Unless I had a partner with strong feelings about it, I don't think I'd do the Santa thing with a child. For one thing, I don't really know how, and for another I don't really feel like I suffered from the lack.
This. My parents were shocked to find out a few years ago that none of us kids were planning on elaborately doing Santa with our kids (I'll probably go get pictures at the mall. That was as "Santa" as any of us planned to get). Apparently they had much guilt that they didn’t give us that magical part of Christmas and were certain we’d give the true magic of Christmas to our kids. Cracked me up.
As a side note, as a Christian, it's important to me that Ellie understand that in our family, the story of Jesus' birth is not a fairy tale. How does she differentiate between a fun story her parents tell her for the magic of it and a religious tradition that we believe is grounded in truth?
Yeah, this is a tough one. One tradition that my immediate family didn’t do, but my aunt and uncle did with their kids (and we spent many Christmases with them) was “Jesus Birthday Cake.” Breakfast on Christmas morning was always some sort of sweet breakfast food. We’d sing Happy Birthday to Jesus and talk about the importance of the day.
Then we’d go open the stockings that Santa brought.
Damn. I can see the problem with this. She might not get it this year or next, but I bet after that she would.
Happy Birthday Emeline. I miss you something fierce.
My parents always made a thing of Christmas and I never felt betrayed or fooled when I found out Santa was real. I think I gradually figured it out and then tried to delay it so I could keep believeing in Santa.
I was raised Christian and I don't think there was ever a time that I thought because Santa (and the Easter Bunny, and the Tooth Fairy) weren't real that Jesus wasn't real either.
Santa was cool, but a once a year thing in our lives, but Jesus is every day.
vw-- My extended family did the Jesus Birthday Cake! I don't think we actually sang happy birthday but we had a Jesus Birthday Cake.
Thanks for the ~ma, guys. I'm pretty depressed about this. When he first went into the hospital, the doctors were all "Oh, gall bladders are routine! He'll be playing tennis tomorrow!" And then he didn't get scheduled for surgery for another 3 days due to a totally inexcusable series of fuckups, and then when he was out of surgery he wasn't able to be extubated for another 2 days but the nurses were all saying "Oh, this is totally normal for a man his age, he'll be fine" and now he has pneumonia and we've had to start talking about DNR plans. Happy fucking Thanksgiving.
On a lighter topic, we always had gifts from Santa at my (Catholic) grandmother's house, but were never encouraged to "believe" in him as such because, well, Jewish. The gifts from Golo (the giant who lives in Granddaddy's head - different grandfather from the one above) were always much more special, because Golo is real. Golo's Norweigen rat friends Sven and Olaf are also real, but we never got presents from them because they are cheap bastards.
And Tep, good luck with the move! So exciting!
{{Jessica}} and much health~ma to your grandfather.
Universe, you are once again on notice.
Jessica, so sorry to hear that things are not going smoothly at the hospital, so more ~ma.
Ooof, the Santa thing. I remember feeling humiliated when I found out--like I was the butt of an elaborate joke played at my expense, the lone dupe, and God, how dumb was I to fall for it? (Why, no, I don't have a persecution complex, why do you ask?)
This was me, I think helped along by the fact I believed for longer than most of my classmates--I was in 4th or 5th grade, and I think most of the others figured it out by 2nd or 3rd. I remember feeling like the most stupid, uncool, and left-out kid ever when I found out, because in the weeks before I'd argued in favor of Santa when classmates discussed whether or not he was real.
As a parent, I'm torn. I don't want to be a curmudgeon denying my child the Magic of Christmas, but OTOH I don't want her remembering her discovery of the truth as painful and embarrassing almost 20 years after the fact! We haven't talked up Santa much, but Annabel has picked up the belief from the kids at daycare and from her grandmothers talking him up. So I'm sort of planning to have some of our gifts be Santa gifts waiting under the tree Christmas morning...but I don't want to work as hard at maintaining the illusion as my parents did. I'd rather leave a lot of clues so she'll figure it out herself in a few years.
On the Santa debate ... pending actual discussion with the father of any future children... I think I'll tell the kid(s) that it is a fun legend, but not actively foster a real belief in Santa beyond a few anonymous prezzies mysteriously showing up.
