Some Women are Geniuses

Seriously, the inventors of the "Elf on the Shelf" are awesome. I bought in to the commercialization and purchased one at Hallmark. Brian of course wanted me to just buy an elf and use the gimmick, but I like to support the great minds who came up with the idea, so I bought the real deal. So far so good. Of course, my children with their completely unoriginal naming tendencies, named the elf "Elfie". Shane began his 100 questions. Why isn't he real, why doesn't he move, why doesn't he talk, why can't we touch him, why can't we watch him move, when does he tell Santa, on and on. But bottom line, they are thinking twice before behaving badly because they are afraid the elf will report back to Santa. As for now, I have told my kids they are already on the naughty list and will not get on the nice list until they have major attitude improvements. Is it just my kids or do all kids get worse this time of year? Shane has had a great few months and now the past 2 weeks have been terrible. Last year he was so bad that he DID NOT get presents from Santa. I know, call CPS, we may be the only parents to actually follow through and not allow presents from Santa in our house. My mom was mortified and threatened to wrap gifts and sign them from Santa. They got gifts from family, but none from Santa. I don't even think he noticed, so a lot of good that did. I told him that he may be the only kid to go two years in a row with no gifts from Santa.