Can you even remember what the holiday season was like before the Elf On The Shelf poked his pointy little red hat into your household’s “days until Christmas” countdown? That little red dude is everywhere following Thanksgiving, and let’s not even get started on the countless Pinterest pages devoted to staging his creative antics.
Whether you love him or hate him, it seems like the elf is here to stay. But the elf now has competition in terms of daily holiday “fun” (well, fun for the parents in this case- not so much the kids).
With Halloween on the horizon, inspire some terrifying hijinks with… The Doll in the Hall.
The Doll in the Hall is the genius brainchild of mom Natasha Hudarovich, who posted her novel idea on her Facebook page. She details the doll’s purpose with the picture; the concept is so simple, yet so sinister:
Basically you take a creepy Annabel porcelain doll that your kids already believe is haunted and keep secretly moving it around the house.
Let’s just put it out there immediately that if you already OWN one of these type of dolls, you probably have a taste for creepy things already, so scaring your own kids with it would be a no-brainer. Have you ever seen one of these dolls in a movie where it wasn’t either killing or terrifying someone?
And how about when their blinky eyes start blinking at you for no apparent reason? I’ve seen the movie Annabelle; I know where this is going.
Since the vast majority of kids would be uneasy around a doll like this to begin with, convincing them that the doll is haunted should be an easy feat.
Just like our spunky little Christmas elf, the doll’s nocturnal activities culminates in it’s relocation to somewhere else by morning. And although I’m sure one could get really creative with the doll’s activities (generating tons of Pinterest-worthy ideas), the mere movement of the doll should suffice since kids are likely not going to want to find the doll EVER.
In case that presence of the doll in the house isn’t terrifying enough for your kids, Hudarovich suggests going the extra mile for some Halloween “cheer”:
For an extra festive touch I put the doll right in bed with one of the kids whenever they throw it in the trash.
Because they will try to throw it out. Oh, they will.
But they’ll likely only try that once, after waking up to THIS the following morning:
The testing of the Doll in the Hall in her own home has been extremely successful, if by “successful” we mean “the kids will never sleep alone in their beds ever again”.
According to her post, the latest status of the doll’
it’s Day 3 and they want to move.
If you’re thinking that no parent would dare to perpetrate such a ghastly Halloween tradition on their sweet, innocent babies, well, you’re wrong. Natasha’s post has already gone viral, earning over 170K likes and 200K shares in merely six days.
The Doll in the Hall’s smashing success has even led to it’s very own Facebook page, which includes updates on the doll’s most recent location, as well as video reactions of Hudarovich’s kids to finding it each morning. Here’s an example of the doll’s creepy appearances:
Now granted, I’m a 43 year old woman, but I’m also a 43 year old woman who still sprints up the dark basement stairs because ghosts. So if I saw this doll hovering outside my door, I’d DIE.
But as a parent, seeing this doll hovering outside the door for her kids to find makes me die LAUGHING (her kids, not mine. Much funnier when I’m not dealing with the trauma…).
And while many parents may object to potentially scarring their kids for life, the Elf on the Shelf has already done a decent job of that in many households. He may be tinier & cuter than the Doll in the Hall, but is his creeping around at night really any better?
I once posed our elf popping out of a box of frozen waffles, thinking my kids would enjoy the breakfast surprise. It’s been almost a year and half since then and they still won’t eat waffles, so any nightly visitor can scar a kid for life, apparently. While I personally wouldn’t do this to my kids, the thought of it definitely made me laugh!
So parents, if your kids are mouthing off, or not putting away their toys like kids do, maybe the doll in the hall is the perfect revenge…I mean answer for fixing their behavior.
Instead of an Elf on the Shelf in December, I’m doing a Doll in the Hall in October. Basically you take a creepy Annabel…
Posted by Natasha Hudarovich on Tuesday, October 2, 2018