Kate woke with a start. Looking over at the clock she could see it was quarter to 6. sighing softly, she rolled over resting her head against mikes shoulder. The weather had finally cooled down a bit making sleeping a bit more bearable.

"morning" Mike whispered kissing the top of her head

"morning" she whispered pushing herself up on to her pillow. It was the blissful peace before the morning madness before the school run which usually was a rush of trying to find shoes, cardigans and other bits of uniform that had been thrown here there and everywhere and normally Grace was the main culprit and it was usually because she was not looking properly.

"what was that?" Kate sat bolt upright hearing a sound from downstairs

"probably that bloody kitten practicing her gymnastics along the shelf again"

"no Midnight is here" Kate said as the black kitten jumped up on to the bed.

Scratching behind the kitten's ears Kate sighed sliding from the covers she grabbed her robe from the bottom of the bed.

"where you going?" mike asked

"to see what that noise was since my knight in shining armour won't go down" she grinned

Sighing himself Mike through back the covers Mike slid from the bed also grabbing his robe. Heading down the stairs in front of Kate he walked through in to the living room to see Grace sat on the floor with all the advent calendars around her.

"what the hell?" Mike called

"Grace?" Kate said stepping in to the room "what are you doing down here at this time"

"i heard a noise and I came down and Bob was eating all the chocolates from the advent calendars so I stopped him" she said sweetly looking up

Noticing the chocolate smear around Graces mouth and the smudge on the front of her pyjamas. Folding her arms Kate sighed "oh really and who's chocolates did he eat."

"well, he was just about to open mine and I stopped him. Oh, and he left dads because he had a cherry ripe in his. I am going to get ready for school" she said skipping towards the stairs

"just a moment Grace" Kate turned. "and where is Bob now?" she asked knowing full well both elves were in the big bathroom 'having filled the bath with hot chocolate and marshmallows' and were on little swimming floats floating in their homemade swimming pool

"he just disappeared as soon as I hit him away from my chocolate" she said heading for the stairs

"that kid is way too smart for her own good" Kate sighed trying not to laugh as she picked up the advent calendars. Thankfully she had only eaten the one day from each and not all the chocolates so she could easily replace the missing days in Chris and Nicoles with some chocolate she had in the cupboard.

Mike smiled pulling out his cherry ripe chocolate "well at least I have mine" he smiled unwrapping it "want to go splitzies" he said biting half off holding out the other half.

"you know I can't stand them and didn't you have a cherry ripe yesterday and the day before?" she asked "i thought it was a favourite one not the cherry ripe one" she grinned

"it is a favourite one I had a caramel chocolate on Wednesday" he grinned

"well, I know I would be complaining if I had that many cherry ripe bars 3 out of 5 days let's hope the rest of advent is better" she said flopping down on to the sofa waiting for the shrieks up in the bathroom when the kids realised what the elves had been up to. Although she was dreading cleaning the bath up later.

Hearing the squeals of delight from upstairs Kate walked up the stairs and in to the bathroom just in time to stop Chris from climbing in and joining the elves in their chocolaty bath.

"hey Mr what have those pesky elves done to my bathroom" she grinned

"chocolate bath" he pointed laughing

Lifting the elves off their sun loungers floating on the middle Kate smiled "naughty elves" she said reaching in pulling the plug out allowing the brown sludgy water to go down the drain. Shall we go and get you ready for pre-school" she smiled lifting Chris up.

Later Kate was regretting the choice of actually making a chocolate swimming pool as it was taking a age to come clean from around the bath, a heavy line of chocolate powder around the rim where the water line was. Making a mental note for all future elf on the shelf anticks to be cleaner or easier to clean up. After all she only had 20 days to go.

Picking up the kids later she was glad that Nicole seemed to be in a better mood and that her rehearsals had gone better than the previous days. Her confidence seemed to be much better. Grace on the other hand was now back in the mood as she realised the star didn't have as much stage time as Mary or the angels and was back to spouting how unfair it was that she wasn't in the main role of the play. She also handed Kate a letter from her teacher.

Reading it she was surprised that it said reminder for costumes that grace would need dark trousers and a dark top as well as gold or silver tinsel and her PE shoes. And she would need it by tomorrow for the dress rehearsal

"Gracie what is this?" Kate sighed

"oh yeah I need my costume for tomorrow it's the dress rehearsal"

"yes I can see that. Why didn't you give me the letter sooner? How do you think I am going to be able to get all of this by tomorrow?" Kate sighed

"Target is open till 10" Grace smiled

Sighing Kate pulled off the carpark. Target was not high on her list of things to do after school in December when the shops were already full of bonkerdom of people in a rush to get Christmas gifts. And now she was going to have to search for black leggings and a black t-shirt for grace by tomorrow as well as trying to find some gold tinsel. Thankfully the main bulk of the costume was being provided by school.

Pulling in to the carpark of Target Kate sighed she knew Grace would more than likely run off and try and add things they didn't need. If she could just take a basket in then she would but she knew a trolley would be better to contain Chris and stop him playing hide and seek in the lingerie section.

Heading straight to the kids clothing Kate sighed looking through the leggings just hoping they had a pair in Graces size. Thankfully they had a 6-7 in a charcoal grey dropping those in to the trolly Kate moved on to the t-shirts

"mummy why have you got grey, Mr snape said it had to be black" she said

"well, if you had given me the first letter then I may have been able to get black as you didn't grey will have to do."

"But mummy" Grace said

shooting Grace, a look back "Grace! They only have grey in your size so that will have to do and if Mr Snape says anything you can tell him the reason why" she said pulling off a slightly lighter grey t-shirt from the shelf. it didn't match but once again it was the best she could do.

Heading to the Christmas decorations she was glad there was at least some silver tinsel left on the shelf pulling it off it wasn't entirely silver as there were some black flecks woven in.

"mummy I want gold. It says I need gold!"

"Grace they only have silver and it is almost 5 o'clock. I am not trapesing all over the city to find gold tinsel. Silver will have to do. Stars are silver anyway."

"but I am a gold star!"

"Gracie" Kate turned "if you don't stop then I shall tell Mr Snape not to let you be in the play and tell Trixi to go back to Farther Christmas and tell him not to stop at our house" Kate hissed taking grace by the arm leading her towards the check out

Later that evening Kate had made sure she had placed the advent calendars up high in case Grace decided to pull another stunt like she did that morning. Putting all of Graces things in to a carrier bag with her name and class name on she put it in her school bag. Opening it she found several letters about the coming weeks including one asking for a donation for the class party. Grace had nominated Kate to make fairy bread. Sighing at least she had the weekend to get the stuff to make it and it was something that needed to go in on the morning of the party

Pulling up Chris's bag she opened it checking to see what was needed for the following day. He already had several Christmas cards from the other children in his pre-school class. And a invitation to the Christmas song recital that was happening on Friday. Which also happened to be his last day before Christmas. 3 Christmas performances all next week. The last week of term was always fun especially watching the plays as they always had something go wrong.

enjoy and sorry its been a while