It's Beginning To Look a Lot Like Christmas...

Heyo!  I don't know about the rest of you, but when I came back from Thanksgiving break, Christmas was in full swing! We had off school this past Monday for the first day of hunting season, which is AWESOME for people like me who've never shot a gun and would pass out if they had to gut a deer. I took the opportunity to decorate my room so it was all ready to rock and roll when the kids came back on Tuesday. I also spent some time making a set of Christmas themed math and literacy centers, which are now available on my TpT site!

Click to check it out in my TpT store

I was also SUPER excited to get started with my elf on the shelf. Last year, my students decided to name him Mistletoe, which I love love love. On Tuesday, I mentioned to my kiddos that I had an elf visit our room last year, but I was worried that he might not find my room, since I switched schools. I told them that he showed up right after Thanksgiving last year, so we should be on the lookout for him. Totally took the opportunity to talk about things that Mistletoe would be happy to see if he were watching... My favorite response: "We shouldn't pick our noses while he's here." Priceless. (I wrote don't be yucky).

He showed up in our room Wednesday morning, hiding in one of the cups on my amazing word wall. The kids were VERY excited to see him, and some of them even said they saw him blink or turn his head... I love how much they believe! I caught one of my students whispering to him at the end of the day once everyone else had left... Made my heart smile!

The MOST exciting part of the day was when we came back from lunch. They started saying that they saw him move. I, being the slightly overly dramatic person that I am, played along. I was COMPLETELY dumbfounded when I went into the room and saw that he really had moved. One of the teachers in my building, and I'm STILL not sure who, snuck in and moved him while we were at lunch. So here's little old me, JUST as excited as my first graders. He really is magical!  Today I decided to have him start a little mischief. He destroyed our calendar, and the kids thought it was the funniest thing.

If you use an elf in your classroom, what are some fun places that you hide it? I'm ALWAYS looking for silly things for Mistletoe to do!