"Elkie" our Elf on the Shelf

This year we started a new tradition (again!) with Elf on the Shelf.  It's such a cute book and a great idea, and our boys LOVED it!  They named him "Elkie" (not to be confused with Elfie...we called him that a lot on accident), and every morning they would run downstairs to try and see where he had moved to after he got back from the North Pole with his report to Santa (for you non-Elf on the Shelf people, basically the elf watches the kids all day, then "goes" to the North Pole to report to Santa if they behaved or not, and then comes back to the house but appears in a different spot...so it's fun to find him in a new place everyday).  This was fun for us as well for the first week...then we realized that we are NOT creative parents and we would forget to move Elkie until 2 seconds before the kids ran downstairs, which was slightly stressful!

 Our elf, Elkie

 We read the kids the Elf of the Shelf book the Sunday after Thanksgiving and started this fun tradition :)

 It's a crowd with 3 kids and a mommy in a twin size bed!

 Such a happy girl!

 CUTE boys! (the creepy elf is in the background...)

Elkie brought the kids A Muppet Christmas DVD one morning (this turned out to be a bust...they would rather watch Cars or Toy Story!  Maybe next year?!).  

So from now on after Thanksgiving, Elkie will be joining our family every year until Christmas Day.  We really like doing fun things like this because the kids get so excited.  However, we have STRESSED over and over, and we will forever do so, that Christmas is about the birth of JESUS.  We are celebrating the birthday of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and He is the reason for the season.  We tell our kids that when Elkie is at our house, he is not putting them on a naughty or nice list, he is encouraging them to love one another like Jesus taught us to, and to obey and respect your parents:

"Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.  'Honor your father and mother' (this is the first commandment with a promise), that is may go well with you and that you may live long in the land."

Ephesians 6:1-3

Santa and gifts and cookies and everything else is fun and exciting, and we love to enjoy these things with our kids, but our primary goal as parents is to build our kids foundation on the rock that is Jesus Christ.  We pray that they will know Jesus and have a relationship with Him, to glorify Him in everything that they do, to place Godly friends in their lives to encourage them and to provide them with God fearing spouses.  This Christmas we spent a lot of time in God's Word, and our prayer is that with everything that goes on during Christmas, our focus will forever be at the cross, at Jesus, at His resurrection and at His love for us.