Today is our final day off here at the North Pole before Christmas arrives. The day started off with Santa presiding over the Christmas Devotional at church this morning. It has become a tradition to have it on the last Sunday before Christmas every year.

After the devotional was over we all moved to the cafeteria for a giant pitch in and gift exchange. The pitch in lunch was great. There were a total of 374 dishes to choose from. Elf Janene’s coleslaw was a big hit followed by Elf Billy’s loaded mashed potatoes. Of course Mrs. Claus’s sugar cookies were the biggest hit for dessert.

After lunch all it was time for the gift exchange. All of the gifts had to be gender neutral. We also decided to stick with Santa’s call for a homemade Christmas this year and have all gifts be homemade.

The gifts were all placed under a giant Christmas tree and one by one we all went up and picked a gift out. I picked a beautiful homemade angel ornament. Some of the other gifts included homemade soup and cake mixes. There were also a lot of homemade soaps and candles. The most popular gift picked was a hand carved statue of Santa.

It was about 2pm when the gift exchange ended and all of the elves returned home to get some rest knowing that it is going to be one crazy week leading up to Christmas next weekend.

— Elf Ernest