Making Memories with a Christmas Elf

  Last year, we got a very special visitor a couple of weeks before Christmas Eve - Ella the Elf!

  I got the great idea from The Connection We Share, and adapted it just a bit. (She even offers printables to make it extra-easy for you - check it out!) 

  Each morning cute little Ella would bring a special treat or activity idea in a letter, with necessary supplies to go with it in a paper bag. 

 The first morning I sat her in the window with a letter address to Kay and said nothing about it. It was mid-morning before she finally spotted the special visitor, sitting innocuously on the shelf, and the note with her very own name on it - and eagerly handed it to me to read. It was just an introduction - My name is Ella and Santa has assigned me to be your elf this year! Nice to meet you! Each morning I'll bring a special treat or activity to do and each night I'll return to the North Pole to help finish making the toys. But don't worry - I'll be back again the next day with something special!

  In the interest of full disclosure, day one certainly didn't go as I had imagined it in my head. When I read the letter, Kay started to cry. "But I don't WANT her to go back to the North Pole at night!" Great way to make memories, I remember thinking to myself ruefully. But the rest of the days went much better. (Thankfully!)

 Some of the ideas we did are listed before. I'm not including them all, since The Connection We Share did such a marvelous job coming up with creative ideas that I'm simply going to send you there for the full details. My main adaption was to make the letters a bit shorter (Kay's 4 year old attention span wouldn't hold out longer than a few sentences in most cases, even if that author was an elf from the North Pole!)

"I love jingle bells! Will you make me a jingle necklace?" (In the bag was pipe cleaners and jingle bells)

  "Your tree is beautiful - but it's missing something. I know! Let's make an ornament for it!" (Included with some ornament-making materials.)

 Candy cane seeds - put in special North Pole snowflakes (white hole punch paper) and these special seeds (peppermint candy). "Then leave it someplace cold. You'll be surprised at what grows!"

 "Hot chocolate is our favorite drink at the North Pole. I always put lots of marshmallows and sprinkle crushed candy canes on top. Today you can make your own!" (With mini-marshmallows and instant cocoa)

  One morning in the bathtub, with Kay's name written in foam letters and stuck to the bathtub wall.

  One day she brought a Christmas book. "I love with Mrs. Claus reads us stories around the fireplace. What is your favorite Christmas story? This is mine - let's read it together!"

  "What is your favorite Christmas movie? Let's watch it today!" (with microwave popcorn)

 One morning she brought chocolate chips to make cookies but they got so excited they jumped out of the bag and scattered around the house. Kay was asked to help find them. (This was actually the trickiest one - hiding the chocolate chips in a place where the dogs couldn't eat them! Chocolate is a big doggie no-no!)

  But the favorites, by far, where the days Ella brought poop as a snack. No, wait for it. "Snowman poop" was really powdered donut holes and "reindeer poop" was chocolate-covered raisins. Gross? Definitely. And that's why my preschooler loved it the most, no doubt!

 My main surprise about it all: while I expected Kay to love it and to be excited about Ella, I didn't realize how much fun I would have with this whole thing. It give us a new activity to do together each day, and making memories is what the holidays is all about for me! Kay is already asking if Ella will be visiting again this year. I pretend not to know, saying, "I hope so! We'll have to wait and see!" but the truth is - oh, yeah! She's definitely coming again! I just have to get thinking about some ideas for this year.