Top 10 ‘Elf on the Shelf’ excuses

    By now, you’ve probably realized that you too have a defective elf. It’s only Dec. 10, and your elf has failed at least once to fly back to the North Pole in order to make a report to Santa while your children are nestled all snug in their beds.

    So, when your little ones rush downstairs to excitedly discover the new spot their beloved elf is in, you have exactly three seconds to make an excuse as to why he/she hasn’t moved an inch from the day before.

    Here are 10 choices you can pull out of your Santa hat:

    1. Fozzie the elf must’ve liked the spot he was in.

    • WHYY thanks our sponsors — become a WHYY sponsor

    2. Ringo was too tired to fly because he didn’t get a good sleep the night before.

    3. The weather wasn’t good enough for Satchamo to fly to the North Pole.

    4. Ethundal had a heavy dinner.

    5. Santa already heard how good you’ve been.

    6. Santa stopped by himself for the report last night.

    7. Amy’s GPS wasn’t working, but now it’s fixed.

    8. Blitzkreig is taking a vacation day.

    9. Red’s taking a sick day.

    10. Jingle is running late because her other meeting ran over.

    Sadly, thinking on my feet led me to use excuse #10 this morning. But in my defense, our elf had been huddled up in the dollhouse convening with Rescue Heroes, so it was the first thing that came to mind. I’m hoping the list above offers you some more kid-friendly excuses while we all await the hearing for our defective elf class action lawsuit.

    And for those nights when you actually remember to move said elf … here’s a link to our top ten QUICK and EASY ideas in case your elf is as lacking in the creativity department as ours.  

    Do you do Elf on a Shelf?  Share your tales of woe here.

    WHYY is your source for fact-based, in-depth journalism and information. As a nonprofit organization, we rely on financial support from readers like you. Please give today.

    Want a digest of WHYY’s programs, events & stories? Sign up for our weekly newsletter.

    Together we can reach 100% of WHYY’s fiscal year goal