Elf on the Shelf Meets 25 Days of Books

Merry Christmas!

It's my favorite time of year, and I'm very excited to have a 3-year-old and 1-year-old to celebrate the joys of the season with. I can't believe that my eldest is celebrating Christmas for the fourth year. It means that he really looks forward to our traditions and is beginning to grasp what the Christmas season is all about.
Last year, we adopted an Elf on the Shelf named "Elphaba" a.k.a. "Elphie" and her Elf Pet "Rainy" as part of our traditions. This year, December first rolled around and despite my careful planning, I realized that Elphie and Rainy were still somehow in their boxes in the closet, and had not yet made their way to be seen by my children.
A) How dare they. Don't they know how Christmas magic works?
B) Thankfully my kids are young enough to not care that their Christmas friends made a late appearance.
Anyway, a little quick thinking later, and I came up with a solution to many of the Elf on the Shelf woes that I (and probably? - other parents) have encountered.

Problem: The elf doesn't move. The nerve.
Solution: A letter pouch! I used this cute little "magical" red bag as means of communication between elf and child. The child can ask the elf a question such as "why didn't you move last night?" and magically, they may await an answer, in which their not is replaced in the bag with a response from their elf or elves.

Problem: The elf promotes fear, not holiday giving and joy.
Solution: The pouch wins again. I have seen adorable things on Pinterest in which parents use their elves to instill the true meaning of Christmas in their children. Our elf writes suggestions and places them in the magical bag. Things like "make a Christmas card for someone in the hospital" or "fill a bag with toys to donate" then are the actions that the elf is looking out for. The challenge isn't about avoiding naughty behavior as much as it is about increasing the nice behavior.
*Side note: I'm not going to lie, if my children are misbehaving while our elf is about, I do like to pause and whisper "oh my goodness, did you hear that? Is that the sound of an elf taking notes?" All in good fun. ;)

Problem: The Elf takes too much effort, especially considering all 25 of the books you must wrap to be carefully unwrapped and read each night.
Other problem: All that wrapping takes a TON of time in itself.
Even more problems (have we reached 99 yet?): Young children might unwrap them BEFORE the very night that it was intended to be unwrapped!
SOLUTION!! Our very lovely Elphie was happy to assist us with our 25 Days of Books tradition. Instead of wrapping each one individually, we have a larger, perfectly book-sized magical bag which Elphie miraculously fills with a new Christmas-themed book each night. It saved the elf "helpers" lots of time, took away about 24 days of temptation from the youngsters of this household, and is pretty darn eco-friendly if I say so myself.

I used Thirty-One's Timeless Memory Pouches for the magical bags. The price was right ($5 for a two-pack of one large and one small pouch) and the quality definitely will last us at least as long as Elphie does. You can buy them here: https://www.mythirtyone.com/JasmineGonzalez/shop/Catalog/ItemDetail/3885?isSummary=False

Which books are your favorites to read at Christmas time? Comment below! I'll be sharing the 25 that we have used for our first year of beginning this special tradition, along with some classic favorites, in my next post.

-Sarah