Being one of Santa’s elves is a year-round job. The elves at Give A Little Christmas know this firsthand. The Middle Tennessee area has tens of thousands of families who need a little extra Santa magic. Since 2012, GAL has been taking care of a small percentage (anywhere from 350 to 700 kids) of those families every Christmas.

How do they raise money and collect enough toys to help that many kids? Elves have to come up with new and creative ideas to involve the community.

This year, they are working on a Christmas album as one of the ways to raise money for the charity and also help the underpaid music community by giving them a paid project to work on.

Jingles aka Olivia West will be recording original songs. They are planning to have it available in time for Christmas but will start pre-orders in July.

Also, this year, Bubbles The Elf had a chat with the Mt Juliet Community Center and is taking over the MJ Craft & Vendor Fair. This will raise money and collect toys at three separate events.

A portion of all the booth fees for vendors will automatically go to GAL. They will also be collecting toys at the door. A few of the booths will be giving a donation from their sales to them and a booth will be there selling ‘mystery’ gifts where you could get gift cards and other cool items.

For the first event, Santa chatted with the Easter Bunny to team up. It is called March Into Easter and the Easter Bunny will be there for photos and kids’ activities. It is a craft fair, so there will be more than 70 craft booths and vendors, plus food trucks. The other two events, Christmas In July (laua theme) and Fall Into Christmas (Nightmare Before Christmas theme) will have photos with Santa and any other fun ideas that they come up with before the event.

March Into Easter is being held on March 26th from 10 until 4 at the Mt Juliet Community Center on Charlie Daniels Pkwy. There is no cost to attend, but you’ll want to purchase some of the unique handmade crafts. We will hide eggs throughout the booths and each egg will have a door prize. This part is for the adults who are walking around and shopping. The event is not an Easter Egg hunt for the kids but they will have Photos with the Easter Bunny for no charge, plus free activities such as coloring and painting.

The first 100 guests will receive a bag with lots of cool items in it, including coupons to use at the event.

For more information, visit their Facebook page MJ Craft & Vendor Fair or email mjcraftfair@gmail.com.

For more information on Give A Little Christmas or if you’d like to become an elf, email givealittlechristmas@gmail.com or visit www.givealittlenashville.com.