{"id":1363,"date":"2020-11-27T13:52:45","date_gmt":"2020-11-27T02:52:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/?p=1363"},"modified":"2021-11-23T17:15:09","modified_gmt":"2021-11-23T06:15:09","slug":"the-best-alternative-to-elf-on-the-shelf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/the-best-alternative-to-elf-on-the-shelf\/","title":{"rendered":"The Best Alternative To Elf On The Shelf"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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I don\u2019t know about you, but I\u2019ve never really been a big fan of Elf On The Shelf. Don\u2019t get me wrong, I\u2019m not at all Bah Humbug about Christmas and having fun family Christmas traditions to enjoy with the kids.<\/p>

I even enjoy looking at some of the antics the elves get up to at my friend\u2019s houses on their Facebook and Insta feeds. But, we\u2019ve never had an official Elf On The Shelf in our house. I\u2019m sorry, but I can\u2019t get past the fact that these creepy elves have been sent by Santa to spy on my kids.<\/p>

Without consciously meaning to or even knowing I was doing it, my children have been raised with an attachment<\/a><\/span> or gentle-parenting<\/a><\/span> style of parenting. I\u2019d never even heard of the terms when my motherhood journey began, I just followed my instincts and that\u2019s how it worked out!<\/p>

We co-slept, breastfed, carried our babies in baby carriers<\/a><\/span> and never left them to \u201ccry it out\u201d as was the recommended norm if you wanted to sleep through the night. That style has continued as my babies have grown up – we discuss and help to solve problems rather than threaten and punish.<\/p>

So, the thought of telling my children that an elf had been sent by Santa to spy on them and then report any bad behaviour back to Santa was just too incongruent with the kind of upbringing they were used to and didn\u2019t sit right with me.<\/p>

But, don\u2019t worry! My kids didn\u2019t miss out on the fun! A few years back when the Elf On The Shelf movement was really taking its stride, I managed to find a cute little toy elf (much better looking than the real elf on the shelf dolls) at a local shop.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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This elf then magically appeared with some treats for the kids and a note to tell them that he was here to help them get ready for Christmas.<\/p>

He would do similar, fun things overnight, usually not quite as mischievous as a typical elf on the shelf, and the kids would find him each morning, sometimes with a new Christmas tree ornament, a treat, a Christmas book to read or maybe a note telling them what to do next to get ready for Christmas.<\/p>

Our elf was fun! He was helpful and giving and, best of all, the kids could touch him and cuddle him as much as they liked!<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Each year our elf would return to help us get ready for Christmas. Often he would bring a new elf friend and our collection, and obsession, with Christmas elves got bigger. <\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Then, last year, a new elf arrived! We arrived home one day to find possibly the cutest elf ever, sitting on our doorstep with a note tucked up under his arm.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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On reading the note we discovered that we had been elfed! Somebody (we still don\u2019t know who but I\u2019m tipping it was someone who knew about our Christmas Elf obsession) had left an elf, by stealth, on our front step!<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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What a fantastic new Christmas tradition! I had never heard of an Elf By Stealth<\/a><\/span> before this cute little guy turned up at our front door – have you guys heard of it? Is this a thing that I have somehow missed?<\/p>

If you\u2019ve not heard of it before, it\u2019s all explained here<\/a><\/span> for you but, the crux of it is, you can choose to keep the elf you\u2019ve been given or pass it on to someone else by stealthily delivering it to them – the idea is that no one knows where their elf came from, just that it has been delivered to them in an effort to spread the joy of giving at Christmas time.<\/p>

There\u2019s a note you can print<\/a><\/span> to deliver with the elf to explain the game to the next recipient and keep the Christmas fun spreading through your neighbourhood.<\/p>

Of course I couldn\u2019t part with the elf we found. He was just too cute to not keep him! But, I loved the concept of this new Christmas tradition so much that I ordered 2 more elves (they\u2019re available here on amazon<\/a><\/span>) and printed out 2 new notes<\/a><\/span> and stealthily delivered them to 2 families nearby.<\/p>

That was exhilarating! All of the decisions, planning and execution were a whole family event. It\u2019s actually kind of scary trying to sneak up to someone\u2019s doorstep and leave them an elf and a note without being seen. We even got sprung by the resident cat at one of the houses we delivered to.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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I\u2019m certainly not suited to a life of crime! But, it really was fun back at home wondering whether our chosen recipients had discovered their elves yet.<\/p>

And whether they would guess it had come from us – many fun conversations were had and you could really feel the sentiment of the joy of giving (with no recognition or reward) seeping through.<\/p>

We were all just genuinely excited for the families to receive their elves and we hoped they would get as much excitement and joy from receiving them as we did from giving them.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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So, whether you\u2019re looking for a Christmas tradition that\u2019s better than Elf On The Shelf, or you\u2019re just looking for a new fun family Christmas tradition to start, check out elfbystealth.com<\/a><\/span> – buy an elf<\/a><\/span>, print a note<\/a>,<\/span> and stealthily deliver your elf to a friend, relative or someone in need of some Christmas cheer.<\/p>

It\u2019s definitely the best alternative to Elf On The Shelf I\u2019ve ever seen, and it\u2019s a great, new, family Christmas elf tradition!<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I don\u2019t know about you, but I\u2019ve never really been a big fan of Elf On The Shelf. Don\u2019t get me wrong, I\u2019m not at all Bah Humbug about…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1371,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[268,255,254,265,256,267,262,264,259,253,269,257,270,271,266,260,866,261,263,258],"table_tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1363"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2244,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363\/revisions\/2244"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1363"},{"taxonomy":"table_tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.mumknowsbest.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/table_tags?post=1363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}