Invasion of the Elves

I mentioned in our Christmas morning post that mom and dad only bought the boys one joint Christmas present this year but Santa more than made up for that. And amazingly he knew we'd need his presents BEFORE our trip so he sent his elves to deliver our stocking the night before we left. What a thoughtful Santa!
Of course he couldn't come himself, what with last minute fattening up and toying making and such, so he sent a few elves to deliver them.
Unfortunately (and much to the surprise and joy of Isaac and Ethan), elves are messy and leave little footprints everywhere. And if you forgot to leave out cookies for them (we did since we weren't expecting them) they will steal and eat yours and leave the crumbs for you to clean up.

So Friday morning we woke to find little white (amazingly they smelled and tasted a lot like powdered sugar) footprints from the chimney to the kitchen and back.
They'd left a note from Santa explaining it all and leaving everyone a nice surprise in their stocking. Okay so Taylor's got left on the ground since he doesn't even have a stocking. We really need to stay home one of these years so I bother to get the Christmas basics.

Those sneaky elves came right down the chimney. How convenient that they left footprint proof!

And tracked it all the way to the kitchen!

Santa was very generous this year- apparently he knows how much we travel. Each of the boys got an ipod touch full of (very familiar, okay so we listen to it in the car daily) music, movies (what a surprise, they're the same ones we know and love), and games (yes, even angry birds and plants vs. zombies much to moms dismay). (Okay so Miles MAY have gotten an old iphone that now doesn't have service and functions as an ipod touch).

Santa may have gone a little overboard but after the last few trips of having to drag an ENTIRE carry on bag full of gameboys, portable DVD players, leapsters, books, music, and toys to entertain 3 boys on long flights back and forth across the country and even across the world, mom may have put in a small request.

We're liking the idea of 1 devide per child for all their entertainment needs- movies, music, games, even books. 1 device to charge. 1 device to keep track of. Simple. That's what we're going for. And then when we're home, they'll mostly be put away and all the fun (so sad) games will be removed (bye, bye angry birds) and the educational ones left for when they earn some electronic time (which takes a LOT in this house, thank you strict mom).

What I was most happy about this morning was that although the boys were very happy about getting ipods (they're constantly asking to use our iphones to play the games) they were even more excited that actual ELVES had come to their home. They literally told EVERY person at school and the airport the whole story and just could NOT believe that those "sneaky" (as they called them) had stolen our cookies and made such a mess. It was truly fun to see them so excited about the elves. Here's to hoping the elves become a tradition they love and remember for years.