The Santa Pottery (where you paint pottery with Santa), Frosty the Snowman play, Riding the Santa Express train, even the movies to see Madgascar 2 all led up to a magical Christmas for The Red Ranger and will give him memories to last him for a long time.
And plenty of things for his mommy to scrap into her scrapbooks!

I'll blog and add pictures and details to all the Christmas activities soon but this is all I can manage right now. Right now I'm off to find the dining room table, which had been buried under wrapping stuff since Christmas and assorted toys, and to throw some meatballs and my sauce into the crockpot for dinner tonight. For now that's all I'm going to say I'm going to tackle so that I don't overdue things.
I'm also saying a prayer for baby Stellan who I read about on my friend's Renee's blog.
You can read more about Stellan and his family here. http://www.mycharmingkids.net/