20 easy Elf on the Shelf ideas

This was our first year to have an Elf on the Shelf.  My daughter LOVED it!  I must admit, it was pretty fun for me too!  I have seen some crazy stuff on the internet that people do with their elves, but there was no head shaving or undecorating the Christmas tree at our house.  Our elf was cute and mischievious, but not messy or bad.  Here are 15 of the easiest things we did with him...fun the easy way...just my style!

1.  Reading a book ('twas the night before Christmas)

 



 

2.  In the car...

 

3.  In the bathroom wrapped up in a little toilet paper.  If you enjoy cleaning up messes, he could toilet paper a whole room!

 



4.  On top of the cake plate trying to steal the cookies...

 



 

 

5.  Making paper snowflakes...



 

6.  We homeschool and have a big white board, but he could leave a message on any white board you might have.

 

7.  Turned the milk green in the fridge...

8.  putting a puzzle together...

9.  playing a game of Candyland with friends...



10.  He drew a picture of himself and put it on Claire's bulletin board...

 

11.  He decorated a house plant....

 

12.  Having a tea party with friends...



13.  under the tree among the presents....

14.  helping with homework?  Claire left her handwriting book out and he practiced writing his name in cursive...

15.  Playing with toys...he just happened to be playing with zoo animals the day we were going to the zoo!

16.  This is Pete with my daughter's camera.  When she looked at the pictures on it, she found pictures of him...in the Christmas tree, with the cat, etc.



 

17.  We have had an unusually warm December this year so when we got a cold front Pete was ready with the hot chocolate ingredients...

 

18.  He ate a cookie out of the cookie jar...

 

 

19.  He climbed the Jesse Tree.  If you don't have a Jesse tree, he could climb the Christmas tree or a house plant instead.

 

 

20.  One night Pete made a sugar molecule.  Now, this got included in the "easy" post because I needed 1 more easy thing to make 20.  :)

However, this could be done easier if you don't have a molecule kit.  We just happened to have bought one because we were studying molecules that week.  He could also draw the sugar molecule or print it off from the internet.

Jesse Tree Part 2

Claire is still really enjoying the Jesse tree and I think she's learning a lot too.  She's heard all these stories before, but I think they are really sticking with her this time.  And she loves making the ornaments!

Day 4:  Abraham..

"Look up at the sky and count the stars, if you can. Just so shall your descendants be."

Day 5:  Abraham & Isaac

Used a cardboard coaster for this one too.  Those free coasters we got at the state fair are really coming in handy!

 

Day 6:  Jacob's ladder



Day 7:  Joseph's coat of many colors

I traced a coat pattern that I got off the internet onto a piece of stiff felt and Claire added different colored ribbon.

Day 8:  Baby Moses

We used a half of a walnut shell, glued some cotton in it and glued a little plastic baby on the cotton.  I have a whole package of these little babies left over from the King Cake I made for Mardi Gras.



Day 9:  The Passover

I just printed out a sheep pattern from the internet and Claire glued on pieces of cotton balls and a wiggly eye.



If you want to see Days 1-3 click Part 1.

Elf on the Shelf (Wordful Wednesday)

I caved and got my daughter an elf on the shelf this year.  She's 10 and know the "truth" about Christmas, but she likes to pretend she doesn't.  And you know what?  I like to pretend she doesn't either so that's why I was suckered into paying 30 bucks for this thing.  (Shhh!!  No one tell my husband what it cost!)  Anyway, we've been doing it for 2 days now and it's a lot of fun...and apparantly we got a really smart elf because we've found him reading and writing so far...maybe his educational diligence will rub off on Claire!

This is "Pete."  I have no idea why she named him Pete.  I wanted to name him Elfred...because he's a red elf and if you switch the words you get Elf-red.  Claire was not amused by that and named him Pete. :)

I'm linking up with Parenting by Dummies today for WW.  Stop by and join in the fun!

Jesse Tree Part 1

We are doing a Jesse tree for the first time this year.  I saw some kits online, but I thought it would be fun to make all our own ornaments.  We are doing so with just stuff we already had around the house...I didn't go out and buy anything for it.  Today is day 3 and Claire is really enjoying it!
To read about the Jesse tree click here.

 

Our actual "tree" is a branch off of one of the MANY crepe myrtles in our back yard!

(I'm always happy to trim away at part of that jungle!)

 

Day 1:   The Story of Creation

For this ornament I spray painted a cardboard coaster and Claire put a glow in the dark sticker of the earth on the front...



and heavenly bodies on the back...



Day 2:  The Fall of Man

For this ornament we used a styrofoam apple decoration that had been cut off of a bigger decoration.  It used to be gold with sparkles (that's why it's bumpy!) but I spray painted it red.  Claire used straight pins to pin a little rubber snake around it.

 



 

 

Day 3:  Noah and the Flood

For this ornament I cut a circle out of cardstock and Claire glued on a yarn rainbow.

There are also 2 identical butterfly stickers on the back. 

They were the only "animal" stickers that I had 2 of!



I'll post the rest of the ornaments as we do them.  This is turning out to be a really fun project!

Monopoly Party

We hosted a Monopoly party for my son's homeschool youth group this weekend.  I made these little notepads for party favors...

 

 

It was a combination party/donation drive for Catholic Charities.  We made a list of needed items and assigned a dollar amount to each.  The kids could bring items to earn extra monopoly money to start the game with.  This is what we collected...

 

The kids played 4 different game boards. 

Star Wars...



 

Disney...

 

 

Looney Tunes...

 

 

and of course, Classic Monopoly...

 

 

The winner of each board went on to play the Monopoly Deal card game.  The winner of that card game was crowned "Monopoly King" and won 100 grand bars for him and each of the people who were at his original board.  I also found this monopoly shirt on walmart.com so this was the grand prize...

 

My son ended up winning the whole tournament.  I told him that wasn't fair since he was the host, but he said he didn't care.  He wanted the shirt!! :)

 



The individual game winners won these prizes...

I got the bags from Oriental Trading and printed out my own pictures to iron on.  Then, I scanned the $500 bill from each of the 4 games and printed it out to make a bookmark.  I filled the bags with bubble gum coins, chocolate coins and payday bars. :)

We hope to make this a yearly event using different boards each year.

 



Catching up!

October was a busy month!  Novemeber is goig to be pretty busy too!

I never did a Halloween post or an All Saints post like I usually do so I guess I'll combine them into one!  The kids went to a party at a friend's house on Halloween.  They had fun trick-or-treating with their friends.  They were a pretty big group...

My kids were Dorothy and Perry. :)

 



Before Halloween my son's bookclub read Frankenstein.  I made these rice krispie treat monsters for them.  The original recipe says to make them green, but in the book the monster is NOT green so I stayed true to the book even though they would have looked cuter green!

Our homeschool group has an All Saints Party every year.  This year Claire went as St. Elizabeth of Hungary.  I love that there were "princess saints" because with all I had going on we had to throw the costume together at the last minute!

 

Nathan's teen youth group puts on the All Saints Party for the little kids.  He doesn't dress up anymore, but here he is working the St. George and the Dragon game...

 

Wordless Wednesday

  This week's theme is Disney Costumes/attire. I love how Mickey is always dressed for the occasion!