A Letter to Santa and a Little Elf

A few years ago, my mom and dad gave us an ornament for our Christmas tree.  It's a hollow tube with one end that comes off.  It says, "Letters to Santa" on the side.  This was the first year Miss was old enough to have an understanding of the idea of writing a letter to Santa to tell him what she'd like for Christmas.  So yesterday we wrote a letter.  Really, I wrote a letter and prodded her for the things she'd like to ask Santa for.  She initially said, "A teddy bear."  When I asked what kind of teddy bear, she said, "A pink one."  This was news to me.  Every other time I've asked her what she would like from Santa, she has said, "Care Bears," even going so far as to specify a few specific Care Bears.  I have since purchased said Care Bears.  These will be gifts from Santa.  So, I must admit I kind of prompted her to include Care Bears and a few other things that "Santa" has already gotten her in her list to him. We also added a section to ask for things for Lass.

Then we rolled up the letter, put it in the tube, and hung it back on the tree.  I told Miss Santa would come to get it while she slept.

This morning we got up and went to see if Santa had taken the letter.

He did, of course. Miss thought this was quite fun.  I also used this exercise in sending a letter to Santa to introduce the "Elf on the Shelf" concept to our house.  I had gone back and forth with myself about whether we were going to have an Elf this year.  Once I learned about it, it seemed like a cute concept.  Folks seem to have lots of fun with their elves.  Miss's school has an elf they have named "Jingle."  By the time I finally decided to go ahead and get an elf, I missed the "late November" time period when these elves are supposed to arrive.  Oh well. Miss doesn't yet understand what "late November" means anyway.  So, I decided to coordinate the arrival of the Elf with the disappearance of the letter to Santa.  As in "Santa came last night and took your letter and, wow look!, he left an elf for us."  Cool, eh?  The book and box for the elf (we got "Christopher Pop-In-Kins" instead of the other Elf on the Shelf that lots of other folks get) were left under the Christmas tree where the ornament was hanging.  We read the book together this morning.  Then I pointed out to Miss that the box was empty, so the elf must be hiding!  She found him pretty quickly (see the little elf below on the mantle in front of the white-framed photo of the girls).  She was a little excited to find the elf and tell him "Hello," though I'm not entirely sure she understands the whole thing.  It's okay. If nothing else it will be fun to hide the Elf each night and let her find him each morning.

And speaking of Elves...  This little elf's sweet personality has just been blossoming!  She is such a funny and feisty and loving little girl!  Her big thing lately is giving kisses.  A LOT of kisses.  She'll just walk up and kiss me wherever she can reach me.  On my knee if I'm standing.  On my big belly if I'm sitting.  On my arm if I'm changing her diaper.

She gives kisses just as much to her daddy and sister.  She gives kisses to the dog.  It makes me melt to see the girls giving each other hugs and kisses.  Big sister seems to enjoy the lovins and there is a lot of hugging and kissing between those two these days.

Talk about holiday spirit!