Let’s face it, the elf is creepy. I resisted. I did. I completely refused for a while. I figured my kids are weird, unsocialized homeschoolers, so maybe they won’t find out, right? I forgot they look at Facebook over my shoulder and scour Pinterest.
The Libertarian lurking inside me yelled, “Don’t condition your babies to accept some seemingly benign cherub with a super creepy grin watching their every move and reporting to the “Big Guy”…!”
The lazy, grouchy mom who only “occasionally” rears her ugly head screamed, “Why do you commercialized holiday-making jerks have to create another expectation for my kids at Christmas? Like cookies, milk, reindeer poop, pies, fudge, advent calendars, indoor trees, meticulously planned and thought out gifts and glitter-riddled Rudolf food isn’t enough?”
But they begged, so a couple years ago, I gave in and bought the $30 elf that looked like it escaped from the seventies wearing dime-store flannel jammies. I half-heartedly placed Snowflake Bells Carly Marmalade (named by the children themselves, of course) into vaguely naughty and precarious situations to the delight of my children.
The next year, I hoped they’d forget but alas, she was apparently the Christmas tradition that completed their childhood experience. I began to casually “forget” to make her to do all the weird Pinterest-y things, so they, being the industrious humans they are, started hiding her for each other, all the while perpetuating the lie that the little nimph was doing these things herself and reporting back to the North Pole. The elaborate ruse was thrilling to them.
One morning, I found Snowflake Bells Carly Marmalade grinning diabolically next to the knife block with a 4 inch paring knife clutched in her tiny, fluffy mitts.
Then we moved because our children started arriving in litters and we needed a bigger place to store them all. The elf was suspiciously missing mid-move, presumably bound and gagged in a holiday storage tub somewhere. I searched high and low for the little turd. In the attic. In the tropical heat of December in Texas. For hours. On multiple days.
The kids wailed and gnashed their teeth. The five year old questioned me with a relentless loop of, “Did you find the elf today? Where’s the elf? How does she know? Where does she come from? When will she be here? Is she Santa’s wife? Does he miss her? Does she wear underwear?”
So, I consulted my assistant, Amazon
Prime and asked her to please send another elf quickly because I can’t take the questioning and crying any longer. Lo and behold, a BOY elf in a tuxedo showed up 10 minutes later via drone and his name is Scut Farkus.
Anyone who knows our family knows we’re fanatical about Christmas movies and ‘A Christmas Story’ is our favorite. Even the twins cry out for “Ralphie” daily. So, Scut Farkus it was.
Well, dear little Scut found his way into many interesting situations this year. Almost all required mini marshmallows for some maniacal reason and once, there an incident involving a knitting needle. (and marshmallows, of course)
Yesterday morning, I found Mr. Farkus in a fairly impressive scene, zip-lining his way to H-E-double hockey sticks…I mean the Christmas tree. I literally, legit almost started boo-hooing. (and yes, those are mini marshmallows attached to the end of his zip-lining apparatus)
It’s not about the dumb elf. It’s not about him watching us all in our underwear or doing ridiculous things with weird household items in his shiny, miniature tuxedo.
It’s about the memories.
That’s what they take with them when they leave, ya’ll. The memories of Snowflake Bells Carly Marmalade and Scut Farkus and all his nonsense.
It’s the traditions, the stories, the songs, the food and the family. Make those memories, folks. Make them good. Try to feel the magic and see the joy in the little faces when Scut Farkus roasts mini marshmallows over a Yankee candle with a knitting needle.
