Earl

Gee. Everyone seems so interested in little Earl.

Earl is our "Elf on the Shelf." It's a gift pack you can buy that comes with a book and an Elf. The story is that the Elf gets "adopted" into your family for the holidays. He's always watching you, and at night, when we are sleeping, Earl flies to the North Pole to tell Santa if you've been good, bad, what you want for Christmas, etc... Then, every morning, Earl is in a different place in the house. He's been in the tree, on doorknobs, on top of the cabinet, hanging from light fixtures, and many more strange places. No one can touch him, though. His magic may just disappear.

This morning, Earl was in one of our plants (yes, that's an AquaGlobe...I don't recommend them).

This is the first year we have done this. I'd seen the book/elf before, but never bought it. When I was in South Carolina, we ran across the book/elf at a toy store and Nicole's kids were totally taken by it. So I purchased an elf for us (and for Nicole's family, but she's not been real happy with me about it...her kids write letters to their elf and have gotten much more into it!)

Anyway, the kids love it. They are constantly reminding each other that God and Earl are watching them, so be good! It wasn't enough, however, to be able to bypass the "jewel project." Together they work out well, though. Earl will to the North Pole on Christmas Eve and return to us again next year.

I would highly recommend "The Elf on the Shelf" to anyone. Maybe it will be one of those after Christmas sales you can't live without! It's been really fun seeing where he turns up in the mornings. The kids are a whole lot better at finding him than I am half the time. The funny thing is, since Zac gets up so early, he always seems to be able to find him before us ;o)