A Visitor in the Troyer Home

Sammy ~ our friendly scout elf

I have to thank Angie, from Bring the Rain for this wonderful new guest we have in our home. Dawson is just elated to have Sammy, our Christmas elf, joining us this year. If you have never heard of the "Elf on the Shelf" you have to check this out, especially if you have young children.

Sammy showed up in our mailbox and Dawson hasn't been the same since! I honestly don't know who has been more excited about this, Dawson or myself. I could hardly wait to read the book to Dawson after getting our scout elf all nestled in his stocking. I read the "The Elf on the Shelf" book to Dawson and we talked about this new visitor that was in our home. Dawson's first task was to name his elf. Dawson is obsessed with the name Sammy, hence the name of our former dog and our scout elf. The book basically explains how Santa knows if you have been naughty or nice. He simply sends out scout elves to watch over children. The elves then report back to Santa at night when the kids are sleeping. In the morning, Sammy finds a new place to watch the kids from for that day. Dawson loves searching for Sammy in the morning and is quick to grab the book if he can't find him. It doesn't say that you have to do this, Dawson just believes that if he hears the story he will be able to locate him :) A few rules of Sammy's...he can't talk, per Santa's law and he can't be touched or he will lose his Christmas magic that allows him to fly back to the North Pole each night.

I'm telling you, it is just adorable to see Dawson with this elf. The first day, I was baking cookies in the kitchen and Dawson was talking to Sammy. I heard him say, "Sammy, make sure you tell Santa that I'm going to make him cookies tomorrow. And, Sammy, I'm going to be really, really good." So sweet! Now, of course Dawson never fails to tell Sammy each time Lane does something that would be disapproving in Santa's eyes. Oh, brothers...so funny.

So, I am just so happy to have found a new Christmas tradition! I just had to share it with you. One more to add to the list. The more you have the better, so we've started quite a few in our family. I love the traditions my family has had since I was a child. I think I may have been a freshman in college when I finally stopped making my name tags for Santa. Really, I know, it's sad. My mom used to give us cut-outs from paper bags that we had to write our names on. I can remember it like it was yesterday, she used those giant zigzag shears that were silver with black handles. You see, I get procrastination (is that a word) from my mom. Her tradition was to wait until the last minute to wrap Christmas gifts. When I say last minute, I mean Christmas Eve between the Smith Christmas ending at approximately 9:00 pm until we went to Christmas Eve Services at 11:00 pm. She really counted on my aunts to help get all the work done, cracks me up just thinking about how they must have been rushing to get things done. Funny, we never really questioned why we weren't allowed downstairs on Christmas Eve with all the "big people". So, while all the adults were downstairs wrapping gifts, all of the children were upstairs making our name tags for Santa. As the oldest, I always made sure that everyone was working to get them done. You know, surely the more name tags you had the more gifts you were going to get. Oh, the good 'ol days.

As much as I love all these traditions, it is most important to us that our children know the true meaning of Christmas: Jesus, the greatest gift of all. I struggle with teaching this to a four year old and would welcome any parental advice in this area. I feel like I'm always reminding him "why do we have Christmas? Whose birthday is it?" The great thing, he always knows the answer.

More to come in the next few days. There's so much happening at the Troyer Household during this busy time of year. I'll be sharing pictures of our trip to see "The Nutcracker" and ofcourse, I have some too-cute, kid quotes to share!

Hugs to each of you!

Jenn