Getting kids excited for a Santa delivery is easy- they’ve been taught from a young age what a great experience it is and all their friends are talking about it. I was a bit worried about getting kids excited for a Geilf the Elf delivery. Chances are, most of their friends had never heard of Geilf the Elf, and if they’ve never experienced an elf delivery it’s hard to know what to expect.
As it turns out, if a kid has a chance at a second Christmas delivery they’ll pretty much get excited at anything! (And who could blame them!?). Here are some of the things we did to get the kids ready for Geilf the Elf. I’ve included links in case you’d like to try the ideas out with your own family.
1) News Release The first day my sister’s kids found out about Geilf, they were driving home and saw a bunch of I Support Geilf the Elf signs in the yards of their neighborhood. (if you don’t know any other people wanting a Geilf delivery, you could always ask some friends to hang a sign in their window- I’ve found people are generally pretty excited to help out this time of year! You can download a free printable sign here) My sister pointed them out and then, as soon as they got home they did a search to see what the signs were all about. They read this news release together and the kids instantly got excited about supporting Geilf the Elf.
2) Signs and Shirts The kids found out about Geilf just after Thanksgiving. Because Geilf the Elf delivers to a smaller number of households than Santa (he tries to concentrate on the family members who couldn’t be together on Christmas) we knew it would be important to make sure and support his cause and to be considered for one of his deliveries. To do so, we printed up a bunch of I Support Geilf the Elf signs and put them in windows where Geilf would be sure to see them. We also printed up some tshirts from Zazzle.com (after Thanksgiving they do a daily deal and one day all their shirts were 50% with free shipping! Definitely worth watching for!) that the kids loved wearing throughout December.
3) Night Before Prep On the night of our Geilf delivery, we wanted to be extra sure Geilf knew where we were. We hung a sign in every window. Since we stayed by a lighthouse, we put up a huge sign in its light to be sure Geilf could see it during the night. Check out the awesome, enormous banner my niece made! We were seriously having fun with this idea!
4) Traditions The kids had already celebrated a great Christmas with their dad. Because it was in a different home than they were used to it also included different traditions than they were used to, which was perfect. They had a wonderful Christmas and we still got to pull out our traditions without the kids rolling their eyes and saying- we just did that at Dad’s house! Even though Geilf came for his delivery on the 28th, we still pulled out the nativity puppets that my sisters has the kids use every year on Christmas Eve. We each opened a present that evening. We did all the things they were used to doing on the 24th. It had the same magic it has every other year- the date really didn’t matter! In the end we had a magical Christmas feeling in the home and the kids were super excited to see what Geilf and his elves brought the next morning.