Christmas Traditions

I feel like Christmas is coming up so quickly this year! I think Thanksgiving being late has thrown us off a little bit. There were many Christmas activities going on in our area this weekend and I wanted to take the kids to enjoy at least one of them. We decided to brave the cold and visit Santa and some of his live reindeer at a local outdoor mall and then take a drive through the Festival of Lights.

Even with the cold there was a long line to see jolly ole Saint Nick so we decided just to see his reindeer this time. I don't know if I have ever seen live reindeer so it was fun for all of us. The one the kids got to pet was named Jingle Bells. :)

It was hard to get a great picture with a moving reindeer and three cold kids but the ones we got were pretty good.   I loved the sparkly balls on his antlers and his sparkly hooves!

Love my girls! 

A sweet lady must have seen us taking pictures and asked if we wanted her to take one of all 5 of us. So nice of her! 

I remember going to see the Festival of Lights as a kid but it has been years and years. I think our 2 year old enjoyed it the most of our three kids. She was so excited and made sure we saw each display. :)

Our 4 year old looking at the lights with her friend baby Ariel 

Our 7 year old wasn't that excited about the idea of looking at a bunch of lights but he started to enjoy it after a little while and wanted to go through again when we were finished. :)

One of the many displays 

So many of our friends have an Elf that visits them each Christmas season.  I wasn't sure about the idea at first, but after seeing how much fun people seemed to be having with it on facebook and instagram we decided to start the tradition with our kids.  I found a letter from Santa on Pinterest here that incorporates Jesus in to the tradition and focuses more on Grace and less on the naughty/nice list.  I really liked that idea and Santa left a letter for the kids explaining his friend the Elf when he sent him to our house on Saturday evening.

I was expecting the kids to be excited about the Elf, but I didn't think they would be quite as excited as they were.  They love him!  They got to choose a name for their new friend the Elf and our son said, what about Scootie?  That is the name of their Grandpa and Grandma's mini dachshund and our 4 year old agreed that should be his name. :)  Even though Santa's letter put more focus on Grace than on the naughty/nice list, we still saw immediate improvement in the kids' behavior.  Our 4 year old especially!  We are already enjoying having him visit.  Our 7 year old knew he was an Elf on the Shelf because other kids in his class talk about their elves.  He had some doubt that the Elf was "just like any other toy" but still seems excited about it.

They didn't want Scootie the Elf to get bored during the night so they brought him a few toys to play with.  When our son moved his Minion the Elf fell over.  Our 2 year old sat him back up and the older two were so upset because she touched him!  Ha ha.  They don't want him to lose his magical powers.  We told them we are sure Santa knows that 2 year olds don't always understand the rules as well as older kids, and that she was really just trying to help Scootie.

The first morning after his arrival, our 4 year old woke up first and she immediately said we need to find Scootie!  She found him hanging out high up in our Christmas tree and they were happy to see that he brought them each a sweet treat and the older two each an Elf on the Shelf coloring book to thank them for letting him visit us.  I see this being a fun tradition for our family for years. :)