Making {Easy} Elf Traditions
I know the Elf holds really high feelings, loathing, loving, disdain, joy. That’s fine, you do you. At my house, I LOVE the Elf! Not for behavioral reasons, but because of the magic and joy I can foster. Being a creative, coming up with Elf joy come really easy to me. That being said, our Elf isn’t behavior based or naughty, they are just fun and full of magic! But that’s not what we’re here to talk about. There are some things our Elf does every year and that also helps knock down the days I have to plan Elf-capades.
I’m here to share some of our Elf traditions with all of you, maybe you’ll adopt a few of your own!
The week of Christmas, 20th-24th the following things always happen, usually in this order:
– Candy Cane Hunt
– Elf Donut Breakfast
– Elf Cookies
– Streamers
– PJ’s & a book, bedroom doors get wrapped
Let’s break it down.
The Candy Cane Hunt.
We have three kids, so we hide one pack of candy canes (12 candy canes total). Once they’ve gone to bed we hang candy cane’s all over the living room and kitchen. Our kids are 11, 8, & 6 we don’t make the hiding spots particularly difficult. We’ll hang a few in the Christmas tree, dangling from stockings, on cabinet pulls and doorknobs, you get the idea. Then the Elf (or elves at our house) is set on the shelf with a sign I drew (but you can easily print) stating that they have hidden 12 candy canes for the kids to find. Our kids get to find 4 each. When we had just one kid we tried all twelve the first year, but it was a lot of candy, so we lowered it and added candy canes as siblings came along.
Pro-tip: make a note on your phone where you hide those candy canes because mom-brain WILL strike and there will be at least one candy cane you forget where you hid it!
Elf Donut Breakfast.
This one can vary, we make it a little extra, but it could easily be just a pile of donuts for breakfast. We get those Donnette’s; chocolate covered & powdered sugar. Using icing make a carrot nose, coal eyes on the powdered sugar donuts. The reindeer are made with the chocolate donuts, pretzels for antlers & icing or mini chocolate chips for eyes. They’re left on special Christmas plates for the kids to eat for breakfast. 
Elf Cookies.
We get our Elf cookies from Rane or Shine Designs, they’re the tiniest cookies served on an edible elf cookie sheet (also a cookie). The kids love them so much! It’s an easy task. If you don’t want to order special elf cookies you could use any cookie really, a gingerbread man, an elf cookie, chocolate chip. What kid wouldn’t love a cookie for breakfast?! We always have Christmas Milk (or eggnog) in the fridge for Elf Cookie day–so the elves usually get credit for bringing that too.
Streamers.
The elves will streamer the door or the hallway to the kids’ rooms. This is a relatively simple task, you can crisscross the streamers across their doors (or the hallway), or you can tape them to the top of the door frame and let them dangle down (a sort of streamer waterfall). We keep a stash of red & green streamers in our elf props for this day each year. The kids love busting through the streamers in the morning.
Christmas Eve PJs and Book.
Every Christmas Eve the elves bring pajamas and a book (or movie). It used to be matching pajamas but the last few years have been onesies that catered to their interests. We bought a sturdy box chest from Michael’s on clearance over a decade ago, and the jams & book are always placed in that box. The box also makes elf removal fairly easy bc the elves rest in said box until the next year, so we always know where to find them!
There you have it! That’s our Christmas week of elves all planned out.
Five less days of planning! A few other traditional days we have are our Shrinking Wish Lists that you can read about here & our Cocoa bar. Our elves always bring us a hot cocoa bar every year. What’s in the bar varies on what I can find around town, but there are mugs, cocoa, cookies, marshmallows, and usually some candy canes involved. A few years ago, I splurged on custom Elf mugs from Personalization Mall and the kids absolutely LOVE them! I hope these traditions help you make some magic this Christmas season! At the very least, maybe it will lessen the load of thinking up new elf experiences!
