A Catastrophe of Elfin Proportions...

As we were rushing around the house on Friday to try and get out the door for our annual pilgrimmage to see Santa and eat at the Walnut Room, disaster struck our elf, Fred. Fred was perched on to of the chalkboard in the kitchen, where he had left a message: "Fred was here." Jack decided he wanted to write a message back to him. Half way through the "F," the chalkboard wobbled, and Fred plunged to the floor, but not before bouncing off Jack's shoulder first. Jack was devastated. Amidst his sobbing and giant tears, I learned what happened. As I tried to calm him down by explaining that it was just an accident, and that I was certain that Fred had not lost his magic when Jack accidentally touched him, Cory was giving me the signal to not say anymore. It turns out that Fred's leg had broken off and was m.i.a. As Fred was quickly hidden before the kids noticed the missing limb, I swept the kitchen floor hoping to catch the leg. While I was doing that, having told the kids that Fred was probably hiding because he was shaken up from his fall, Jack went and got a jingle bell ornament. He shook the bells saying, through sniffles, "Maybe if he hears a Christmas sound, he'll want to come back." It was simultaneously adorable and heart breaking. I was starting to panic internally about the leg when Harry piped up, "Hey! I found Fred's foot!" (Or, if you know Harry: "Hey! I thound Thred's thoot!) As he didn't seem upset at all, I thanked him for the leg and hid it in the palm of my hand. In the meantime, the bells not working, Jack remembered that in the Elf on the Shelf movie, the elf got hot chocolate as medicine to make him better. When I reached into the cabinet for a mug, Jack was concerned that it was way to big for Fred. Knowing that Addie had a little porcelain tea set in her closet, (Cory got it for her birthday,) I used that opportunity to sneak Fred and the glue gun upstairs while I looked for a suitably sized mug. The hot chocolate (and me hiding in the upstairs bathroom with a hot glue gun) worked its magic, and soon Fred was "drawn to the scent of the hot chocolate," according to Cory, and was sitting on the window sill waiting for his mug of chocolatey goodness. Jack left a few cookie crumbs, and when we got home the next night, Fred was sitting at a different window with an empty mug. And all was well with the world.