One day at the North Pole, Arthur and Steve were both busy with the daily duties of keeping things under control, leaving Maggie and Jake with each other in the latter's room
They were bored out of their minds as 11-year-old Jake was reading a comic book while 7-year-old Maggie was quietly playing with her teddy bear
"What do you want to do Maggie?" Jake asked.
"I don't know," Maggie replied. "It's too boring…and I wanna play in the snow…"
"Dad won't let us out without anyone supervising us…"
"But Peter went with us that one time…"
"Yeah, but that was the last time Peter took us out…"
"What about Grandmother and Grandfather-"
"They're in Greenland for going over a treaty and Great-Grandsanta is too old to play with us…"
"Why do they even have a treaty in the first place?" Maggie asked.
"I don't know, can I read my comic book in peace…" Jake's harshness took Maggie aback and luckily he saw that
"I'm sorry Mags, I didn't mean to get harsh…" Then after some thinking, Maggie lit up with a smile.
"Do you remember that green screen that Dad got us for Christmas…"
"Yeah?"
"I was thinking maybe we could have a bit of a photoshoot…"
"Maggie that's ridiculous…"
"Stay with me…We can send Grandmother and Grandfather postcards with our pictures…" Jake thought about it for a little bit and smiled, agreeing with the idea, but another thought came to mind.
"And where would we find a camera…"
"The Hoho has a camera feature in it…We can take pictures and I can edit them…"
"When did you learn how to edit pictures…"
"There was an editing and Photoshop course that I took on the internet. It was a lot of fun…"
Jake tilted his head. "Well Okay…the next big question is where we're gonna take pictures…" then Maggie got up to leave. "Maggie wait up…"
Maggie led Jake to an empty storage room that had not been used and decided that that would be the place to set up shop.
"Okay…Now all we need are supplies…"
"If We're doing a beach theme then good luck trying to find sand…"
"Just leave it to me…" Maggie waved her hand with snow coming out of it.
For the next few minutes, they decided to test the green screen with Arthur's computer, with the two of them being amazed at what backgrounds they could blend into and they both agreed to avoid wearing any green for the photoshoot. Then when Jake placed a photo background onto Paris, Maggie stopped him
"That's the one I want to do first…"
"Do you even have a be-" Then Maggie ran into the room with French attire and a beret on her white hair before her cousin could finish his sentence.
"Okay…I want to do some of these too…so don't be a camera hog…"
"I won't…"
A couple of hours later, Maggie and Jake took pictures of themselves with the green screen background with Maggie posing with the Eiffel Tower and Maggie decided to teach Jake how to edit and photoshop the photos.
"Wow…These look amazing Mags…"
"Thank you…"
By the time dinner rolled around, there was spaghetti and meatballs which gave Jake an idea of where to take their pictures next. When the kids wolfed down their dinner and took their seconds to the storage room and turned their location to Italy. This was where Jake had his chance to shine in the photos, especially with tonight's dinner
Then they printed their pictures from that day and decided to keep going the next day and made a different theme...A beach theme.
"Okay how are we gonna blow this pool up…" Maggie asked.
"Simple Mags, we just blow into the pool thing…" Then Maggie and Jake took about 20 minutes blowing into the pool, another 15 trying to find water to fill up the pool, and the next five minutes to set up their little props for the photo
Maggie used her powers to make snow in the room and Jake used orange and yellow food coloring to make the snow a sandy color and placed the pool on top of the snow.
Jake, dressed in his Christmas camo swim shorts, got the Hoho set up to take a picture of him in the pool with a drink in his hand and sunglasses on. He didn't know that Maggie, dressed in a red and white striped one-piece swimsuit sneaked from the entrance of the room and did a cannonball into the pool just as the camera went off
"Maggie…" Jake whined as the young girl giggled at him.
"Gotcha…" Maggie laughed.
"And what are you two up to…" a voice scared them both and they turned to see Peter and 3 other elves with him.
"Hi Peter…" both children greeted him
"Up to your shenanigans again…"
"Uh…"
"Fancy I would tell both of your fathers about this…"
"Wait, we're making a surprise for Grandma and Grandpa…" Maggie protested.
"What kind of surprise…" One of the elves asked. Then the young ice girl got out of the pool and whispered to the elves and the trio behind Peter smiled
"That's adorable…we would love to help you guys…"
"Really…" both kids said smiling
"Now hold on…" Peter was about to object.
"We don't see the harm in helping the kids out…It's only one time…How bad can this get…" Then Maggie and Jake smiled at each other, continuing their little beach photoshoot.
Things did get a little suspicious on Arthur and Steve's end when they saw the kids packing a bit of supplies and props into the storage room and rushing out. Judy was also caught on the suspicion.
"Judy…Can you go check on the kids…" Steve asked his wife.
"Will do hun…" Then Judy left to check on the kids. When she arrived at the storage room, she was surprised to see that 3 of the elves were somewhat in on what they were doing and one photo that they were trying to take with the kids is Maggie burying Jake in a snow/sand pile in the beachy setting.
Judy smiled and quietly chuckled to herself. It was adorable for her to see the two young kids bonding and having fun with each other. It was hard to believe that they were cousins when they had a brother-and-sister chemistry that would be unbreakable. Then She decided to leave them be for the moment.
After a few more hours, the kids started to get tired.
"I'm getting drowsy…" Maggie yawned.
"Me too…"
"Well it's a good thing most of the photos are done and printed out…"
"Yeah, Grandma and Grandpa are gonna love it…" then Maggie proceeded to lean on Jake as the two were starting to fall asleep
"W-wait…We have to clean this up…" Jake reminded Maggie drowsily.
"You guys can just leave it to us…"
"Thanks guys…We owe you one…" then the Claus grandchildren proceeded to leave the room with the elves easily cleaning up the mess.
Then Steve decided to investigate and went to the storage room where the elves had just finished cleaning the mess. The trio immediately straightened up as soon as they saw him
"What were the kids doing here…" He interrogated the elves
"The kids were doing a photo shoot sir…for Mr. and Mrs. Claus…" one elf answered
"They said that they wanted it to be a surprise for them…"
"Where are the photos…" the elves pointed at a brown folder and looked through it. Over time, Steve began to chuckle at the photos that the kids took. Then Judy and Arthur came in as Steve was looking through the pictures and they too awed at the photos
"Aren't those adorable…" Judy started.
"They are cute…We won't speak a word of this…" Steve winked at his wife and brother.
The next day, Maggie and Jake woke up and rushed to the storage room to finish their little project, only to find a camera already there, a cornflower blue screen, and a couple of stools waiting for them.
"Huh?" the two children tilted their heads, only to hear someone clearing their throat, making them freeze and turn slowly to see Steve there.
"We can expla-" the two started until Steve placed a hand to stop them
"No need to…We thought you guys couldn't do this little project alone…" then Judy and Arthur came to his side along with seven elves. Jake and Maggie smiled and glanced at each other
"You ready Maggie…"
"Let's do this…"
The entire day, The adults helped the children take photos, including a family portrait. Steve noted that the last time that they had a family photo was when Maggie was two years old and Jake was six.
After everyone was done, Maggie and Jake decided to have a snowball fight with the elves, and Judy snuck a few photos of the laughing children, playing in the snow
"I'm gonna get you…" Maggie giggled trying to throw a snowball at Jake
"Not if I get you first…" Jake replied, throwing more snowballs.
After a day of fun, Steve and Arthur carried their respective sleeping children to bed and once Steve reached Jake's room, Arthur had the idea to allow Maggie to spend the night in Jake's room, which Steve was hesitant about
"Arthur, She's too old to sleep with Jakob…She should sleep in her own room…"
"I don't want her to be lonely…This was also Judy's idea for another picture…"
After Steve begrudgingly agreed, Arthur gently placed Maggie right next to Jake. He placed her teddy bear next to her, which the girl subconsciously grabbed before Steve tucked the two snuggling children into bed before Judy quickly snuck into the room and took a picture of the two, being careful not to wake them up with the flash going off.
"That settles that…" Judy gently whispered. Then She led her husband and brother-in-law out of the room to allow the children to sleep.
Malcolm and Margaret arrived back home at around 7:30 am from their trip to Greenland and decided to check on the grandchildren, hearing from Steve that they'd been having a lot of fun.
The two elder Claus peeked in Jakob's room, seeing the two children sleeping together. Then Malcolm spotted a folder with a note on the top with the words saying
DEAR GRANDMA AND GRANDPA, WE MADE A SURPRISE FOR YOU…WE HOPE YOU LIKE IT, Love Maggie and Jakob
The couple glanced at each other and began to open the folder. They had warm smiles on their faces looking at each picture that they took and they began to take the pictures and left for their own room, leaving the children sleeping peacefully
After Malcolm found a few wooden frames, Margaret took a few of the photos that they liked and placed them on the wall. One picture was of Maggie, dressed in a red beret, a white Peter Pan collared dress with pink hearts on it, posing with the Eiffel Tower and had the postcard font BONJOUR FROM PARIS FRANCE. Another picture was of Jake, holding a bowl of spaghetti and leaning with the Tower of Pisa and another postcard font SALUTI DALL' ITALIA
The next picture, which got a few laughs from the couple is the picture of Jake in the pool while Maggie was jumping in midway before splashing everywhere in a beach-like setting.
Finally, the last photo that was placed next to the portrait of their two young sons was a picture of Jake, piggybacking Maggie as she was hugging her cousin, smiling at the camera.
"These two must've had a splendid time on their vacation…" Malcolm commented happily.
"I'm so proud of these two little darlings…Growing up so fast before my own eyes…" Margaret sighed, almost shedding a tear, and gently wiping her eye. Then Malcolm held her hand.
"My Margaret…"
Then the two admired all of the photos before returning to bed themselves. They were looking forward to the kids telling them about their vacation.