Shelf Life

We were late comers to the Elf on the Shelf movement.  

It was a great epiphany for me to realize that even though my kids are grown, 

it's not too late to get in on the fun.  

After reading }this{ post from Barb at Second Chance to Dream,
I was inspired to get an elf and do it anyway, 

and my family agreed to play along.  

We took turns and everyone had their assigned days to decide what the elf would do. 

I will say that having six people to spread the responsibility among was a great thing ... 

I'm not sure we'd have made it to Christmas if it was all up to me and LtDan every single day.  

Even so, there were a few mornings when oops, someone forgot :o)  

Moms and Dads of young kids and doing all things Christmas and Elf on the Shelf, we salute you!

We named our elf Keebler, 

and his arrival was celebrated by the stick people on top of the entertainment center ...

After his big welcome party, Keebler was hanging from the ceiling fan ... 

He got stuck inside the postbox ...

Spent a night in the pantry ...

and considered changing his hat ...

We think he liked the new wreath ( click }here{ to see how I made it ... it was super easy!)

This is where the fact that we have teenagers participating becomes clear ...

and again ...

and yet again, naughty elf ...

We used Barb's cute free printables ...

There were the obligatory antics in powdered sugar...

And of course galavanting with reindeer ...

One night Keebler managed to get himself locked outside ...

He had a great view of all the fun from the light over the kitchen bar ... 

And finished up his tour just so ...

At first, everyone was clearly just indulging mom and I know my kids thought it was dorky, 

but as the month progressed, they caught the vision and in the end admitted it was fun.

We had a great time adding this new layer to family Christmas tradition ...

I think it's going to have a long shelf life!