Another holiday tokens are Santa’s and Granpa Frost’s little helpers – elves. They come in many forms and there are several traditions involving these sweet loving creatures.
Perhaps the most known tradition in the USA is elf on the shelf – the elf-doll itself can be kinda creepy (at least to a European) but the idea is fun so we adapted it with our little elves:).
They are made of wood and yarn and they come alive at night in December and hide and do stuff. But they also fill our advent calendar truck.
Kindness elves are another version of “elf on the shelf” – when I saw them on some mommy blog, I was surprised that they are actually pretty much the same as our elves (that we’ve had for years) – another proof that good ideas come about at the same time in different parts of the world. The idea is that elves give kids fun tasks to do for others (like bake cookies etc…) I never considered “baking cookies” to be a kind act – for us it was always fun but you can look at it that way.
In Scandinavia (especially in Sweden and Norway) they have a couple of different breeds of gnomes and elves: Jultomten /Julenisse (Christmas edition or the Santa himself) and Gardstomtar / Hagenisse (garden gnomes), Husnisse (house elf), Fjøsnisse (barn gnomes) and Nissar in general (small gnome-like helpers). There are many traditions involving feeding the elves (i.e. man puts a plate of porridge with a big blob of butter for the barn elves) and them bringing luck or presents.
Tomtar (that is plural of Tomten or Tomte) is a Swedish variation that is active all year round but has a special meaning during Christmas time /solstice. In Finnish, it is called Tonttu and in Norway Nisse. They are solitary, mischievous domestic spirits and bring gifts on Christmas eve (and they look pretty much like the one in my bullet journal above).
And in our family? We have a LOT of elves, all kinds of elves because my middle child loooooves elves! All kinds of elves, gnomes and alike! She likes anything that has elves or gnomes on it, she likes clothes that look like an elf would want to wear them, she likes red and she likes toadstools and woods. It is very easy to please her:).
So I made her a hat from wool felt, heart-shaped hand warmers and faux fur leg warmers (patterns from an old Ottobre magazine) and a coat that is made from cooked wool and fleece, decorated with toadstools. She wore it literally every day! Who says elves don’t exist? Look closer!
Very Arty Fairy 